Hey lets Intercahnge Model railroad cars via UPS betwen Diffrent Model Railroad Layouts nationwide!

[Anonymous]

There was a Posting about model railroad hump yards and a thought came to me. Every model railroad has is own Trackside industries that get cars switched in from time to time often coming from just a couple of scale miles across the layout, In the real world railroads dont take shipents for such short distances unless its a in house plant switch like a steel mill.
What I am Proposing here is that when each model sends out a car or gets in a car that that car instead of going though a tunnel and sitting out off the way and PRENTENDING that is going across the country. Build a track that leads into a special box that you can put a train in and send it Via UPS (Which is the only Parcel carriar that I know off that uses rail for 75% of there shipments) which then gets put on a Real Train and then gets shipped to another model railroader who has a industry on his railroad were he could spot the car. For Intstace a model railroad car or train load of coal gets sent "Off Railroad" from a model railroad that has a mine via UPS to a another Model railroad that has a power plant. In Retern since you may have a scrap yard you get a train load of Gondolas with Model scrap. You may have a lumber yard on your layout so you send out a car load of Lumber in exchange for a boxcar for your paper mill.
The idea here would be that you always have diffrent railroad cars in your layout and you have diffrent model indistrys that you could consign things to.
There might even be a Model Hump Yard were railroad cars are sorted out and shipped to there prospective owners or consignees. Every week you would send out or recive a box of diffrent Model Railroad cars to be spotted on your industrys.
Each Car would have its own reporting marks so that you can call up a 1-800-number to find out were it is.(Which if its on UPS is might actulay be on a real train!). Anyone here would like to add there thoughts?? This is based on the Play By mail chess games..

[Anonymous]

I like it alot ! although there is a chance that your cars could get damaged or stolen. the solution to that is use athearn blue box and other cheap cars. that would really be cool !

[Junctionfan]

When get a decent paying job and have time to paint up a bunch of rollingstock with my railroad's paint scheme on it, I would love to do that. Does that mean we get to use pool power?

[Anonymous]

I like it alot ! although there is a chance that your cars could get damaged or stolen. the solution to that is use athearn blue box and other cheap cars. that would really be cool !

Just like railroad cars get "Lost" in the real world....[:D]
As far as Pool Power you could have a group of UP modelers send each other diffrent types of UP power or they can do a "Run Though" To a group of "Conrail"
Modelers...As far as cost is concenred I think UPS would charge like 15.00 per parcel of cars. If You are sending out or getting cars every week you might actauly spend that money on new railroad cars and engines

[Junctionfan]

could be expensive if my railroad sends you a large unit train though.

[Kimble]

Neat idea. If I participated (when I build a layout and start buying rolling stock!) I'd insist the recipient post a digital photo on the web so you can see your car at its destination. A nice practical joke could be to set up some miscreants tagging the car with graffiti.

[DSchmitt]

Some very famous model railroaders have "interchanged" cars between there lines, but because they may model different time periods, scales, etc. The each paint suitable cars for the partner railroad(s) and don't send them physically. They do keep track of which railroad each car is on.

Example: "A" "interchanges" one of his 1980's era FMC 50' box cars with "B". "B" models 1937 so represents the "interchanged" car using an outside braced wooden box car with the same reoprting marks and number.

[Anonymous]

You could turn this into a role playing game were lets say a group of Erie RR Modelers Compete with a team of Lehigh Valley RR to atract traffic and Industrys to there lines. There would be a "Dungeon Master" reffereing the whole thing..You would also have "Juntion Settlements" and "Hostile Take overs"...Whoever runs there railroad the most efficiantly and or takes over to become a "Class One" wins..

[andrechapelon]

QUOTE: Originally posted by trainfinder22

You could turn this into a role playing game were lets say a group of Erie RR Modelers Compete with a team of Lehigh Valley RR to atract traffic and Industrys to there lines. There would be a "Dungeon Master" reffereing the whole thing..You would also have "Juntion Settlements" and "Hostile Take overs"...Whoever runs there railroad the most efficiantly and or takes over to become a "Class One" wins..

OR you could play Railroad Tycoon 3 and get the same effect.

Andre

[ClinchValleySD40]

Some people in the pfmsig and private road name sig over on Yahoo already do this. I'm not much interested in swapping cars, but welcome decal swaps. Most cars do not fit into my era and would look out of place.

[Anonymous]

check out OGRR.com, the traveling boxcar as it is called. One person made a boxcar, took a digital photo of it, got a mailing list, and sent the car out. The person who recieved it, took a digital photo of it traveling on their layout, mailed the car to the next person, so on and so on. It is still going around the country. :)

[TexasEd]

Do you own stock in UPS? :)

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by halexander

check out OGRR.com, the traveling boxcar as it is called. One person made a boxcar, took a digital photo of it, got a mailing list, and sent the car out. The person who recieved it, took a digital photo of it traveling on their layout, mailed the car to the next person, so on and so on. It is still going around the country. :)

There was a similar car interchange going on some years ago, called ICE - International Car Exchange. I saw the "rules" one time, but don't recall the specifics. As suggested, the recipient of a car would take a photo of it on his layout and then mail it along to another on the list.

What's old is new again! [:D]

Bob Boudreau

[Anonymous]

Idea (if much changed from the original) - online national rail networks:

The simple way: each person has there own little railroad with industries and published their own timetable. cars are then e-swapped to and from said industries. a seperate server logs where the cars are. example: person A then can "order" (per say) a load of oil cars from texas B to be refined in that persons (A's) philidelphia layout. C may then order chemicals from A to be processed at Kodak. C could then send out boxcars of film to D, a distributer. as people cannot get to their computers every hour to check for deliveries, this would simulate the real-life delays. this could be done on a pretty simple network.

the more complicated way A group of people group up based on a common interest in a single railroad, for example, i am a fan of the Chessie System. these groups then publish a time table and each one takes a branch line. they have to order and dispatch cars to and from the industries on their lines. half the group could be dispatchers (shipping, recieving, track rights, switching), the other train ops (pick up and deliveries). train operators would have to deal with not running into eachother. lotta time involved and it would be quite the networking!

a better option three does anyone out there know anything about the guys who put MS Train Simulator together or the guys who have made the add-ons for chessie and cn? maybe they can build an online version where you just sign on, pick up the next train that needs to go, and drive it there. people with a couple hours on there hands could drive the long consist cross contries, while people with 20-30 min could run yard ops. you could set it up so that the computer, the engineers, or a third party tracks-ops person could do the switching and shipping orders. it would be a little like a real railroad with whoever is there to jump up into the cab and go!

[CNJ831]

The NMRA had a car exchange SIG/program for years, maybe still does for all I know. However, unless you have a relatively small group of very reliable modelers the situation is likely to get out of control very quickly. Lost cars, damaged cars, arguments over UPS costs, very delayed shipping, guys loosing interest with your favorite interchange car at their layout, the list is endless. It's much safer, more practical and likely to be more fun to set up a local group to do this and hand-carry cars between layouts.

CNJ831