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Autorack Load, Strange Looking Cars.

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  • Member since
    July 2006
  • From: 4610 Metre's North of the Fortyninth on the left coast of Canada
  • 9,352 posts
Autorack Load, Strange Looking Cars.
Posted by BATMAN on Thursday, February 6, 2020 1:44 PM

WhistlingSmile, Wink & Grin

Image may contain: sky and outdoor

Brent

"All of the world's problems are the result of the difference between how we think and how the world works."

  • Member since
    January 2004
  • From: Canada, eh?
  • 13,375 posts
Posted by doctorwayne on Thursday, February 6, 2020 4:23 PM

Looks like plastic irrigation pipe/hose to me.  We see a lot of it here in the Niagara Peninsula, and I'd guess there to be lots of it used in the B.C. interior, too.

Wayne

  • Member since
    May 2010
  • From: SE. WI.
  • 8,253 posts
Posted by mbinsewi on Thursday, February 6, 2020 7:27 PM

So, is that a repurposed auto rack?  with the center deck removed? or is it something put together on a flat car for hauling the drain pipe?

Mike.

  • Member since
    July 2006
  • From: Chamberlain, ME
  • 5,084 posts
Posted by G Paine on Thursday, February 6, 2020 10:49 PM

To me, it looks like a set of racks built to transport the pipe. The supports for an auto rack would be much heavier to support tons of vehicles

George In Midcoast Maine, 'bout halfway up the Rockland branch 

  • Member since
    September 2003
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Posted by mlehman on Thursday, February 6, 2020 11:48 PM

doctorwayne
Looks like plastic irrigation pipe/hose to me.

Could also be what we in the Midwest call field tile - except it's now plastic instead of, umm, tile. In that case, it's used for drainage. Both look the same for modeling purposes, as the difference is that drainage tile has small slots or other pirecings that let the water into it to be carried away.

Interesting repurposing of the autorack for this bulky, low mass commodity.

Mike Lehman

Urbana, IL

  • Member since
    May 2010
  • From: SE. WI.
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Posted by mbinsewi on Friday, February 7, 2020 7:03 AM

I tried to look up the car in CP's roster, no luck.  Only a couple of cars in the 550000 series, and they are auto racks. 

So I guess this once was an auto rack, sides stripped off, and rebuilt to haul the drain tile.

You see alot of it on the road in semi trailers, repurposed the same way this flat car is.

Mike.

  • Member since
    September 2002
  • From: North Carolina
  • 1,905 posts
Posted by csxns on Friday, February 7, 2020 3:21 PM

mbinsewi
You see alot of it on the road in semi trailers,

Have a plant here that makes plastic tiles and they ship out by truck but the pellets to make the tile comes in covered hoppers so that is a win win for both modes.

Russell

  • Member since
    May 2010
  • From: SE. WI.
  • 8,253 posts
Posted by mbinsewi on Friday, February 7, 2020 8:38 PM

Yep, your right, the two places that I know of that make it get the pellets in railcars.

Mike.

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