Hi everyone,
I am considering modelling a foundry on my HO 1950's layout. I would appreciate advice on the type and frequency of loads that are appropriate to arrive and depart such a facility. A description of the general operation of a foundry would assist, and all advice would be appreciated
Cheers
James
James,When I worked on the PRR we switch a foundry that received foundry sand (a type of sand used in casting) in covered hoppers,empty gons for wastage and a occasional boxcar for finish product-they normally shipped by truck..
Larry
Conductor.
Summerset Ry.
"Stay Alert, Don't get hurt Safety First!"
The Bucyrus Erie factory in South Milwaukee had a foundry operation until the 1970s, but it is a little hard to say what loads in/out were strictly attributable to the foundry part of it
Yes foundry sand, and B-E had its own side dump cars for disposing of the used sand and slag elsewhere on their property (which in the EPA era they came to regret doing). There were coke and coal loads for the furnace. I also remember seeing considerable amounts of wood which was used for pattern making. They had their own building for a pattern making shop, and another building that just held draftsmen.
That factory also made huge gears and they would get tank cars which i assume held cutting oil.
One thing they also had was their own scale track and scale shed. Thus a frequent visit from the scale test car was in order and you could include that as an interesting bit of detail.
Dave Nelson
Inbound:
Sand, coal, pig iron, iron or steel shapes
Outbound;
Castings, forgings
Dave H. Painted side goes up. My website : wnbranch.com
a small foundry i dealt with for years had downsized considerably and no longer had rail service. but, in addition to coke, limestone, and molding sand, they received a lot of scrap cast iron and scrap steel. these scrap materials were blended in a certain ratio to achieve the grade of cast iron they wanted to produce depending on the end product.
their favorite materials for melting were automotive engine blocks, crankshafts, cylinder heads, etc. and structural steel or steel automobile wheels.
if the motor cast was in short supply, they would buy pig iron but that was more expensive than melting motor cast.
they had a small cupola furnace that looked like a miniature steel mill blast furnace and the coke, limestone, and scrap metals were loaded into it via a trip car that dumped into the top of the furnace.
later on they started using an little electric furnace and had to have even smaller scrap pieces.
charlie
I worked at a foundry in the early 70s that cast the hulls and turrets of the M60A tanks, among other items, such as steel rolls for the rolling mills. There was quite a few covered hoppers with foundry sand as previously mentioned. This foundry melted scrap in their electric furnace, which came generally in gons. Also, I remember pig iron coming in a gondola, and once in awhile, a box car with an additive. Most of this came on flat bed truck. They had some oil storage tanks, and I frequently saw tank cars spotted there.
Out bound products were usually shipped by truck, but sometimes a specialty flat car was needed. This foundry had their own scale track, and their own GE44 tonner. The engineer and his brakeman were usually kept busy during the day turn switching the cars and taking a ladle of molten steel from the EF to the open hearths. This was quite an interesting place to work.
Mike
Hi to each of the six respondants to my query,
I appreciated your (often first hand) observations and advise. This has been highly instructive for me, and will allow me to get cracking with my modelling. That folks take the time to provide their expertise is fantastic, and has been deeply appreciated. Cheers from DownUnder
I worked for a Gray Iron Foundry for 11 years. Twice a day we recieved two hoppers of Coke, two gondola of engine blocks, one gondola of pig iron, and one gondola of shredded steel in bales. The scrap metal was brought in by trucks from a scrap yard about 1/2 mile away which sorted the scrap. The foundry sand arrived in trucks at a couple of locations around the plant. We melted 100 tons of scrap per hour in a cupla. Almost all of our outbound product went out in semis, we everyonce in a while loaded a 60 foot boxcar.
When I was braking on the PRR we switched three foundries and we would setout empty gons for scrap,loads of pig iron and foundry sand at two and foundry sand at the third.