Here is a different video of the coal dumper, shows the whole thing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLbqnw2bKeI
I would think someone could get creative on making an operational flood loader. Maybe a magnet on the car and a reed switch under the track. The reed switch would operate a relay controlled solenoid to dispense a pre-determined amount of coal. A simple tube with hole in it that is gravity fed from the top from the loader, and when the solenoid is activated it pushes that tube over a hole for the shoot. Getting really ambitious would have those magnetic cars pass over a kaydee magnet to open the doors and dump the load at some distant customer. I would recommend finding a load that is very light in weight, it would probably look better and make it so the loco can pull more than 4 cars.
Thats how I would go about it and after thinking about it, maybe I will.
I've got to watch it again now. That's wicked cool, so it really is fully operational for a train of cars.
Now they ought to reproduce it and sell it as a working model!
Flash - no, the space is pretty tight in those corners, though I might experiment to switch the Flood Loader and the sawmill on either end. I think once I build the sawmill I'll see it's space needs more fully. Guess that's my next move.
shawnee wrote: Steem, that coal dumper is so cool, it's insane! Wow that was neat. But there's not way that dumper put the car flanges back on the track, right? It's not like roll 'em up, dump 'em, and roll 'em away and bring another one up...is it?Very, very cool though.
Steem, that coal dumper is so cool, it's insane! Wow that was neat. But there's not way that dumper put the car flanges back on the track, right? It's not like roll 'em up, dump 'em, and roll 'em away and bring another one up...is it?
Very, very cool though.
The track and the car are lifted together, so the wheels never leave the rail. After the car is returned to the lowered position, the next car is pushed into place and the empty car is shoved onto the ramp so it rolls downhill through a spring switch. Magnets under the track prevent the cars from coupling up. Once the switch is cleared, the car reverses direction and rolls downhill some more towards the yard where the train of empty cars are made up.
Dave
Just be glad you don't have to press "2" for English.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQ_ALEdDUB8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hqFS1GZL4s
http://s73.photobucket.com/user/steemtrayn/media/MovingcoalontheDCM.mp4.html?sort=3&o=27
I've toyed with a magnetic load, making the whole hunk of coal. It's not nearly as cool as that tipper, but there would be some way fo dropping a load into the hoppwer, and then craning it out with a magnetic arm. magnets on the bottom of the loads would allow them to stack, then later be emptyed after OPs. It's not nearly as realistic as the tipper, but it gives an idea of loads/empties.
is there room to raise the Sawmill, or create a false wall on it that trains could stage underneath/inside it?
-Morgan
On our HO club layout, the coal mine is basically just a display item with loaded cars coming out one end and empties on the other end, as if they are moving under the tipple and being loaded.
I seem to recall that Lionel had something like a coal loader and dumper that scattered the plastic coal all over the area around it. A working flood loader would have to be scratch built and would have to be quite an ingenious piece of mechanical engineering to measure out exact amounts of coal.
lvanhen wrote: Sorry about the sideways pic!! I edited it in Photobucket, but it still needs a 90 clockwise turn!! The rotary loader empties into a barge using a chain mechanism. The car rolls down an incline from the right (top), it is stopped and dumped, after being righted it rolls down an incline to the left (bottom), it goes through a spring loaded switch and then to an empty track. The pic eas taken 10/28/07 at the Asbury Park, NJ model RR club show. Due to the tight aisles I was not able to get the entire model in one shot. This model was built entirely from scratch by one of their members (I wish I could remember his name!) in about one year!!
Sorry about the sideways pic!! I edited it in Photobucket, but it still needs a 90 clockwise turn!! The rotary loader empties into a barge using a chain mechanism. The car rolls down an incline from the right (top), it is stopped and dumped, after being righted it rolls down an incline to the left (bottom), it goes through a spring loaded switch and then to an empty track. The pic eas taken 10/28/07 at the Asbury Park, NJ model RR club show. Due to the tight aisles I was not able to get the entire model in one shot. This model was built entirely from scratch by one of their members (I wish I could remember his name!) in about one year!!
video:
http://s73.photobucket.com/albums/i238/steemtrayn/?action=view¤t=video-coaldumper3.flv
shawnee wrote:Do clubs and serious operators hand load hoppers during a session, have the Hand-of-God that "appears" and facilitate big stuff?
I do operate on a couple of layouts were there is an emptys-in loads-out arrangment. This is where there are two sets of cars. One with loads another with empties. The train will spot the empties at a mine and pull out the loaded cars. Somewhere else on the layout is a power plant or somthing where one always spots the loads and pulls out the empties. It doesn't really add anything to the operating session at all.
At what time is the pretend Hand-of-God acceptable and not acceptable to you in operations?
tomikawaTT wrote: Most of my visible loads will be running through from staging to staging, so they will be fiddled on and off while loaded in cassettes. I feel that is preferable to having the HOG descend from the sky during an operating session. During a pause, when things are stopped to regroup - that's different.Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Most of my visible loads will be running through from staging to staging, so they will be fiddled on and off while loaded in cassettes. I feel that is preferable to having the HOG descend from the sky during an operating session. During a pause, when things are stopped to regroup - that's different.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Yes, I think this might be the best option. The spots available and in question are on my second level, in the corners, so hidden areas or tunnels view breaks are not an option for loads-in/loads out. Maybe against one of the walls, but like I said would eliminate my saw mill spot which needs the room. Reason I like the Flood loader is that it doesn't require mega space, since they're often just a receiving point for mines ops miles away.
So I now have a rare Walther eastern coal loader on my hands that it looks like i probably won't use. It was such a cool looking model kit.
Limiting the H.O.G. descending from the sky is definitely now one of my MR priorities. Guess it's an evolving sense, model railroading.
Alex
What about if you had a chute running out of a mountain, which you manually dump coal into when there's a coal car underneath the hopper? You can use a funnel to make sure it all goes in the chute.
I've seen something like that at a train show, except theirs was automatic, running off a sensor under the track in the tipple. Elsewhere on the layout there was an operating rotary dumper. It was (still is to me) pretty cool to watch!
Don't remember the name of the John Armstrong layout that had a 'working' empties-in/loads-out flood loader, only that it had a Southeastern theme. His 'solution' was a pair of trains, with identical car and loco numbers, that would somehow be synchronized so that the empties and loads would pass through the loader on parallel tracks that looked like a single track. Never did say how, if at all, it would be possible to synchronize the two so precisely that they would actually look like a single train.
My big colliery will be empties in/loads out (2 identical trains) but doesn't have to be synchronized since the cars pass under the tipple and an immense (in horizontal dimension) loading bin, push in, pull out. Another track under the same tipple will live load open top cars using the reverse wood auger loader described in MR some years ago. Both loaded unit trains and loose-loaded cars will disappear into the netherworld loaded and return empty.
Haven't come up with a good answer to handling logs at the transloader - but it will have an overhead crane, so I should be able to figure out something.
I've had this old Vollmer loader since I was a kid. It was a big purchase at the time. The two chute doors are solenoid-operated. Coal is loaded into bins by removing the roof. Once loaded, you can fill 2 of those small hoppers with coal. (It's not working right now. I've got some work to do on it to get those doors to open and close.)
Here's one of the hopper cars at the other side of town, perched on the trestle where it dumps the coal. Again, these hoppers are as old as the loader. They are old Mantua models, and the "clamshell" hopper doors open when passing over a special piece of trackwork with a mechanical actuator. Then the coal dumps into a box below the layout, which I can remove to re-load the cars.
Yeah, it's a bit of a toy, and not a prototypical as some would like. To me, though, it's kind of fun, and it's still better than expecting some jolly fat guy to put a lump of coal in your hopper.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
Sorry about the sideways pic!! I edited it in Photobucket, but it still needs a 90 clockwise turn!! The rotary loader empties into a barge using a chain mechanism. The car rolls down an incline from the right (top), it is stopped and dumped, after being righted it rolls down an incline to the left (bottom), it goes through a spring loaded switch and then to an empty track. The pic was taken 10/28/07 at the Asbury Park, NJ model RR club show. Due to the tight aisles I was not able to get the entire model in one shot. This model was built entirely from scratch by one of their members (I wish I could remember his name!) in about one year!!
You could use a solenoid to dump coal from your flood loader into the empty cars, and then build the rotary dumper on the other side of your layout!!
Walthers made a rotary dumper several years ago, and there have been articles in this forum as to how to make one operational. It's an ambitious project, but it's do-able. My
Edit: After posting, the image "magicaly" turned right-side-up!! This has got to be right next to UFO's & History Channels Monster Quest!!
Yeah Brakie, it's a conundrum that just recently whacked me on the head. When I was first planning my layout - and the track elements are now pretty much glued in place - frankly I just didn't think enough about it. I didn't have enough knowledge to know at the time, or the refinement to realize it would be toylike. And Midnight, yup, I think you're right, as currently planned my flood loader would look silly in operations. But really, I just don't have the mechanical skills to pull off creating an intricate levered working flood loader right now, it's a bridge too far.
I suppose that I could indeed have the loader smack next to the wall on the other side of my layout, and do the empties in/loads out thing, and load it all behind the scenes. But I think it might look funny smack next to the wall too. Plus, it would wipe out the area for my sawmill.
I'm leaning towards just having the loader off scene, in hidden staging at the far end of my line. Just getting rid of the idea of having this cool-looking eastern flood loader on my layout itself. It's probably the simplest answer. And it would probably accurately reflect an eastern mountain gap branch w/tunnel which I'm trying to model, where empties go up the mountain, west, and full gons come down and head east, much like the action surrounding Clifton Forge VA area.
Serious operators has been pondering that dilemma for years and still can't find the best solution.
The majority goes with the empty in/load out method with great success.This is easy to accomplish if one runs double track behind a hill or tunnel between mine/flood loader to the end user be it a power plant,coke plant or steel mill.
But others have contend that is to limiting as far as prototype operation.
Why? What do you do if you have a power plant and coke plant?
Others contend its best to run loaded and empty hopper trains from staging to staging or staging to end user and rearrange the train between operation sessions..
My thoughts? I lean toward the empty in/loads out method.
Larry
Conductor.
Summerset Ry.
"Stay Alert, Don't get hurt Safety First!"
shawnee wrote: So I've planned my nice little track plan, and am building the layout in steady fashion, got my hands on an Walthers Eastern coal flood loader and havea nice spur to serve it, and suddenly realized...What's the point of having a flood loader if it doesn't load? Won't it look silly, the unit train moving through the flood loader starting empty and then...nothing really happens and it's still an empty when it comes out. What's the point in me having a flood loader that a unit train moves through? Aaargh.
So I've planned my nice little track plan, and am building the layout in steady fashion, got my hands on an Walthers Eastern coal flood loader and havea nice spur to serve it, and suddenly realized...
What's the point of having a flood loader if it doesn't load? Won't it look silly, the unit train moving through the flood loader starting empty and then...nothing really happens and it's still an empty when it comes out. What's the point in me having a flood loader that a unit train moves through? Aaargh.
Also, you'll have to have loaded cars that are still light enough to operate correctly.
Alternatively, you could work out your idea for out-of-view staging. That works very effectively.
I suppose if somebody has a lot of time and engineering talent, with deep pockets to match, almost any kind of animation is possible. Notice I said almost: I have yet to see anybody come out with HO scale preiser-type figures that actually walk or climb ladders!
As for me, the only thing currently self-propelled on my layout are the locomotives. I'm at a point in my life where other things (kids' education expenses, etc.) are gobbling up 99% of whatever money is leftover after paying my bills. I can still have fun with my layout in its current state, even though it wouldn't qualify for GMR...
BTW: I also had a coal floodloader on my layout, and had it setup where I could pour HO-scale-sized granulated coal down a funnel thru a keyhole in the roof, into the hoppers below it. But I stopped doing that because I learned that most businesses that consume coal only have it trucked-in if the mine is less than 100 miles away, so my original operating plan wasn't prototypical enough. Now my hoppers get filled in the staging yard.
-Ken in Maryland (B&O modeler, former CSX modeler)
What's the point of having a flood loader if it doesn't load? Won't it look silly, the unit train moving through the flood loader starting empty and then...nothing really happens and it's still an empty when it comes out. What's the point in me having a flood loader that a unit train moves through? Aaargh. This is causing me severe doubts. Wish I had this kind of sense olf context when I planned my track plan.
So I thought I'd asking about loading stuff into cars in general...
Do clubs and serious operators hand load hoppers during a session, have the Hand-of-God that "appears" and facilitate big stuff? At what time is the pretend Hand-of-God acceptable and not acceptable to you in operations? Do you manually load stuff as a regular regimen in operating your layout, and does that make it seem toy-like?
Should this be something that bothers me or I am just getting increasingly fussy about MR and my layout? Should I just axe the flood loader and have the unit trains come and go off scene, loaded and unloaded, by way of my hidden staging yard?
It's not an issue with boxcars or tank cars to me, since it's theoretically all happening inside or beside a facility in a static way. Open hoppers and gons, a different thing entirely as it's so apparent. Wish I had the mechanical acumen to make an effective working flood loader, but alas, I ain't that good.
Your thoughts and opinions much appreciated, and may help me to rationalize my compromises...