MisterBeasley wrote: There are quite a few of these things on eBay right now if you search for "Mantua Hopper." The listing with the 2 engines actually shows gondolas, not hoppers, though. Some of these are for sugar hoppers, but they look to have the same operating doors, although there's a cover on them and I'm not sure how you would load them. Might be a fun way to sweeten your coffee, though. Oh, and I just noticed that you're new here. Welcome aboard! And, if you click on the photos, they will show up in a slightly larger window. That's a general property of photos posted here, I think.
There are quite a few of these things on eBay right now if you search for "Mantua Hopper." The listing with the 2 engines actually shows gondolas, not hoppers, though. Some of these are for sugar hoppers, but they look to have the same operating doors, although there's a cover on them and I'm not sure how you would load them. Might be a fun way to sweeten your coffee, though.
Oh, and I just noticed that you're new here. Welcome aboard! And, if you click on the photos, they will show up in a slightly larger window. That's a general property of photos posted here, I think.
Also, on Ebay, do a search for "Tyco Hopper." I think more of them were manufactured and sold under the Tyco name. You might also want to look for the "Hopper Car Unloading Set." These sets include the ramp that opens the bottom doors, plus some track pieces and a platform for trainset use. If you're patient and keep looking, you can probably get the hoppers for around $10.00 each and the unloading set for around $20.00. We're coming up on Christmas, so the prices will probably peak soon.
And yes, the sugar hoppers were the same car with a lift off cover. They also had a cement hopper with a cover that was lower than the sugar hopper one, but they're hard to find, and expensive when you do.
It's usually easier to run both locos on the head end, as mid-way through their run, the train needs to be reversed. The usual practice is to use the locos to run the caboose around the train, then the doubleheaded locos run light to a nearby wye, for turning. When the train is reassembled, they're on their way. This operational headache (feature?) is due to the fact that the layout is a point-to-point-to-point: basically a "Y" shape, with the two "arms" of the "Y" stacked atop one another, as a double deck. There's no room for a loop, so the train runs from the end of one arm of the "Y", does the direction change at the junction of the two arms, then, after turning, proceeds to the end of the other arm. The loaded train moves uphill most of the way; 2.5% on the first arm of the "Y", then 2.8% on the second arm. The latter grade is laid out around two horseshoe curves, laid out in opposite directions, and is about 45' long. I run DC, but most of my locos will run quite well together, either doubleheaded or at the front and rear of a train, so it's generally not too much of a problem going uphill. A rear end helper going downhill can cause problems however, especially if the lead loco has excessive play in the drive train. If you use DCC, you could run the front and rear locos separately, preferably with separate operators, and have much better control. I have run a 65 car train (not loaded hoppers) up the long grade, which resulted in the train wound around those two reverse horseshoe curves, a good opportunity for disaster regardless of where the motive power is placed. I used four modified Athearn Mikes, distributed throughout the train at roughly equal intervals, and ran at a very low speed. I really just wanted to see if it would work, as there's no point to it in day-to-day operations. There were two minor derailments, attributable to individual cars, on the uphill trip. Because the grade ends abruptly where I have yet to build the second level of the layout, I had to back the train down the hill. Surprisingly, there were no derailments. The only really "touchy" aspect of the whole move was that the higher of the two big curves is right at the edge of the layout, and there is no scenery yet installed on the inside of the curve, either. I love a challenge.
Wayne
There was an old Smothers Brothers routine that went something like this:
Dick Smothers: My old man's a cotton pickin', finger-lickin' chicken plucker,
What do you think about that?
Tom Smothers: I think you'd better not make any mistakes.
The same goes for using rear-added helpers on a trainload of hoppers with real "coal" loads. I'd imagine there's quite an art to doing that successfully. If you mismatch the speeds either way going around a curve, you're going to derail the cars. Wayne, do you have experience doing this? How well does it work? Am I right in assuming it's pretty touchy?
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
Graham, the hoppers that you're planning to use are quite a bit bigger than the Athearn 34-footers in my train, so Mister Beasley's suggestion of using Woodland Scenics' Cinders for the loads is probably a good idea. I'd guesstimate that your cars are about 50% larger, so, using the material that I use, if you can obtain it, your 24 car train would weigh about 288 ounces. As it stands, a pair of modified Athearn Mikados will pull my train up a curving 2.8% grade: the maximum train length was determined by the length of passing sidings, then the locos were modified to to suit the situation. My minimum mainline radius is 30"; the smaller the radius, the greater the effect of the grade and also the possibility of "stringlining" the train. Whatever you decide to use for loads, you might want to consider splitting the locomotive distribution between the front and rear ends of the train, at least on the uphill run. I have found, though, that it's worth the trouble to avoid leaving rear-end helpers on the downhill run, unless, of course, you use DCC and a separate operator for each set of locomotives.
MisterBeasley
The lighter Woodlands Scenic material may work better on trains that will travel through helixes (max 1.75 turns) albeit downhill. The loaded and unloaded weight of the cars will also be less different.
The Spiral will effectively be a helix on the way up but not on the way down. There will be one other helix that will be for both directions. Minimum radius will be what I call 27 "metric" inches (ie 675mm at 25mm to an inch. The correct conversion is 25.4mm to an inch so my real radius will be 26.57 inches)
The Challenge with any material used will be to have it light enough to "load" evenly (enough weight to form natural batter slopes in the hopper) but not be so heavy that I need more loco's than hoppers (metaphorically speaking) to move the train.
The other material that has come to mind (although it has obvious down sides) is mouse poop. This is because we are in the midst of a VERY severe drought at the moment (less than 3mm rain for October (springtime) so far (<10% of average around 50mm)) and so the little blighters are getting inside looking for food, and leaving their little messages behind. But the messages are a good size and look about right so....probably not.
Anyway, it's bedtime for me, so catcha later.
God Bless
Graham
As a follow-up note, I've been using Woodland Scenics black cinders (medium grade, I think, if the cinders come in grades) as my "coal" loads. It seems to work pretty well, and it's light. The old Mantua cars are pretty heavy, with cast metal bases and hopper doors and a plastic superstructure. Fortunately, the weight is all down low, so they tend to be pretty stable on the tracks.
Are you going to run these on a helix? I'd be afraid that a hang-up of one of the cars at the back of the train would result in the whole thing being pulled off into the center of the spiral, dumping all the coal.
I ran these same cars with coal loads 40 years ago as a teenager. Back then, I routinely had derailments and dumped a few car loads, so I developed a technique to recover the coal. I took a handkerchief or other piece of reasonably fine-threaded but clean cloth, and put it over the end of a vacuum-cleaner hose, without the floor attachment. I wrapped my hand tightly around the cloth, so only one layer of cloth covered the hose opening. Then, when I powered up the vacuum, I found I could pick up and catch the coal in the handkerchief without having it go into the tube. Yes, I got some dust and scenery mixed in, but it was better than buying all new coal every time I had an accident.
Thanks all. There are some productive lines of investigation I can now investigate. I suspect I will end up tracking down one of the Mantua or Athearn hoppers and then modifying the ideas to fit the hoppers modelled on the prototypes used in NSW.
Go to http://www.auscisionmodels.com.au/ and click on the "Products" tag and look at the "NHFF" Coal Hopper to see the type of unit I will be running (or similar earlier prototypes that I have from another manufacturer)
Wayne - The ideas for loads of coal are worth investigating but the weight will make life interesting. Thankfully the loaded run is downhill or level (it will drop around 24 inches from loading to unloading, part of which will be down a 4% grade - This is not as bad as it seems, - see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bethungra_Spiral_(railway) or http://www.artc.com.au/docs/systems/pdf/southern_region_ric003_lb.pdf on the very far right of the page (schematic only) for the prototype the location with this grade will be based on. Due to relative space of prototype vs model and the resulting compromises needed the "up" and "down" grades on my model will be about 2.2% and 4% respectively...but I digress)
I will be running about 24 coal car trains so the weight loaded and un-loaded will be a challenge.
As for potential deailments - the cleanup may take time but isn't that a prototype challenge too??!!
Anyway, when I can get my AutoCAD file into Jpeg format I'll post some of my design ideas.
PS I should have said "Good Morning" to all you lazy people who have been sleeping while I have worked hard all day - its 9pm Wednesday here but 6am Wednesday "Forum Time". But I can't talk. The roles will be reversed within an hour or two...
Yes, Mantua did make these in the 1960's. They are 38-footers. I've got a fleet of 10 left over from my teenage years, plus one additional one I picked up used at an LHS in New Hampshire. I replaced the Talgo truck-mounted couplers with Kadee #5's mounted on the body. This photo was taken to illustrate the tame grafitti that came on the car when new:
Here's a shot of my unloading ramp with another car dumping coal.
This is the ramp insert, again saved for lo, these 40 years of wandering in the wilderness:
The ramp was originally a cream-colored plastic, and came glued into a piece of Atlas snap-track. I've re-painted it black and added lots of Instant Rust, which can also be seen on the girders in the second picture. I build a "volcano" of foam and coated it with WS cinders, and then mounted the catch-box under the layout below the volcano's "crater," which is actually a hole through the layout.
Finally, this is my loading facility, an ancient Vollmer kit. The doors open with solenoids:
If you look at the unloading ramp, you'll see that it is substantially above the rail heads. I can't run any of my locomotives over it, although most freight cars will pass easily. So, you would really want to put one of these on a dead-end siding with space for a few cars beyond it, and shuffle the cars in a few at a time. Other people remember having problems with the coal loads, but my recollection is that they were OK unless you ran them over one of the uncoupler ramps designed for horn-hooks. Those would trip the hopper doors every time. The doors are aluminum (I think) so they are not affected by Kadee magnetic uncoupler ramps. Of course, all bets are off if you dump the cars due to a derailment.
If I recall correctly, the older Athearn 4 bay, offset-side hopper has opening hopper doors, although I don't know if that version is still being made. A modern unit train operation wouldn't likely be using that type of hopper, though. I think that one of the "bathtub-type" cars would be more appropriate. Unloading would be done with a rotary dumper, so you'd need a rotating coupler on one end of each of your cars if you wished to have an operating unloading facility. I use loose coal loads on my 1930s-era layout, although the loads are loaded or emptied manually. Single cars are delivered to individual customers, and a 12 car "unit" train, of hoppers only, makes a tri-weekly trip to a power plant. Unloading or reloading takes place between operating sessions. If you're going to run loose loads, you need a cheap source of "coal". Mine comes from two sources: the major one is locomotive traction grit. I got mine from the steel plant where I used to work. It's used instead of sand for locomotive traction. The size is good for HO, and the material has a bit of a sparkle to it, much like hard coal. The main drawbacks of it are finding a source, and the fact that some particles seem to be iron-based, and therefore, magnetic. I've had no problems because of this, though, and also use it loose in locomotive tenders. It's also rather dense: that 12 car train, plus a caboose, weighs 100 ounces, and is a real test for motive power on heavy grades. The other "coal" that I use is coke breeze, which is basically very fine industrial coke. This stuff is a very dark grey, with a fair amount of dust included, and only an occasional "sparkly" element. It's actually a better stand-in for coal in a loco tender, but its main disadvantages are that it's quite dirty and very abrasive. I've had almost no problems with spillage due to derailments using either substance, and clean-up, when necessary, is simple: I use a soft, wide brush to brush the spill onto a sheet of paper, saving the bulk of it for re-use, then vacuum up the remainder.
Here are a couple of pictures showing the traction grit "coal". The locomotive is a modified Athearn Mikado.
Same location, the loco this time is a modified Bachmann USRA Light Mountain.
An finally, the only hopper picture that I could find showing the "coal" load.
Sorry, but I was unable to locate any pictures of the coke breeze "coal".
Not made anymore, but Tyco/Mantua made a small twin bay open hopper that worked. The doors where more like ballast hopper doors and closed by gravity. Tyco had a special ramp that forced the doors open when the car was moved over it. I had one back in the 60's and IIRC, the doors did not close real tight or sort of bounced open when going over switches. A small trail of material would be left in the switches.
Also, I think Ulrich may have had a 4 bay car that could be opened with some sort of lever on on one side. The big problem with 'open' loads was they if you had a derailment, there was a major cleanup to be done - and there always seemed to be a derailment at the worst time....
Jim
Modeling BNSF and Milwaukee Road in SW Wisconsin
Has anyone ever modelled, or does any company make HO scale coal hoppers that can be discharged via the bottom hopper door?
I am modelling Australian Outline and, having grown up in a coal producing area, I am keen to model modern coal unit trains. The layout design I am working on can allow for the loading part of the trip via a balloon loop (some may call it a flood loader), but the unloading is more of a challenge.
At this stage this whole process is mainly a bunch of ideas floating around in my head and slowly getting on to paper (screen actually) and any ideas that may help for any part of this loading/unloading cycle would be useful. I will also have to experiment to determine what materials are best for the coal (not real coal as it creates too much dust).
If you can make sense of these ramblings, any ideas would be useful.
GrahamNSW, Australia