I have a number of N scale 40 foot high cube box cars, and as asked about the 85 footers in another thread, does any railroad still use the 40 footers. I know that they were used to transport appliances.
Hi-cube 40 footers were a very small segment of the national car fleet during their heyday. The advent of hi-cube 50 and 60 footers ushered in cars that were much more versatile as far as potential payloads were concerned. By the mid 80s, the 40 footers were gone. Since you mentioned 40 footers for appliance loading, L&N had a large number of standard height 40 foot PS-1s assigned to appliance loading at Appliance Park in Louisville, Ky, up until the very early 1980s.
STILL use?
No.
Except maybe MoW service (could be useful). Wander over to the Tangent website and read up on them.
They were built about 1970. So they'd be past the "40 year rule", which would have triggered at least minimal rebuilding. And who needs a 40' high cube box enough to spend money on it fixing it up? Uh, nobody.
Ed
Maybe there would still be a need for hi cube boxcars if there were still US made appliances. Maybe.
Dave Nelson
They'd just go into containers anyhow
dknelsonMaybe there would still be a need for hi cube boxcars if there were still US made appliances. Maybe.
That would be news to the factory workers in South Carolina who built our Bosch dishwasher and those in Memphis who built our Electrolux washer and dryer. These "foreign" companies (and ongoing traditional US suppliers, such as GE) have been building appliances in the US for years.
Most (maybe all) are shipped in containers and trucks, though.
Layout Design GalleryLayout Design Special Interest Group
My railroad has a Maytag factory on it and since I have number of these boxcars, I will probably use them. Where they used for any other cargo besides appliances?
caldreamer My railroad has a Maytag factory on it and since I have number of these boxcars, I will probably use them. Where they used for any other cargo besides appliances?
Another no. If you look at the photos on the Tangent site, you'll see they all (all I looked at or own, anyway) have a "return when empty to...." marking. So they either hauled appliances or air.
Now, AFTER they stopped hauling appliances (if they did stop), then they likely went into general service. Or, at least, other cargo appropriate to their size and capacity.
Caldreamer, the 1970 s is the ideal period for those box cars FWIW.
Rio Grande. The Action Road - Focus 1977-1983
Appliances shipped by rail today would be in the now-standard 50'IL and 60'IL 100-ton 13'IH highcube cars like the FBOX and TBOX cars. A 70-ton 40' car is laughably obsolete at this point.
When these 40' highcubes were built in the late 1960s the standard boxcar was a 50' IL/10'IH 70-ton box. The 40' high-cube box was specialized for this service in order to load an extra layer of bulky appliances.
Chris van der Heide
My Algoma Central Railway Modeling Blog
"Baby Hi-Cubes" started being built in the mid-1960's. Northern Pacific and the Burlington Route had them for several years before the BN merger (March 1970).
They were also used to haul the large (HUGE) paper rolls used by newspapers.
The SP Ordered 100 Ton 40' High Cubes as late as 1977 for use in hauling copper, they may still be in use on the UP, and the 40 year cutoff date without rebuilding would have been 2017.
Rick Jesionowski
Rule 1: This is my railroad.
Rule 2: I make the rules.
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The 1977 built SP 40 footers were not hi-cubes in the sense of the 40 foot appliance cars. They were 10'6" inside height cars built to transport copper products from the smelters to other industries. These cars were basically 50 foot PC&F (Pacific Car & Foundry) or FMC incentive per diem cars, minus ten feet of length. Their cubic capacity was 4125 cu. ft. due to the lack of an interior wood lining, and they would be loaded to maximum tonnage long before cubic footage became an issue, unlike appliances which were low density/high bulk loads.
The numbers, classes, builders and dates are:
SP 605000-605299 B-100-32 PC&F 1972
SP 605300-605549 B-100-32 PC&F 1974
SP 605550-605699 B-100-41 FMC 1977
And, if you want one, here's a kit:
https://shop.cannonandco.net/product.sc?productId=207&categoryId=21
On the Tangent website they have a couple circa 1983 photos with BN cars in a train.
Removed - I stepped into a prototype experts only topic by mistake.
Jim,
The SP car is a Plate C car.
By definition, a high-cube car exceeds Plate C.
So the cars you're talking about will not give you a model of the SP car.
Well, MESSENGER,
what else can we do when he brings us a picture of what is clearly labeled a HI-CUBE car when we are talking about a PLATE C car?
They nowhere claim this is a model of the SP PLATE C (NOT HI-CUBE) anode boxes. And the numbers don't match.
Knock off the sarcasm, guys.
Posts have been edited.
--Steven Otte, Model Railroader senior associate editorsotte@kalmbach.com
I agree with Steve. I asked a valid question, lets keep this on the topic.
Caldreamer
caldreamer I agree with Steve. I asked a valid question, lets keep this on the topic. Caldreamer
Caldreamer,
I think your question was answered. So I don't see why we shouldn't wander off-topic.
Sometimes some very interesting facts and observations come up when that happens.