Some big mills that make cereal or dog food bring in box cars and tank cars. Don't forgot that some industries use fuel oil.
Lion:
Why are the baking products run over a metal dectector? Are they shipping product to a prison? <G> Or do they have a problem with metal shavings? I'm sure there is a logical reason but please inform us.
crhostler61 When I was a kid growing up in the 60's in a northern suburb of Reading PA there was a very large battery plant (made lead acid batteries for vehicles). I remember seeing tank and boxcars on their property. Mark H
When I was a kid growing up in the 60's in a northern suburb of Reading PA there was a very large battery plant (made lead acid batteries for vehicles). I remember seeing tank and boxcars on their property.
Mark H
If you're thinking Exide, that's long gone, and recently in the news as they have uncovered high concentrations of lead at the former site (not surprising). Deka between Fleetwood and Topton is still a going concern, one of the biggest battery makers around, but the plant isn't, as far as I know, rail served. The trains roll past on the East Penn branch but that's about it. They warehouse in Topton, and use company trucks to haul trailer loads from the plant to the warehouse. Not sure if maybe the warehouse is at least rail served for outgoing shipments.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
When I was a teenager back in the 1960s, I ended up with a used Swift packing plant model, one of the old Suydam ones. I still have that, and as I've built my current layout (now my retirement layout) I've added a couple of others that play well with it. First, I have an icing facility for my ice-bunker reefers, and more recently I added a leather tanning complex. These combine to give me both local traffic and, of course, the ability to use staging to service them.
Stock cars bring animals to the packing plant, and then reefers take the meat away. The reefers must be iced both before and perhaps after loading. Icing is also needed on through freights.
The packing plant also generates hides, which are taken by boxcar to the tannery. This was typically done in old boxcars specifically marked "Hide Service Only," because once a car had been used for fresh hides, no one would want to ship anything else in it ever again. I bought a couple of Tichy kits and made my own hides-only boxcars.
The Walthers Empire Leather Tanning Company came with a nice description of how tanneries operated, making note of the inputs and outputs. In addition to the hides coming in and "clean" boxcars of goods going out, a tannery would also use acid (tank cars) and salt (covered hoppers.) So, in addition to needed a couple of other interesting pieces of rolling stock, I got to model the unloading facilities for them as well.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
theodorefiskThis is only a quick overview of how finished goods are currently moved. Very rarely are boxcars chosen if the goods are in high consumer demand due to the vagaries of rail service. (I am in the transportation and logistics business) Ted
Ted,There is still thousands of boxcars being used in fact I been seeing a lot of 50-60' boxcars owned by lease companies including GATX.The boxcar is still a handy way to move freight seeing 2 1/2 53' trailers fills a boxcar..
Larry
Conductor.
Summerset Ry.
"Stay Alert, Don't get hurt Safety First!"
Depending on your era, box cars could be used to haul grain, even up to the early 1970's. Most were common 40' box cars with 6' doors preferable.
Ralph
Another Texas example. On the ex SP line now utilized as an industrial spur by the BNSF through Brenham, TX, tank cars of corn syrup go to the Blue Bell Creamery's novelty plant (up to 4 at a time). Brenham Wholesale used to receive box cars of canned food (the switch was removed last year). A spur at an old lumber yard receives hi cube box cars; but I do not know what is carried. And the main Blue Bell factory receives covered hoppers of sugar and other bulk ingredients. Blue Bell recently completed a seven story storage building; but I do not think it is rail served. If it was, it could see reefers or insulated box cars.
In Abilene, TX, on the old FW&D, was a siding with metal roofed, but open sided unloading facility for corn syrup tank cars. The local railfans called it the "sugar shack."
On the former MKT branch line from Dublin to DeLeon, TX; which was saved primarily because of its importance to the local peanut industry, tank cars were used to transport peanut oil. Occasional shipments of peanuts/peanut products utilize boxcars; although covered hoppers seem to be what is most prominent in use today.
Knowing your era could be very important. Referring to the current modern era, finished goods, such as food, drinks, detergents, and any other type consumer products in boxes/cartons will, for the most part, leave a manufacturing facility in a trailer or container. If in a trailer, it will be going on the highway(I am referring to anything other than a UPS/YRC/ABF pup trailer) However, there are a number of trailers that have reefer units that go on the rail and those names can include Alliance, Marten, CR England, Central Refrigerated, White Arrow and others. In a container, it will go via rail and those containers will be 40', 45' and 53' in length. the 40' & 45' containers could very well be shipped via rail to a port for export OR they could be used from an inland point to a west coast port area but for domestic transportation only. 53' containers are for domestic transportation only within Canada, US and Mexico and the containers can be rail controlled or owned/leased by trucking companies and third party logistics companies.
This is only a quick overview of how finished goods are currently moved. Very rarely are boxcars chosen if the goods are in high consumer demand due to the vagaries of rail service. (I am in the transportation and logistics business)
Ted
ACY Sorry. I'm a traditionalist. If the established terminology works, I think changing it is unnecessary and can lead to confusion. As far as I know, tankers are ships, trucks, and sometimes airplanes. Tom
Sorry. I'm a traditionalist. If the established terminology works, I think changing it is unnecessary and can lead to confusion. As far as I know, tankers are ships, trucks, and sometimes airplanes.
Tom
Tom,Here's the rub..Some railroaders use a lot of "railroad speak" to include terms like high roof boxcars,standard boxcar,tankers,flatbed car,lumber car,pin slack,shake 'em loose,king pin and some rather colorful monikers I can not use here.
Heres another tibit.That lumber car would be nothing more then 65519 to a switchman.The switch list will tell you where it goes.
A tank or tanker car would be nothing more then its number and load for train placement to that switchman..
Sean ---
I hope you and the other forum members didn't interpret my comments as saying, or even implying, that you or anybody else is stupid. If anybody feels that way, then I apologize very sincerely for leaving that impression. The "tank car" identification is a very minor point, and one that many very smart and famous people in the Media don't understand. I wanted to mention it for the sake of holding onto the established terminology, at least in the Kalmbach Forum. I had no intention of insulting or belittling or embarrassing anyone.
Rob, nice work there from what I see. Mlehman, thanks for what you said about terminology. When I got back into trains, I meet a guy who has a PhD in mechanical/science field who worked on helping build and launch space shuttles and rockets back from. The time when the US first landed on the moon. He was into mrr and he referred to tank cars as tankers sometimes. I don't think anyone would call him stupid or anything. I feel that as long as people know what you referring to or have a good idea, then if not all bad I think but its just me. As they say everyone has their opinion.
Sean
Sean, the unknown train travler,
On my empire eight wheel tank cars tend to run from staging to staging. The only places they might unload are at the JNR's diesel fueling facility (one car a fortnight, more or less) and at the Forest Railway general service spur (less frequently.) My one four wheeler runs up the TTT to the big colliery about once a week - the company store also refuels diesel trucks. The anhydrous ammonia tank unloads at the magazine once a month - the mine operators are very sparing in their use of explosives. Some of that diesel goes into home-mixed ANFO.
There are blocks of boxcars that never get switched out of my through freights. Others can go from staging to almost anywhere, or vice versa - as long as anywhere has a freight house. The road network was largely undeveloped in my prototype area in 1964, and the JNR was still very much in the LCL/small consignment business. Most industries didn't have direct to the door rail service. On my layout the only ones that do are the big colliery (which has the company store as well as mine supply spots) and the forest railway (and associated sawmill.)
Some model railroaders subscribe to the theory that every car in their roster has to have some spot where it will be placed for loading or unloading. I do not. I run entire trains of cars that are never switched, including one (of ultra-modern high speed cars) that spends almost all of its time in a cassette.
As for tankers, I've known several. They all answered to, "Sergeant." I've also encountered some of the seagoing variety, back when I was a wet behind the ears cadet. IIRC, tanker staff drew extra pay, level depending on cargo hazard level.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - tank cars, no tankers)
Since we're nitpicking terminology, we should clarify something else, since several people have mentioned "reefers" (with two e's together to be correct) and the OP wrote "...I was looking for a few industries that's served by or with box cars (refrigerated and non refrigerated box cars)..."
A "refrigerated boxcar" is a refigerator car or reefer. There are some insulated boxcars that are "non-refrigerated" but which are usually classed as RBL. The RBL stands for refigerated bunkerless (w/ loader in this case), so it's technically a reefer, but without a means of holding ice (what goes in the bunker, at least in the old days) or a refigerator unit to cool it. Properly insulated, the mass of the load helps keep the temperature right. Alternatively, the insulation is sufficient to keep the load from freezing in the winter presuming normal travel time to the customer.
And there are a few boxcars that are insulated. How that's parsed between RBLs and insulated boxcars I'll leave to someone else to explain.
Then there are just regular old boxcars that come in a variety of flavors.
This adds even more complexity to the OP's original question. Things are often not as simple as they seem.
Mike Lehman
Urbana, IL
There are so many such industries I can't name them all. Here are some examples from my layout that take reefers, box cars, and/or tank cars. Not all of these are finished, weathered or "planted" in the scene yet.
This rural fuel dealer receives diesel fuel and propane.
This plant makes well drilling fluid from barite. It can be shipped in 55-gallon drums in boxcars, but also loaded in pressurized covered hoppers.
Here's part of a feed and fertilizer business that receives bagged product in boxcars.
At left here is a printer that takes paper in boxcars, while at right is a grocery distributor that can take reefers or boxcars.
Here's another distribution center that primarily takes reefers, but can also receive shipments in the occasional boxcar.
This industry is a lime plant that ships crushed stone in covered hoppers, but it also has this dock to receive stuff in boxcars and flat cars.
Here's a salt plant. It receives some inbound shipments in boxcars, and another part ships bagged salt, also in boxcars.
Yet another part of the salt plant takes inbound chemicals in tank cars, which are unloaded here.
Rob Spangler
Bob Schuknecht From a Google search: tank·er ˈtaNGkər/ noun noun: tanker; plural noun: tankers 1. a ship, road vehicle, or aircraft for carrying liquids, especially petroleum, in bulk. 2. Military member of a tank crew.
From a Google search:
"Car" is the noun, "Tank" is the adjective that modifies or defines the kind of car.
Thus you have "Tank Cars" and not "Tanker Cars"
The plural is on the word "Car" and not on the adjective "Tank".
ROARING
This from a LION who struggled with English every year through Jr. High and High School.
The Route of the Broadway Lion The Largest Subway Layout in North Dakota.
Here there be cats. LIONS with CAMERAS
How about a commercial bakery.
Oil arrives in tank cars, flour and sugar arrive in covered hoppers, Packaging materials arrive in box cars, and finished products depart in refrigerated cars.
The Baker Boy plant in Dickinson does not do the baking, instead of putting the finished product in the ovens, the run them through huge freezers, and then after passing over a metal detector they are packaged for shipment. The stores, bakeries and resturants that purchase the product do the actual baking and then call it "Fresh Baked".
ROAR
Modeling in HO...Reading and Conrail together in an alternate history.
ACYThose cylindrical things are tank cars --- not tanker cars.
Tom,You are correct of course but,I have heard them called "tankers" by some railroaders in the last 2-3 years.
The why part I do not know unless it has something to do with the numerous tank trains..
You haven't mentioned era, and that could make a big difference. Livestock haven't normally been shipped by rail in the U.S. or Canada in 50 years or so. Those cylindrical things are tank cars --- not tanker cars.
Farmer's Coop grain (box cars) and anhydrous ammonia (liquid fertilizer in tank cars) kind of crossing eras there though
I would like to do something different. My cpuaka brain is.coming up with the same basic ideas as alot of others. .I was thinking of having a small forest somewhere on the layout, so I could do a disillery served by the rails (box cars bringing in supplies.
The paper industry uses a significant amount of both boxes and tanks, along with others depending on what form of raw material the process is started with. Also, along the line where I worked there is a plant that, at the time, made Hawaiian Punch. Corn syrup inbound in tanks, filled bottles outbound in boxes.
Sean,If I may why not think outside of the well worn industry box that we all have used?
Some ideas.
American Recyclers.
In:
Boxcar: scrap rubber Tank Car (plasticsizer) and empty covered hoppers
out: empties and covered hoppers loaded with rubber pellets.
JWE Polymers.
In covered hoppers (carbon black) and empty boxcars.
Out: Empty covered hoppers and boxcars loaded with rolled rubber.
Awlmanns Distribution Inc.
In Alcoholic beverages(50,53 and 60 foot boxcars)
Osman & Sons Supply Co.
In: Boxcars of bagged feeds,fertilizer and mulch.
Hylos Inc:
In empty 50' boxcars Out: Gaylord containers of crushed glass.
Back in the 1960s, there was a Swift plant in my hometown, which I think was a byproducts plant. There were a lot of tank cars and some refers there. The plant had a lot of pipes leading to a grid of storage tanks. There was a main building that was was made of corrugated steel and cement, as I recall.
Mike