What's in that freight car?

[Ed Kapuscinski]

The BLMA beer car and Maule threads got me thinking... I wish there was a directory of freight car types and what they haul or are used for.

I mean, sometimes it's obvious (like the 33k LPG tank cars), but in others, it's not (for example, Conrail X58 boxcars).

Obviously, some cars hauled all sorts of stuff (like those X58 cars), but having a source for this type of info would be amazing when trying to properly select rolling stock for a layout, or trying to find industries for the cars you've collected.

What do you guys think about something like this? What are the things you'd want in it?

My thoughts:
Records should include the spotting time of a car, including the date, what was in it at the time, where it was coming from, where it was going to.
Populating it might be tough, especially without inside knowledge, but if it caught on and was able to be contributed to wiki-style, it might eventually be useful.

What do you guys think?

[C855B]

Gosh... most of our answers should already be in the ORER. A surprising number of cars are in specified service pools.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Interesting. That's a good point!

[Kisatchie]

Hmm... all my reefers
haul bananas...

[Philip H]

Gosh... most of our answers should already be in the ORER. A surprising number of cars are in specified service pools.

Quite true - though ORER's are not exactly common commodities . . . .

[Rich_S]

Ed, Kalmbach produces a book for the transision era, which might be of limited help?

https://kalmbachhobbystore.com/model-trains/books/12489__Freight-Cars-of-the-40s-and-50s

Jeff Wilson also has a series of books called "Industries along the Tracks". I do not own any, so I cannot comment if these books contain information about cars types that served the industries covered in the books?

[jmlaboda]

Quite true - though ORER's are not exactly common commodities . . . .

That is unfortunately true.  Various railroad COLOR GUIDES have more but even then it is not always correct or complete.

And you have some cars that are similar but not hauling the same thing, like 60' auto parts cars and 60' appliance boxcars.  60' auto part cars run, if I remember the Railroad Model Craftsman article right, at around a 70T capacity but can have trucks that resemble either your typical 70T trucks or 100T (basically 100T trucks with 33" wheels) while appliance cars are in the 100T car range.

And some types are common prototypes but with specific service, like the former Southern Railway XF, Food Loading Only, 40' boxcars with green doors and yellow plaque that said "XF, Food Loading Only"...

I hate to pee on anybodies' dreams but while having some sore of reference would be good but building a database for such would require extensive work... and I should know...

[Philip H]

i wonder if we could help add some of this to @spookshow 's excellent Site?

[Hamaker]

I'm ignorant....what does ORER mean ?

[wcfn100]

but having a source for this type of info would be amazing when trying to properly select rolling stock for a layout

I have this resource and all it did was screw me up. 

The problem is knowing when to stop.  You might think it would be cool to have a list of cars that show what they hauled and where but with that comes road numbers and specific car classes which ultimately leads to depression when you realize we only have 5% of prototype freight cars available in N scale. 

So now I have a list of 40+ cars I have to scratch build or kitbash because I happen to know I need these exact cars.

While we're on the subject and I'm taking at you, do you know any good excel to mySQL importers?  I'd like to get my 10,000+ car list on-line for others to see, but I am NOT typing it all again. 

Jason

[Ed Kapuscinski]

I'm thinking of even more specific stuff though. I mean, most sources that I've read in the Industries You Can Model books, etc... are all someone generic. "Paper mills got tank cars of chemicals, and shipped 40'-50' box cars of paper".

However, that doesn't mean that all 50' box cars were likely to show up at a paper warehouse. For example, the Conrail X73 cars (the Atlas Precision Design rib sided cars) were used in paper service, but I'm not sure if the FGE style cars were. I'd like to be accurate and only use my X73s for the right service, and my FGE style cars in a different service.

See what I mean?

[Kisatchie]

I'm ignorant....what does ORER mean ?

The Official Railway Equipment Register.

It lists all railroad freight cars in service at the time of publication. I happen to have one ORER, the April 1969 issue. It's pretty thick.


Hmm... like Kiz...

[Hamaker]

Thank you so much for answering my question.  I'll now take off my AAAA t-shirt   

[Ed Kapuscinski]

I have this resource and all it did was screw me up. 

The problem is knowing when to stop.  You might think it would be cool to have a list of cars that show what they hauled and where but with that comes road numbers and specific car classes which ultimately leads to depression when you realize we only have 5% of prototype freight cars available in N scale. 

So now I have a list of 40+ cars I have to scratch build or kitbash because I happen to know I need these exact cars.

While we're on the subject and I'm taking at you, do you know any good excel to mySQL importers?  I'd like to get my 10,000+ car list on-line for others to see, but I am NOT typing it all again. 

Jason

Ooh, yeah, I know how dangerous a little data can be!

If you want to do that, honestly, I'd just through it in a Google Spreadsheet, his the share with everyone thing, and you're good to go.

[peteski]

Thank you so much for answering my question.  I'll now take off my AAAA t-shirt   

Um, you missed one "A".