Questions about 50ft IPD boxcars rebuilt for extended height.

[chutton01]

The questions being:
    How common was this over the decades (starting in the 1980s I guess)?
    What was the most common height extension - 6in, 8in, 10in+?
    Was there a specific capacity aimed for in most cases?
    Was it more common to use a new roof (perhaps a flat vs. a peaked roof) for the rebuilding, or just reuse the old roof welded to the new frame extension.  I'm guessing the later.

As may be apparent, I have been watching too many videos over the past few months (including the now seemingly more mellow Jaw Tooth), and these extended height rebuilds, while not everywhere, seem common enough.
To illustrate further, this article "SLR extended-height boxcars" has a little background and several images of a group of such boxcars that ended up on the SLR (at least they were there in 2016),
Thanks

 

[BaltACD]

Customers change the specifications of the products they intend to ship - to retain the business (if they desier to) the carriers change the configuration of the cars that are assigned to move the business.

[chutton01]

Well, yes BaltACD, that is true, and in fact I recall reading that from the 1990s onward almost all boxcars built for use in the US and Canada were of the "Extended Height" (Plate F? - with the white top end panel) category, 50ft and 60ft, so it makes a lot of sense that IPD era boxcars would also be rebuilt with extended height for greater capacity.

Unfortunately my searches on how often this was done, what kind of capacity increase was most common, and various other topics of interest was not as fruitful as I hoped, considering there seems to be a decent, non-zero amount of these extended height cars on the rails even today.  The SLR site I linked to in the OP was helpful and interesting, but the configuration of that height extension is different from others that I have seen on-line (usually not remaked upon, which is the problem).  I am just wondering if people know better sources of info.

Thanks

[BaltACD]

chutton01

Well, yes BaltACD, that is true, and in fact I recall reading that from the 1990s onward almost all boxcars built for use in the US and Canada were of the "Extended Height" (Plate F? - with the white top end panel) category, 50ft and 60ft, so it makes a lot of sense that IPD era boxcars would also be rebuilt with extended height for greater capacity.

Unfortunately my searches on how often this was done, what kind of capacity increase was most common, and various other topics of interest was not as fruitful as I hoped, considering there seems to be a decent, non-zero amount of these extended height cars on the rails even today.  The SLR site I linked to in the OP was helpful and interesting, but the configuration of that height extension is different from others that I have seen on-line (usually not remaked upon, which is the problem).  I am just wondering if people know better sources of info.

Thanks

By mentioning IPD I suspect you are referring to Incentive Per Diem - a program that was pushed by the bean counter community to 'remedy' a percieved shortage of railroad equipment.  

The game was that financiers would by several hundred cars of the type that would qualify for the enhanced 'IPD' charges and home road them on a 2 mile long 'Short Line' and designate the cars as free runners - load them anywhere EXCEPT back to the home road.  The home road accrues the per diem revenue from any railroad the cars happen to be on at any point in time.  How successful the game was from either the car supply or per diem revenue aspects I have no idea.

[chutton01]

True BaltACD, I am using IPD as shorthand for the large number of outside-post 50ft (and some 60ft) XM/XML boxcars build from the midish-70s to about 1981 (a convention used by several model railroad magazines, now gone, even for non-IPD cars like Railbox). BTW, the consensus was the IPD program was successful to a degree in the environment it was proposed under, and not so much afterwards as changes in the rules, and more importantly a manufacturing recession at that time, greatly reduced the need for additional boxcars, and in fact during the 1980s very few general service boxcars were build. This article gives an overview for the (very) few who might not know that (I believe that MR talked about this in its Freight Cars of the 70s series as well). 

Alas, the above still doesn't help me much with finding some decent info on the different extended height rebuilds I have seen in media...

[ORNHOO]

BaltACD

Customers change the specifications of the products they intend to ship - to retain the business (if they desier to) the carriers change the configuration of the cars that are assigned to move the business.

Back in the 1970's the company I worked for shipped boxes of fruit (pears, mostly) in PFE reefers. When I started we were limited to stacking the 42 pound boxes eight high from end to end by the weight limit of the car. After a couple of years the load limit was increased to where the boxes were stacked nine high, then after a few more years we could stack ten high (all the way to the ceiling) when the railroad increased the load limit once again. Did the increase in weight limits create an incentive for higher cube cars?

[chutton01]

ORNHOO

Did the increase in weight limits create an incentive for higher cube cars?

That I am pretty sure is true (again to a degree), part of the old "Cube Out" vs "Weigh Out" debate.  Railroads seem to have been saying "why not avoid both?" for decades now. Its why track weight limits are being raised to 286k (and in some cases 315), and why almost all new N.A. Boxcars are (I believe) plate F, such as this - to cram more/heavier ladings in per car (and as a bonus, you might not need as many.freight cars in your fleet). This applies to gondola, covered hoppers, tank cars and so on as well.

So that why those IPDs boxcars rebuilds had their side extended, for extra capacity (don't know if they replaced the trucks from 70t to 100t standards).

[rwclx]

[quote user="chutton01"]

 

 

ORNHOO

Did the increase in weight limits create an incentive for higher cube cars?

 

 

That I am pretty sure is true (again to a degree), part of the old "Cube Out" vs "Weigh Out" debate.  Railroads seem to have been saying "why not avoid both?" for decades now. Its why track weight limits are being raised to 286k (and in some cases 315), and why almost all new N.A. Boxcars are (I believe) plate F, such as this - to cram more/heavier ladings in per car (and as a bonus, you might not need as many.freight cars in your fleet). This applies to gondola, covered hoppers, tank cars and so on as well.

So that why those IPDs boxcars rebuilds had their side extended, for extra capacity (don't know if they replaced the trucks from 70t to 100t standards

 

IPD Boxcars are a complex subject. Most, as has been said, were built between the mid 1970s and about 1981. There was an actual shortage of QUALITY boxcars for high class freight shipments, such as paper. The ICC agreed with the IPD concept to put more cars into the fleet nationally. The compensation for the cars was complex, but consisted of a mileage component (low) and a time component (higher paid by the hour), collectively these were referred to as "Car Hire". The mileage and time rates were set by an ICC approved formula based on the original cost of the car. As the cars aged, the rates came down. An exception was that if a car was rehabilitated or rebuilt, the car would earn car hire rates based on the depreciated value of the original investment PLUS the cost of the rehab. Again this was all formula driven. The system worked well and encouraged both new investment and rehabilitation.

Then several changes hit at once. First, there was a recession in the early 80s which depressed demand for cars. Second, the Railroads were deregulated and they then could offer lower rates in shipper furnished cars. Third, Conrail was created (more later). Fourth, the major railroads who controllled Trailer Train decided that TTX should provide boxcars at agreed upon contract rates, which became RAILBOX. New investment dried up, as the railroads covered their orders with their own cars or Railnbox and lots of IPD cars were stored. Car Service Rules were changed in a way that allowed IPD cars to be returned to the road whose marks were on the car.....Bad because most of those roads had little or no loading for the cars.

Most IPD boxcars were built as 70 ton (capacity) and either 10'6" ("Plate B") or 11'1" ("Plate C") interior heights. These dimensions pretty much duplicated the Railbox cars. As the IPD cars became surplus, the owning leasing companies had to make them attractive so they would be leased again. Differrent leasing companies did different things. Some raised the interior height from Plate B to C. A small number were converted to 100 Ton capacity (MUCH more complicated than just changing the trucks: Underframe, draft gear and car height (distance from Top of Rail to vertical center line of the coupler) all required modification. How the Leasing Company Owner, and their selected contract shop, made the changes was left to them, which is why there is NO uniformity to how roofs were raised. This is just a VERY short form answer.

Conrail?? Created by the Government to save the Northeast Railroads. Much more received traffic in other people's cars than they originated in their own. Paid out MUCH more Car Hire to others than they collected on their own cars (hundreds of millions of dollars annually.....A lot of it in IPD Boxcar costs). Conrail recruited most of the large roads to go to the Government and scrap the Car Hire compensation in favor of a "Free Market" solution......Which came to be called "Deprescription". The car owner had to negotiate new Car Hire rates with each road in North America. Since the big roads (both east and west) had the negotiating power, Car Hire rates fell something like 50-60%. The exception was to Boxcars marked with Shortlines marks as of December 31, 1981.....These ccars were "Grandfathered" and their CH rates frozen for the rest of their life......and many still exist today.

The owners of the IPD cars scrambled in the new world to find new modifications to make their cars attractive to the market in capacity, size (interior height) and condition. Some cars had roofs raised to Plate F, some were upgraded to 286,000 capacity, some were converted to plug doors (sought after by some shippers) and various other changes. Generally these changes were made in fairly small lots, at many different contract shops and with "plans" that varied widely from company to company. That is why there is little uniformity in how the cars were modified. In many cases the shippers didn't like them. They weighed too much, so the payloads were smaller than other cars. Over time the raised roofs tended to leak, as did the doors. Some cars couldn't practically be raised fron 220,000 (70 ton) capacity to 286,000.

Through all this there was a drive by many roads to require heavier loading to get better (to the shipper) rates. Some commodities got extra product into a Plate F (cube out) while others filled a Plate C 286,000 capacity car to the limit (weigh out). One size does NOT fit all......and all commodities do NOT gain from extra cubic capacity, but that is a story for another day.

[RKFarms]

Were these boxcars used as part a scam by some short lines back in the 70's or 80's? I remember a very short line near where I went to high school that was involved in something to do with a lot of boxcars, but do not remember the details. It would have been the Lasalle and Bureau County RR that went from a connection with the IC in Lasalle to maybe Ladd or Cherry off to the northwest. I graduated in 70 and it was not going on then but do remember going back to that area later and seeing boxcars on part of that line. Thanks, PR

[BaltACD]

RKFarms

Were these boxcars used as part a scam by some short lines back in the 70's or 80's? I remember a very short line near where I went to high school that was involved in something to do with a lot of boxcars, but do not remember the details. It would have been the Lasalle and Bureau County RR that went from a connection with the IC in Lasalle to maybe Ladd or Cherry off to the northwest. I graduated in 70 and it was not going on then but do remember going back to that area later and seeing boxcars on part of that line. Thanks, PR

I believe the ploy was that financiers would place hundreds if not thousands of IPD cars under the reporting marks of a short line (with their consent) with the idea being that the cars never or rarely being on the tracks of the short line.  The financiers game was to make a killing on the IPD as where ever the cars were (as long as they weren't on the short line) would be paying per diem fees to the car owner.

[jeffhergert]

RKFarms

Were these boxcars used as part a scam by some short lines back in the 70's or 80's? I remember a very short line near where I went to high school that was involved in something to do with a lot of boxcars, but do not remember the details. It would have been the Lasalle and Bureau County RR that went from a connection with the IC in Lasalle to maybe Ladd or Cherry off to the northwest. I graduated in 70 and it was not going on then but do remember going back to that area later and seeing boxcars on part of that line. Thanks, PR

 

A previous (2002) discussion on the subject.

 http://cs.trains.com/trn/f/111/t/4019.aspx

Jeff

[RKFarms]

Thanks Jeff. I found the information very interesting and the map brought back some memories of my time in that area and all the branch lines that were still there and mostly still in use.

PR

[cv_acr]

RKFarms

Were these boxcars used as part a scam by some short lines back in the 70's or 80's? I remember a very short line near where I went to high school that was involved in something to do with a lot of boxcars, but do not remember the details. It would have been the Lasalle and Bureau County RR that went from a connection with the IC in Lasalle to maybe Ladd or Cherry off to the northwest. I graduated in 70 and it was not going on then but do remember going back to that area later and seeing boxcars on part of that line. Thanks, PR

The LS&BC story if i recall it correctly supposedly involves a bunch of PC boxcars that were sent to a shop for contract repair but they just kept coming. (PC was a disorganized mess and it seems they lost track of a lot of cars.) Allegedly the LS&BC ("let's steal box cars") relettered a bunch of the PC cars for themselves, but likely parts of the story have been embellished over the last 5 decades.

I don't believe LSBC ever got invovled in the IPD stuff.

[ericsp]

As someone who is as interested in cars as locomotives I can tell you boxcars that have had their height increased have not been very common in central California over the last 20 years. My guess from my observations is that there were not a significant amount of boxcars so modified.

[Leo_Ames]

Sounds a bit like the story about the scrap yard that kept ordering gondolas. Was a few months apparently before the local crews started to wonder why it seemed like they were delivering far more empties to the scrapyard than they were taking back with loads.

[chutton01]

ericsp

As someone who is as interested in cars as locomotives I can tell you boxcars that have had their height increased have not been very common in central California over the last 20 years. My guess from my observations is that there were not a significant amount of boxcars so modified.

OK, from what you mentioned and rwclx posted about above, I understand that rebuilt '70s era (IPD or not) boxcars simply aren't that common. I pretty much thought as much before starting this thread, but I do see them in various railfan videos of recent vintage (within 2-3 years). In regards to the boxcars in such videos, the majority seems to be post 1990 Plate F's, then what seem to be stock standard "1970s" outside-post (oddly, a decent percentage have relatively flat roofs as opposed to the more common peaked roofs), and only occasionally some rebuilt extended height boxcars, so on reflection that seems to confirm the observations in this thread that extended rebuilds were done in small lots.
I was hoping that posters might know of some decent sites with images of these rebuilts (small lots or not), much like the SLR page I linked to above, as my search attempts seem to be a fools errand (right now the first two google returns for me are to this thread, and the 3rd is to the SLR site). Oh well.

[ericsp]

The sites linked below are good for freight car pictures. If you sign up with Railcar Photos (free) they have a good search page that may help you find pictures of these cars.

https://www.railcarphotos.com/

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/rsTypeList.aspx

http://rr-fallenflags.org/

[cv_acr]

Some older cars rebuilt from Plate B to Plate C clearance dimensions, weight capacity upgrades and body vents are quite common as wood-pulp service cars on Canadian roads that move a lot of forestry products.

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cp214450_2&o=cprail

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cp214511&o=cprail

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cp215578&o=cprail

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cp224019&o=cprail

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=hs61482&o=hs

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=hs61341&o=hs

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=hcry7044&o=hcry

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=bcol850313_2&o=bcol

 

And since the discussion started with SLR's excess height "Plate F" extended cars, they also had some "Plate B to C" conversions as well:

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=slr149&o=slr

[cv_acr]

Some other interesting random rebuilds:

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cp84983&o=cprail

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cp41024_2&o=cprail

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cp42831&o=cprail *

* also rebuilt from stretched 40' boxcar to 50'

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cnw90070&o=cnw

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cna549206&o=cn

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=gtw384062&o=gtw

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cr221464&o=conrail

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=nyc221879&o=csxt

[chutton01]

Thank you Chris, many of those images feature the conversions I was thinking about in terms of extended height rebuilds.

[BaltACD]

cv_acr

Some other interesting random rebuilds:

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cp84983&o=cprail

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cp41024_2&o=cprail

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cp42831&o=cprail *

* also rebuilt from stretched 40' boxcar to 50'

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cnw90070&o=cnw

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cna549206&o=cn

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=gtw384062&o=gtw

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cr221464&o=conrail

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=nyc221879&o=csxt

I don't believe that 60 foot cars were involved in Incentive Per Diem.

[cv_acr]

BaltACD

 

 

cv_acr

Some other interesting random rebuilds:

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cp84983&o=cprail

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cp41024_2&o=cprail

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cp42831&o=cprail *

* also rebuilt from stretched 40' boxcar to 50'

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cnw90070&o=cnw

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cna549206&o=cn

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=gtw384062&o=gtw

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=cr221464&o=conrail

http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=nyc221879&o=csxt

 

 

I don't believe that 60 foot cars were involved in Incentive Per Diem.

 

Absolutely nothing except maybe the CNA car in that particular sampling is a former IPD car, but they are some interesting examples of rebuilt cars for various reasons.

The CP and HS cars in the first post however are mainly original RBOX plate B cars, filtered through one or two intermediate owners.

[BaltACD]

IPD Explanation

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zew6obPiVXo