Modeling modern era. What class of covered hoppers can haul flour?
Have Accurail ACF center flow hoppers and don´t know if they are the right railcar.
Flour is transported in 'Airslide' or 'Pressure/Differential' covered hoppers. The Airslide cars have a perferated plastic liner that air bubbles up from and this makes the load flow out of the discharge hopper. Airslides are being phased out of service and P/D cars are being phased in. They look like very long covered hoppers with lots of 'plumbing' on the lower discharge area. Walthers and Atlas have made good HO models.
Your Accurail cars are basic ACF 4600 cf capacity grain cars that gravity dump. They would transport grain from the growing regon to a flour mill that would process the raw material into flour.
Jim
Modeling BNSF and Milwaukee Road in SW Wisconsin
Hi, Soller
You might want to look at the new PD3000s from Spring Mills Depot? I can't attest exactly that they were used for flour but it sure sounds like they were designed with that kind of commodity in mind.
http://www.springmillsdepot.com/pd3000main.htm
Have Fun, Ed
The Pressureaide covered hoppers are also used to haul flour. Atlas makes models of them.
3000 cubic foot hoppers probably rarely haul flour.
"No soup for you!" - Yev Kassem (from Seinfeld)
The current Pressureaide cars come in several sizes. The PD3000's are usually used to carry cement, and the PD5750's can carry 100+ tons of flour. They key is selection the right capacity car so you do not 'cube out' before you get to full tonnage capacity of the car. The reverse is not filling the car with too much product, thus making it over-weight! The prototypes have a harder job that what we modelers have. Wheat Flour can vary, but the most common quoted weight is 37 lbs/cf...