What's in an "empty" gondola?

[peteski]

My favorite gon ever was totally empty except someone had dumped about 20 fire extinguishers in a little pile at one end.  I definitely mean to model that someday.

Fire extinguishers  in N scale?  They'll be tiny!   

[Tristan Ashcroft]

Fire extinguishers  in N scale?  They'll be tiny!   

I mean, I'm not saying I've already worked out all the logistics...

[learmoia]

Small trees?  I've seen a few on CSX in the Huntington-Charleston, WV area that have sat long enough that stuff is growing in them, tall enough to be seen from the ground.

Corn stalks growing around top hatches of grain cars.....

[Curtis Kyger]

Thread drift....  I once saw a gondola that contained one rock.  The rock was about the size of a Volkswagen Bug. I wonder how they unloaded or otherwise removed the rock.

[wazzou]

Thread drift....  I once saw a gondola that contained one rock.  The rock was about the size of a Volkswagen Bug. I wonder how they unloaded or otherwise removed the rock.

Excavator.

[nkalanaga]

Eja:  Depending on what your loads are, dirt and grass in the corners wouldn't be unheard of, although trees are unlikely.

~Ian:  Wheat etc was very common in the Northwest on grain hoppers in the 1970s.  Also pigeons.

[Angus Shops]

Aren’t railways expected to supply clean cars or their customers? If I was a shipper and received an empty car for loading and it was full of the detritus from it’s previous customers…

I’m thinking of a photo of the car cleaning tracks in Nelson BC. That would be a great addition to the operational complexities of a major terminal, along with RIP tracks, scale tracks, and etc.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

My favorite gon ever was totally empty except someone had dumped about 20 fire extinguishers in a little pile at one end.  I definitely mean to model that someday.

Not the same, but related - the best boxcar roof I ever saw had basically a full standard can of paint that had fallen from some height, smash landed on the roof, crumpled, sprayed paint everywhere, and just dried out and stuck there.  I suppose no one who cared ever made it up to the roof.  It was a plate C car, so I guess it never got scraped off on a bridge or whatnot.

I fully encourage railfanning from bridges.


Edited to fix the spelling of plate in "plate C".

Oh man, I need to do BOTH of those!

[cv_acr]

I fully encourage railfanning from bridges.

I railfanned with some guys who disposed of their trash via passing gondola.

[cv_acr]

I railfanned with some guys who disposed of their trash via passing gondola.

Including a broken lawn chair once.

[Missaberoad]

I railfanned with some guys who disposed of their trash via passing gondola.

Railroaders have been known to get rid of trash in gondolas. 

As far as whats in an empty gondola, besides the aforementioned answers of bits of lading stapping and
dunnage the floor is often covered with a muck of dirt/metal/gross. And as far as modern railroads go, car cleaning is typically the customers responsibility.

[RockGp40]

Aren’t railways expected to supply clean cars or their customers? If I was a shipper and received an empty car for loading and it was full of the detritus from it’s previous customers…

The boxcars of paper rolls I receive on the MDDE are cleaned by the recipient of the boxcars. When I say cleaned, they are loosely swept and any remaining dunnage is removed (excess cardboard protection/plastic wrap/bubble wrap/etc). I wouldn't eat off the floors though.

As a train service employee, I only have to make sure the doors are properly closed for transport before I couple and brake test. If I had to clean out the cars, the train would never move during my 12 hours.

[lock4244]

I railfanned with some guys who disposed of their trash via passing gondola.

BM at Bayview? 

[Blazeman]

Our practices varied by plant on receiving empty gons for loading.  More than once a car for ore loading was rejected for trash.  The Keokuk operation received scrap borings and turnings, unloading with a magnet, so the cars would be then suitable for reloading with pig iron. 

Those of us longer in the tooth will recall late 70's when there were extremely monumental snows in Buffalo how PC commandeered strings of empty gons to fill with snow removed from the yards, shipping them to more temperate locales on line to melt.  How the water was removed was never discussed.  Considering how PC worked, that would be the destination yard master's problem to resolve.

[nkalanaga]

If the floors weren't water-tight, it would simply run out as the snow melted.