Three Dome Tank Cars

[ROBERT HUNT]

We occasionally see multiple compartment tank cars here in the southeast on CSX and NS. They are for specialty chemicals that are not generally sold in quantities that would fill a larger car. The gentleman who lives near a large shipping source sees a mi-rad of different type multiple product cars.

[timbo]

Multiple 

[timbo]

Come to the Texas Eastman plant or UP yard in Longvie, TX. We regularly ship 3 and 4 compartment cars. some even on the BNSF.

[tree68]

Just saw a three dome tank car on the Deshler 360 cam - modern construction, too.

[Gramp]

Paul_D_North_Jr

Here are the 3 responses I received to Gramp's question above - the short answer is yes: 

"At one time, both Sea Land and Puerto Rico Maritime had 35' multiple-tank tank contaioenrs. These were "half-high" containers." 

"Here is a photo fof the Sea Land tank container I referred to...I saved this photo from a Facebook post...not my photo!" [sorry - I can't reproduce it here.]

"The word you're searching for is "multi-compartment"."

I did a search for "multi-compartment tank container" and found quite a few examples.  Here's a link to just one: http://peacock.eu/tank-container/t-14/ 

Good question - interesting answers.  Thanks for asking. 

- PDN. 

 

Thank you, Paul

[gntrain1]

tree68

I'm pretty sure Coors travels by rail...  In bulk.

 

tree68

I'm pretty sure Coors travels by rail...  In bulk.

 Yes, Coors is brewed in Golden Colorado and shipped via insulated tank cars to bottling plants across the States. They have a pretty good sized rail facility at the brewery. Coors is brewed only at the one location and then shiped in tank cars to be bottled elsewhere, unlike the other big national beers (Bud, Miller, Pabst and all of their variations) that are brewed in multiple locations and bottled on the spot. This means Coors uses only one source of water which results in better quality control and a consistant flavor no matter where you drink it.

[ericsp]

CShaveRR

Not Cargill, Eric...The old CWCX cars have been owned by Walter Haffner Company (a lessor, presumably) since 2003.

Thanks, that means RCP has some bad information.

[Paul_D_North_Jr]

Here are the 3 responses I received to Gramp's question above - the short answer is yes: 

"At one time, both Sea Land and Puerto Rico Maritime had 35' multiple-tank tank contaioenrs. These were "half-high" containers." 

"Here is a photo fof the Sea Land tank container I referred to...I saved this photo from a Facebook post...not my photo!" [sorry - I can't reproduce it here.]

"The word you're searching for is "multi-compartment"."

I did a search for "multi-compartment tank container" and found quite a few examples.  Here's a link to just one: http://peacock.eu/tank-container/t-14/ 

Good question - interesting answers.  Thanks for asking. 

- PDN. 

[tree68]

I'm pretty sure Coors travels by rail...  In bulk.

[allieq524]

Tank cars with "domes", one two, three, maybe 4, or more, (ICC/DOT 103 or 104 of AAR 203 or 204) pretty much went out of service by the mid-1980s, replaced by DOT 111s or AAR 211s.  Comparmented cars usually carried/carry more than commodity  - in the "olden days", a compartmented car may have carried various petroleum products for local delivery - gasoline, kerosene, diesel fuel etc.  The current non-pressure (general service) tank cars do not have "domes" - as with pressure tank cars, those circular "things" on the top are "protective housings".  

A good reference for contemperary tank cars is the Association of American Railroads' Bureau of Explosives' "Field Guide to Tank Cars", 3rd Edition, 2017.  Web search aar.org/boe, look under "Reference Materials."

[Randy Stahl]

ericsp

 

 

BaltACD

Spirits from Wine to maximum proof alcahol were delivered to distributor/bottlers by rail in days gone by and may still be today although I don't know of any specific examples.

 

 

 

The Gallo winery in Modesto, CA ships a lot of wine by rail. However, it is shipped in insulated boxcars. Modesto & Empire Traction hands the cars off to BNSF at Empire. They then leave on the H MOD___. The train’s destination has changed over the years. Right now I think it only makes it as far as Barstow, CA before being broken up (H MODBAR).

 

I have heard Railex, now UP Cold Connect, carries wine (possibly in conjunction with Railex Wine Services, LLC, which was not bought by UP).

 

I think Biagi Brothers ships wine by rail for California wineries.

I have also seen tank cars (single compartment) placarded for non-denatured ethanol (1170) and for alcoholic beverages, not otherwise specified (3065). Some of those tank cars have CWCX reporting marks, which is either Canadiagua Wine Company or Cargill.

 

The P&W is getting cryo cars of Gallo wine delivered to a Gallo warehouse in Worcester.

 

RSS

[CShaveRR]

Not Cargill, Eric...The old CWCX cars have been owned by Walter Haffner Company (a lessor, presumably) since 2003.

[ericsp]

BaltACD

Spirits from Wine to maximum proof alcahol were delivered to distributor/bottlers by rail in days gone by and may still be today although I don't know of any specific examples.

The Gallo winery in Modesto, CA ships a lot of wine by rail. However, it is shipped in insulated boxcars. Modesto & Empire Traction hands the cars off to BNSF at Empire. They then leave on the H MOD___. The train’s destination has changed over the years. Right now I think it only makes it as far as Barstow, CA before being broken up (H MODBAR).

 

I have heard Railex, now UP Cold Connect, carries wine (possibly in conjunction with Railex Wine Services, LLC, which was not bought by UP).

 

I think Biagi Brothers ships wine by rail for California wineries.

I have also seen tank cars (single compartment) placarded for non-denatured ethanol (1170) and for alcoholic beverages, not otherwise specified (3065). Some of those tank cars have CWCX reporting marks, which is either Canadiagua Wine Company or Cargill.

[Paul_D_North_Jr]

Gramp

Are the tanks moved on double stacks single tank containers?

Good question.  Most of them I've seen - and that's rarely - are pretty much just plain cylinders, without any domes.  

[SD70Dude]

BaltACD

Murphy Siding

samfp1943

I had a classmate who's family was in the wine and liquor business.  They received wine in three dome, and other multiple domed tank cars, the capacity was not huge, by any means. The wine was used to package several really, cheap wines. NightTrain, MadDog20/20, are a couple , I can recall, and several others [basicly what would have been referred to as 'head busters' ].  They always seemed to have a couple of those tank cars hooked up out back. 

      Off track a bit... I recall a cartoon attributed to the New Yorker magazine. It was of a semi tanker truck. The sign painted on the side said "Cheap white wine".

      If wine was delivered in a tank car, did the receiving liquor distributors put it in wine bottles?

Yes - the same as if it had been delivered to the distributor/bottler in a railroad tank car.  Spirits from Wine to maximum proof alcahol were delivered to distributor/bottlers by rail in days gone by and may still be today although I don't know of any specific examples.

The Crown Royal distillery in Gimli, Manitoba still uses tank cars.

[BaltACD]

Murphy Siding

 

samfp1943

I had a classmate who's family was in the wine and liquor business.  They received wine in three dome, and other multiple domed tank cars, the capacity was not huge, by any means. The wine was used to package several really, cheap wines. NightTrain, MadDog20/20, are a couple , I can recall, and several others [basicly what would have been referred to as 'head busters' ].  They always seemed to have a couple of those tank cars hooked up out back. 

      Off track a bit... I recall a cartoon attributed to the New Yorker magazine. It was of a semi tanker truck. The sign painted on the side said "Cheap white wine".

      If wine was delivered in a tank car, did the receiving liquor distributors put it in wine bottles?

Yes - the same as if it had been delivered to the distributor/bottler in a railroad tank car.  Spirits from Wine to maximum proof alcahol were delivered to distributor/bottlers by rail in days gone by and may still be today although I don't know of any specific examples.

[Murphy Siding]

samfp1943

I had a classmate who's family was in the wine and liquor business.  They received wine in three dome, and other multiple domed tank cars, the capacity was not huge, by any means. The wine was used to package several really, cheap wines. NightTrain, MadDog20/20, are a couple , I can recall, and several others [basicly what would have been referred to as 'head busters' ].  They always seemed to have a couple of those tank cars hooked up out back. 

      Off track a bit... I recall a cartoon attributed to the New Yorker magazine. It was of a semi tanker truck. The sign painted on the side said "Cheap white wine".

      If wine was delivered in a tank car, did the receiving liquor distributors put it in wine bottles?

[Gramp]

Are the tanks moved on double stacks single tank containers?

[BaltACD]

ATSFGuy

Could three dome tankers come back at some point?

I doubt it - tank car customers, for the most part if not all, have geared their facilities to be able to handle the maximum size loads of the commodities they handle.

Back in the day of the triple dome tank cars, locomotive fuel tanks were nominally 1500 gallons or less - today's locomotives have fuel tanks in the 4000-5000 gallon range.  Everything in shipping today has been Super Sized!  Would you like fries with that?

[ATSFGuy]

Could three dome tankers come back at some point?

[CShaveRR]

I remember as recently as 1970 seeing a gas station (on Eastern Avenue, SE, in Grand Rapids) that would receive a three-dome tank car at a spur which was right next to it.  There may also have been a fuel-oil distributorship there.

The multi-compartment cars one would see back then had mostly riveted-body tanks, and it was easy to see how they were divided into compartments.  The old three-domedoil cars lasted pretty much through the 1970s.  Chemical companies who needed such cars had leased newer ones with welded carbodies, but those were relatively rare.

Throughout the 1970s, if one were looking for them, one could find single-dome tank cars that showed evidence of having been rebuilt from multi-compartment cars.  That would probably have required new tanks, but the same old insulation with rivet lines where the domes had previously protruded.  

Of course, domes began to disappear from tank cars built beginning in about 1960.  All of the major carbuilders still built multi-compartment cars.  General American had most of the cars that were used by the wine companies.  These were twice as big as the old six-dome tank cars (one wonders whether those could have been painted as side-by-side flasks or canteens!), and came in many configurations--two, three, or four compartments, some with equal-sized tanks and some with tanks of differing sizes.  Union Tank Car would generally build the cars for fuel companies, with three equal-sized compartments (they also had a good-sized fleet of two-compartment tanks with the manways surrounded by a single platform; I don't know who leased most of those).  ACF had some three-compartment cars that were leased by anyone from fuel companies to chemical companies to food processors.

Since the 1990s, very few of these cars have been built.  Lubricating oils still are carried in such cars on occasion, and most of the cars that have been built are for petrochemical companies:  ExxonMobil, Chevron, etc.  Cars built after 2000 (the most recent I've found were built in 2012) are numbered in the dozens, instead of the hundreds or thousands.

[Semper Vaporo]

You'll have to grade on the curve if you give tests without giving people a chance to study for them!

[7j43k]

A reply:

a test only

[ericsp]

jeffhergert

I have seen one detrucked and up on legs used, at least at one time, as a storage tank.  At one time, it wasn't unusual to see the former small retired and detrucked tank cars in small towns being used for storage.  Not so much anymore.

Jeff 

 

If I remember correctly, the California Fire Code prohibits using tank cars to store flammable fluids. Tank cars used as storage tanks before that was added may be grandfathered in (I am not sure). If other states have done the same thing then that would explain less tank cars being used as storage tanks.

[Paul_D_North_Jr]

A quick Google search found this photo, which reminds me of my Lionel triple-dome tank car: 

http://www.trovestar.com/generic/zoom.php?id=141926 

Or this one, at the nearby (?) Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania:

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:RR97.36_Three-dome_tank_car_No._4556.JPG 

Or this thread on the Model Railroader Forum:

http://cs.trains.com/mrr/f/13/t/262669.aspx  

- PDN. 

[DSchmitt]

https://www.tangentscalemodels.com/general-american-6000-gal-3-comp-tank-car/

"These tank cars were extremely long lived, lasting well into the 1970s and 1980s with virtually no modifications. "

[7j43k]

Besides shipping different commodities and different grades of the same, another reason to have multi-compartment cars is so that you can VERY CLEARLY deliver three shipments to three different customers. 

 

Consider the problem:  You deliver a 10,000 gallon car to a customer who is only supposed to draw down 3000 gallons.  With only one tank, there's the problem of when to stop.  Or is that whether....?

But with a 3-tank car, you can tell the first customer to empty tank A.  Very simple. No arguments.

 

Just a thought.

 

 

Ed

[SD70Dude]

jeffhergert

I have seen one detrucked and up on legs used, at least at one time, as a storage tank.  At one time, it wasn't unusual to see the former small retired and detrucked tank cars in small towns being used for storage.  Not so much anymore.

There are still a few of those in use in my area.

What is more common is to see old covered hoppers being used as storage bins in farmyards.  And of course plenty of boxcars have been converted into storage sheds, both on and off railroad property.

And this is to say nothing of trailers or sea-cans.

The two that stand out for me are a wooden Northern Alberta Railways stock car that CN Engineering still uses as a shed in Peace River, AB, and a "Conrail Mercury"-painted trailer that somehow found its way into a farmer's field just outside of Seba Beach, AB.

Lots of neat, old stuff still out there.

[jeffhergert]

About 1987-88 I saw one of those elderly three dome tank cars in storage on a Iowa Interstate siding , along with other cars.  There was a strike looming on the CNW and it was said the UP was going to temporarily route some trains over the IAIS.  Since it was expected this siding would be needed to make train meets, the storage cars disappeared and I never saw the tank car again.

I have seen one detrucked and up on legs used, at least at one time, as a storage tank.  At one time, it wasn't unusual to see the former small retired and detrucked tank cars in small towns being used for storage.  Not so much anymore.

Jeff