Has anyone built the Heljan Hillsborough Gravel Company? Is it really for gravel or is it for some other type of rock or mineral? Which type of cars are loaded here? How are the cars loaded? Is that an open top conveyer belt? The picture on the box shows covered hoppers with hatches. If that is correct shouldn’t the tops of the bins and the conveyers be covered instead of open? What kind of equipment is needed that this kit doesn't include? The only picture of something similar I can find uses air to load the cars but it is being used in agriculture not mining. Also it doesn’t have an open conveyor instead it has piping. I’m confused, please help so I can make this somewhat authentic. Thanks.
It's Hejan, and a pic can be found here: https://www.walthers.com/gravel-company-18-x-6-x-14-quot-45-x-15-x-35cm
This is a local gravel company, it's bin seems to be covered. Maybe that's for the sand, though. https://www.google.com/maps/@39.1242063,-76.7910537,3a,75y,8.25h,106.73t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1se8ChEZZ3vgzwLJbxLKlirw!2e0!7i13312!8i6656
I don't know why you would put gravel in a covered hopper. It's not like it's going to melt or wash away.
Henry
COB Potomac & Northern
Shenandoah Valley
Dang autocorrect. OK Heljan. I thought I copied it straight off of the box. Anyway that's what I'm wondering if maybe they didn't know which kind of hopper to use in the picture and should have used a regular open hopper.
My opinion, was not as a real railroader. Brakie would be more knowledgeable, for one. Still it's rocks in a box, why make it hard to store and load.
I've never seen gravel stored in bins like that. Lime, yes, which would require covered hoppers
But there are machines which crush and sort gravel to particular sizes, so is it possible that the Heljan model is of a processing plant which stores the gravel, by size, in the various bins for ease of loading?
Of course a company can call itself a gravel company and be engaged in other related lines of business that would call for such bins.
Dave Nelson
Lone Wolf and Santa FeHas anyone built the Heljan Hillsborough Gravel Company? Is it really for gravel or is it for some other type of rock or mineral?
The kit strikes me as some kind of generic thing, and that the designer didn't give much thought into how it would interact with the railroad.
The kit as it comes has some open bins and conveyors. It looks like it's intended for crushed rock that doesn't require protection from the elements. If you want to represent railcar loading or unloading to go with it, you'll need to add some more to the complex, as there's no provision for any of that in the kit.
I used the same kit, in my case labeled as a Revell product for a "gravel plant." I rearranged it considerably, added roofs to the bins, and combined it with other scratchbuilt and kitbashed components so it became part of a lime plant.
The stair and railing parts were omitted in favor of finer parts from my scrap box. I think the ladder, platform, and safety cage were left over from a Rix grain elevator. I used sheet styrene for a door, and changed the openings in one end of the head house structure so they became vents. The addition where the conveyor enters the left side of the head house is scratchbuilt from Evergreen corrugated styrene.
I turned a Walthers Medusa Cement into a structure that loads hoppers, along with other bins from an old IHC cement batch plant. The parts that come from what amounts to the Heljan gravel company feed, or are fed by, other parts of the plant.
Rob Spangler