Rotary Hoppers

[miniwyo]

I have heard a lot about rotary hoppers on here, how do they work? I think I know but I just want to clarify.

Thanks!!

[Anonymous]

I used to work security at a power plant that burned coal and fuel oil. I used to watch the coal trains come into the plant. The cars, all connected together, would one by one be pushed into a garage type building. Once the coal car was inside, these huge arms, 2 per side, would raise up and grip the top lip of the car. Then, the floor would actually rotate, turning the car upside down, which dumped the coal under the building. From there, conveyor belts would feed the coal to a machine that would spill the coal out into a huge mound. In the winter time, the coal can freeze and stick to the sides of the car. Before the car entered the dumping building, it would pass in front of these flame nozzles, 3 per side of the car, to heat the sides and melt the ice. That's why you may see 3 huge rust spots, or, discoloration on the sides. Those are caused by the flame torches. By day, a huge auger is operated that runs on a type of railroad track, cruising up and down that track while the operator would cut into the coal pile with the auger buckets. Then, the coal traveled along conveyor belts to feed the boilers. The scarey part is: on weekends and nights, that giant auger machine was automated, and you'd be walking along, half asleep because you're on the midnight shift, and all of a sudden that machine automatically came to life! Scares the #@*! out of you! And, you'd see this machine moving on its own, with feelers, looking to bump into the coal, then, it would dig in, move up & down its track all by itself. I don't miss those days!

[miniwyo]

Thanks guys. That is acctually how I thought they worked but wasn't sure. You all have been a real help. Thanks again

[CShaveRR]

Fascinating story about the lignite gons. I wish I'd seen them when they had roofs.

I've seen them in recent years; they're owned by the David J. Joseph Company, which often gets secondhand cars to lease to various users (including railroads, on occasion).

BPSX 201-462 became DJJX 4000-4199 and 4800-4849. Of those cars, 120 went to ECDC Environmental (ECXX 96001-96120), and are used for the transportation of "dirty dirt"; they were later relettered to UPCX 96001-96120.

More recently, the Depew, Lancaster & Western Railroad has gotten a few (ten or less) of the DJJX gons.

(Can you tell this is right up my alley?)

[CShaveRR]

That's only 262 cars originally, 250 of which survived to be relettered DJJX. I forget what the breakdown is, but they were built in two distinct groups, several years apart (possibly a reaction to deteriorating MILW conditions, as you say).

[Overmod]

I seem to remember somewhere that rotary dumpers were used to empty boxcars... if memory serves, loaded with grain or a similar bulk cargo. It poured out through the doors... IIRC there was a picture of the operation in one of the magazines many years ago. (No, I did not inhale whe I was younger... that is, inhale anything other than beer...)

[Anonymous]

There was a series in another magazine (won't mention the name, but it's published in colorado) that went on for a few issues dealing with grain traffic in the days before the covered hopper, using boxcars. They had pictures of the dump mechanisms (which basically tilted the car to one side, then rocked it end to end to complete the dump. The series wasn't that long ago (within past 2 years).

Tim

[mvlandsw]

QUOTE: Originally posted by ericsp

QUOTE: Originally posted by M.W. Hemphill

A rotary coupler is what you're referring to: it could be mounted to any open top car, a gondola, hopper, or ore car of any shape, to make it a rotary-dump car.

If you wanted to create a conversation piece or waste money, you could put a rotary coupler on a car with a roof.

You could use it to ship Ole Frothingslosh, the beer with the foam on the bottom.

[Overmod]

You HAD to get me thinking about Iron City Beer, didn't you...

Would FATima still drink her Olde Frothingslosh if the car turned it upside-down when unloaded? Not so special when the foam on the bottom is now on the top...

Reminds me of the way to shut up stereotypical boastful Texans... ask them if it's true that Texas has the largest midgets?

If Jiminy Cricket were a Sufi, would he qualify as a rotary hopper... ?

[jeffhergert]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Overmod

I seem to remember somewhere that rotary dumpers were used to empty boxcars... if memory serves, loaded with grain or a similar bulk cargo. It poured out through the doors... IIRC there was a picture of the operation in one of the magazines many years ago. (No, I did not inhale whe I was younger... that is, inhale anything other than beer...)

Quaker Oats in Cedar Rapids, Iowa had something like that. Of course, it didn't empty the entire contents of the car, and whatever was left inside had to be manually cleaned out.

[Allen Jenkins]

Covered hoppers, have been dumped since the seventies, at the Port of Tampa CSX Florida Phosphate Shipload facility, at Rockport, Port of Tampa, Florida. The load is phosphate fertilizer ingredient. (DAP, TSP, GTSP). Idler cars, are inherant. One car at a time, and they claim ownership of the invention. Each car, looks like any other hopper, was an ACL car, and has a rotary coupler at one end. They are never uncoupled during the process, and the top doors are the conventional round, or square hatch doors. The bottom doors, are also conventional hopper doors, no longer used. Heron Rail Video, displays the system, in their video, CSX Bone Valley! ACJ.

[jeaton]

Allen

Let me get this straight. This is a pretty much standard covered hopper, trough on top, typical hopper doors? Uncoupled for the dump? If so, how much faster to unload?

Jay

[edblysard]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Overmod


Reminds me of the way to shut up stereotypical boastful Texans... ask them if it's true that Texas has the largest midgets?

Yep, its true, we do.
And we lease them out to the Lakers so they can have something that looks like a pro team...

Remember the Alamo...

Ed[8D]

[Allen Jenkins]

Hoss, let me tell you, the Walthers Rotary woodchip dump, is this one. Enclosed in a building, with only one rotary coupler per car, and idler on the head end, to be pulled to spot the first hopper to the dump (many an empty ACL dry rock covered hopper), an old rebuilt four bay shorty, 70t. converted to 100t. Pennsy called them "pregnant", this car, actually has a roof, that is capable of hinging on either side of the car. Al Westerfield, has produced this car, in HO, under the ACL roadname, albiet a sand car? Millions, of long tonnage, have been shipped to world portage, this mode. Any short side hopper in the Port of Tampa Rockport Facility, is this. Anyway, ACJ.

[Anonymous]

Hi folks, I could not stop by this topic with out smiling a bit. Years ago when I was in my twenties I worked with Southern Company's Georgia Power Co. We had some plants that used rotery hoppers (Plants Yates, Hammond and Harley Branch), but the real show was the crossover dump trestles at Plants Wansley and Sherer that dumped the coal through the bottom doors of the gondolas (that's gon-dola in Georgia Power speak) down onto the coal handling aprons for movemet to storage or directly into the plant. Three to Four 80 car trains a day just to keep the plant going. Rotery is great to see up close where space is a constraint, but bottom dumps when space is available is fun to watch, quick in delivery, and smooth (for the most part) in delivery. They were sprung open (another GPC term) through trip levers that were activitated when the train crossed onto the property. I was never told how that was done, but I'm sure that it was unique.

[jeaton]

ACJ-Got it, what I thought it might be.

Piouslion- Maybe you knew about this.
In the mid 1980's, the Reed rail-barge transfer operation just above Kentucky Damn on the Tennessee built a harbor on the east side of the IC (now P&L) tracks with the channel back to Kentucky Lake wide enough set two coal barges under the railroad bridge. The rail over the channel was anchored to a couple of BIG beams forming the bridge, thus leaving space for the coal to drop through to the bages positioned below.

None of that fancy air door stuff, the doors were knocked open by hand, drop the shakers on each of the two spotted cars, empty cars, lift the shakers, move forward two cars, repeat the process.

I'd swear I saw a 100 car train dumped in less than hour.