Container compatibility - my head is exploding!

[MK]

Carter, would you be able to attach the PDF to a post separately?  You need to be a member to access.

[cfritschle]

Carter, would you be able to attach the PDF to a post separately?  You need to be a member to access.

I hope this works.   

[nkalanaga]

Works fine!  Thank you!

[MK]

Thanks Carter!

[jagged ben]

Magnets work much better than tacky glue or putty.   But neither can help you make the decision to cut off incompatible pins if you want to mix incompatible brands while at the same time losing the benefits of the pins if you want to go back to mating compatible brands.

[MK]

Magnets work much better than tacky glue or putty.   But neither can help you make the decision to cut off incompatible pins if you want to mix incompatible brands while at the same time losing the benefits of the pins if you want to go back to mating compatible brands.

Not having own a single container (or container related vehicle), that was the single dilemma that I arrived at in exploring this aspect of containers.

[nkalanaga]

Not too far from my experience.  Modeling 1974, I have containers, but seldom have a need to stack them.  Most of my older ones don't have pins OR magnets, just sit in the pedestals on the flatcars.

For JTC and Athearn containers, since they come in multi-packs, I cut the pins off one, to fit the flatcars.  I leave the pins on the second, so it can be used on a chassis.  I've taken the middle magnets out of JTC's 40 ft containers and put them in MT containers so they'll fit the chassis.

[Englewood]

My solution seems to be to have enough containers from each manufacturer to make a complete train. 

[MK]

LOL!!!!!  That's one way to solve the problem! 

[CRL]

Sure am glad I have absolutely no interest in container trains. 😉

[nkalanaga]

Container trains?  No, not really, on the BN in 1974.  But there were containers, on chassis as TOFC, and on flatcars as COFC, sometimes single, often mixed with other piggyback.  Intermodal wasn't a word in the Northwest yet, or a big part of the traffic.  I have a picture of the Spokane-Portland section of the BN's primary trailer/container train, one day in 1977.  An F45, ten 89 foot flatcars, and a caboose.