cv_acr BN7150 Was this paint box car equipped with a charcoal heater? Weaver O scale 40' PS-1 "BAR 2037" That paint job (and number series) was used on the insulated cars, but that model is not an insulated car. http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=bar2170&o=bar
BN7150 Was this paint box car equipped with a charcoal heater? Weaver O scale 40' PS-1 "BAR 2037"
Was this paint box car equipped with a charcoal heater?
Weaver O scale 40' PS-1 "BAR 2037"
That paint job (and number series) was used on the insulated cars, but that model is not an insulated car.
http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=bar2170&o=bar
Oops! The car has ventilators! However, no heater under the floor! It was removed, wasn't it?
Chris van der Heide
My Algoma Central Railway Modeling Blog
Overmod John-NYBW The french fries we made from that batch were like limp noodles. Fits with what frozen potatoes would do. They likely weren't 'spoiled' in a health sense... just a culinary one. Potatoes are much more complicated than I think most people realize. To cook the starch in them 'right' can require real care... and if the internal structure containing that starch is wrecked, weird things can happen.
John-NYBW The french fries we made from that batch were like limp noodles.
Fits with what frozen potatoes would do. They likely weren't 'spoiled' in a health sense... just a culinary one.
Potatoes are much more complicated than I think most people realize. To cook the starch in them 'right' can require real care... and if the internal structure containing that starch is wrecked, weird things can happen.
I remember what we had to do to make our fries from scratch at McDonald's. First we had to bring a big heavy bag of raw potatoes up from the basement. Then we ran them through the peeler about a half dozen at a time. It was a drum with roughened sides that the potatoes spun around in. Then we chopped the potatoes into two large sinks and bathed them not once but twice in ice cold water to remove excess starch. You had to dip your arms into that water to move the potatoes around. A pink foam would form on top of the water. Once rinsed, we put the fries in baskets and blanched them in shortening and put them on a rack for the finished frying, also in shortening.
I don't think they do that any more. I think their fries come prepackaged and just need to be fried. That's what we did until we got good potatoes in. We got boxes of fries that were labeled for Burger Chef. I don't think they use shortening any more either.
John-NYBWThe french fries we made from that batch were like limp noodles.
For those of you that love mashed potatoes... the way to cook them is to preheat in very carefully controlled 163-to-165-degree water for about 15 minutes (this is not a joke; you use something like a candy thermometer and 'titrate' with small shots of water to keep the 'bath' at precise temperature) followed by a plunge into very cold water for a half-hour, then cooking to taste. If you were ever plagued by gummy or limp potatoes, that treatment liberates the right fluffy 'interior' texture...
John-NYBW cv_acr http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=bar6015&o=bar http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=bar6125&o=bar http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=bar6388&o=bar I noticed only the third picture had a plug door. I'm guessing this was insulated. Were these the only ones used to ship potatoes or would they use regular boxcars as well?
cv_acr http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=bar6015&o=bar http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=bar6125&o=bar http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=bar6388&o=bar
http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=bar6015&o=bar
http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=bar6125&o=bar
http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?i=bar6388&o=bar
I noticed only the third picture had a plug door. I'm guessing this was insulated. Were these the only ones used to ship potatoes or would they use regular boxcars as well?
No, that's most definitely not an insulated door/car.
Just because it has a plug door doesn't necessarily mean the car is insulated, and in this case it can't be - the door is an "exterior post" plug, with all the door framing fully visible. The exterior sheet metal visible here is also the interior wall of the door. (Just one thickness of sheet metal. No insulating layer.)
The plug door helps make a nice door seal and a smooth interior for high-grade loads like paper rolls.
dti406 After the mess with PC delaying shipment of the potatoes during a freeze in the late 60's with the potatoes rotting in the car after the heaters ran out of fuel a lot of the traffic was no longer sent by train. The New Haven cars were repainted into PC Green and put in flour hauling service, most probably out of Buffalo, NY. Rick Jesionowski
After the mess with PC delaying shipment of the potatoes during a freeze in the late 60's with the potatoes rotting in the car after the heaters ran out of fuel a lot of the traffic was no longer sent by train.
The New Haven cars were repainted into PC Green and put in flour hauling service, most probably out of Buffalo, NY.
Rick Jesionowski
My first job was at McDonald's from 1968-69. I remember we got a bad batch of potatoes from the McDonald's warehouse and I remember the owner of our franchise complaining to the district supervisor that we had been selling lousy french fries for about a week. Back then, McDonald's still made their french fries from scratch. The french fries we made from that batch were like limp noodles. I wonder if we got some of those spoiled potatoes.
Rule 1: This is my railroad.
Rule 2: I make the rules.
Rule 3: Illuminating discussion of prototype history, equipment and operating practices is always welcome, but in the event of visitor-perceived anacronisms, detail descrepancies or operating errors, consult RULE 1!
And veering slightly off topic, but Montreal, Maine & Atlantic did one "heritage" car in a modern version of the State of Maine products scheme in the mid 2000s. Just the one car out of these group though, the rest were just standard MMA maroon.
http://canadianfreightcargallery.ca/cgi-bin/image.pl?o=mma&i=mma1_4
John-NYBWApparently I was wrong earlier and the NH did use their cars to ship potatoes if this post from the Trains magazine forum is correct: "It was a joint order by both the New Haven and BAR that resulted in this cars and all the fleet being painted Red-White-Blue and the New Haven cars having NH reporting marks on this scheme. In the white, the was a NH reporting mark, "NEW HAVEN", and a script herald, so they weren't painted indentically to the BAR cars...
Here's a New Haven version:
http://rr-fallenflags.org/nh/nh45085jpa.jpg
NHTX BAR's insulated, heater equipped, boxcars were purchased with the intent to haul newsprint when they weren't in potato service. During the potato rush, BAR used cars leased from New York Central's Merchants Despatch Transit, as well as reciprocal use cars from Pacific Fruit Express. Once the rush was over, the reinforcements returned home and many BAR icers followed the PFEs west, to help out there. The dual use of the BAR 2000 series insulated boxcars was evidenced in Boston when they delivered rolls of newsprint to New Haven's Roxbury Yard. Because New Haven's cars were built to BAR specifications by the same Pacific Car and Foundry, they hauled many a Maine potato to New York City. The routing was BAR-B&M to Worcester MA, and New Haven to NYC. Attempts to load these cars on New Haven's car floats at their Oak Point Yard often resulted in expensive noise from the low-slung under floor heaters, many of which were later removed.
BAR's insulated, heater equipped, boxcars were purchased with the intent to haul newsprint when they weren't in potato service. During the potato rush, BAR used cars leased from New York Central's Merchants Despatch Transit, as well as reciprocal use cars from Pacific Fruit Express. Once the rush was over, the reinforcements returned home and many BAR icers followed the PFEs west, to help out there.
The dual use of the BAR 2000 series insulated boxcars was evidenced in Boston when they delivered rolls of newsprint to New Haven's Roxbury Yard. Because New Haven's cars were built to BAR specifications by the same Pacific Car and Foundry, they hauled many a Maine potato to New York City. The routing was BAR-B&M to Worcester MA, and New Haven to NYC. Attempts to load these cars on New Haven's car floats at their Oak Point Yard often resulted in expensive noise from the low-slung under floor heaters, many of which were later removed.
It seems unlikely that paper rolls would have been loaded into the insulated cars given their smaller door size.
The RW&B paint scheme was applied to other types of boxcars, not just the insulated cars. Incuding 50' plug door cars intended for paper service.
Since I have been living in Maine for forty years now, my East Penn Railroad does run a Potato Special of 6 State of Maine cars (5 Bangor and Aroostook and 1 New Haven). And some how Maine Central and Boston and Maine freight cars do make frequent appearances in eastern Pennsylvania.
oldline1 John-NYBW oldline1 The New Haven hadsome State Of Maine R-W-B cars too. Were they used in potato service also? oldline1 I did some additional reading on it and learned when the BAR ordered their second batch of cars, these painted with PRODUCTS in the red stripe, the New Haven piggybacked their order for more cars on their order and agreed to have the same paint job to get a discount. I would doubt they were used for potatoes because it is Aroostook County in Maine which produced most of Maine's potatoes and I would think they would use the BAR cars to ship them. I learned something else through that reading. Maine potatoes are harvested in the cool weather months. The official potato harvest date in Aroostook County begins September 23. The schools actually shut down for several weeks so the kids can work in the potato harvest. Since my layout is set in midsummer, shipping Maine potatoes doesn't really fit. I was going to have regular shipments to a produce warehouse in my largest town but now I have to rethink that. Maybe I'll have them ship blueberries instead. That season runs late July to September. Potato Recess | Potato Harvest in Aroostook County (newengland.com) Aroostook County's harvest break is indispensable for the potato industry, farmers say | Wood Prairie Family Farm John, Thanks for that info and those links. Very interesting articles. First time I saw an HO model of an SOM New Haven car I thought it was someone's imagination and then saw a prototype phot in a book. Surprised me! I have always loved the SOM cars since the first one I saw as a kid going to Baltimore on a B&O freight. Thanks again for the info. oldline1
John-NYBW oldline1 The New Haven hadsome State Of Maine R-W-B cars too. Were they used in potato service also? oldline1 I did some additional reading on it and learned when the BAR ordered their second batch of cars, these painted with PRODUCTS in the red stripe, the New Haven piggybacked their order for more cars on their order and agreed to have the same paint job to get a discount. I would doubt they were used for potatoes because it is Aroostook County in Maine which produced most of Maine's potatoes and I would think they would use the BAR cars to ship them. I learned something else through that reading. Maine potatoes are harvested in the cool weather months. The official potato harvest date in Aroostook County begins September 23. The schools actually shut down for several weeks so the kids can work in the potato harvest. Since my layout is set in midsummer, shipping Maine potatoes doesn't really fit. I was going to have regular shipments to a produce warehouse in my largest town but now I have to rethink that. Maybe I'll have them ship blueberries instead. That season runs late July to September. Potato Recess | Potato Harvest in Aroostook County (newengland.com) Aroostook County's harvest break is indispensable for the potato industry, farmers say | Wood Prairie Family Farm
oldline1 The New Haven hadsome State Of Maine R-W-B cars too. Were they used in potato service also? oldline1
The New Haven hadsome State Of Maine R-W-B cars too. Were they used in potato service also?
oldline1
I did some additional reading on it and learned when the BAR ordered their second batch of cars, these painted with PRODUCTS in the red stripe, the New Haven piggybacked their order for more cars on their order and agreed to have the same paint job to get a discount. I would doubt they were used for potatoes because it is Aroostook County in Maine which produced most of Maine's potatoes and I would think they would use the BAR cars to ship them.
I learned something else through that reading. Maine potatoes are harvested in the cool weather months. The official potato harvest date in Aroostook County begins September 23. The schools actually shut down for several weeks so the kids can work in the potato harvest. Since my layout is set in midsummer, shipping Maine potatoes doesn't really fit. I was going to have regular shipments to a produce warehouse in my largest town but now I have to rethink that. Maybe I'll have them ship blueberries instead. That season runs late July to September.
Potato Recess | Potato Harvest in Aroostook County (newengland.com)
Aroostook County's harvest break is indispensable for the potato industry, farmers say | Wood Prairie Family Farm
John, Thanks for that info and those links. Very interesting articles. First time I saw an HO model of an SOM New Haven car I thought it was someone's imagination and then saw a prototype phot in a book. Surprised me! I have always loved the SOM cars since the first one I saw as a kid going to Baltimore on a B&O freight.
Thanks again for the info.
Apparently I was wrong earlier and the NH did use their cars to ship potatoes if this post from the Trains magazine forum is correct:
"It was a joint order by both the New Haven and BAR that resulted in this cars and all the fleet being painted Red-White-Blue and the New Haven cars having NH reporting marks on this scheme. In the white, the was a NH reporting mark, "NEW HAVEN", and a script herald, so they weren't painted indentically to the BAR cars...
The reason for the purchase was the New Haven was a big-time transporter of potatoes from the BAR... These were indeed insulated, heated boxcars -- a charcoal heater sits underneath. The New Haven even had a special potatoe train that ran daily when in season I believe... It was a big business and they apparently wanted to own some of these cars and ordered jointly with the BAR... They came on around 1953."
Here's a link to the thread if you want to read more:
"State of Maine Products" billboard boxcars. - Trains Magazine - Trains News Wire, Railroad News, Railroad Industry News, Web Cams, and Forms
(I've made several tries to post a clickable link to the Trains Magazine thread but it doesn't come out correctly. It shows as a clickable link in edit mode but when I update, it doesn't appear as one)
I was browsing through some photos and I saw a model of a RWB State of Maine car with PRSL reporting marks. The PRSL was the Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines and it ran mostly in southern New Jersey. I can't imagine why they would have the SOM cars in their fleet. I don't know if there was an actual prototype for one. I would doubt it but who knows.
The elaborate red-white-blue paint scheme was expensive to apply and maintain and got repainted into a simpler all red paint scheme although they did sport a rather large, elaborate tri-color herald. Decals are available from Highball Graphics (www.highballgraphics.com) in most major scales. Most of the cars in HO being passed off as PC&F insulated boxcars are about as correct as a lead balloon if prototype fidelity is a consideration.
The Lionel 6464275 boxcar cited as being so accurate is a joke if you want a PC&F car. I recall reading somewhere, the 6464 boxcar was proportioned in size to fit in a standard Lionel freight car BOX, not from scale drawings. Lionel is guilty of following the same practices as most postwar pioneers. Make one body type of each major freight car and paint it in every gaudy paint scheme on the continent, whether it is close or not. That's what gave us PRR dome cars, New Haven SDP-40s and Santa Fe GG-1s.
If someone wants a car closer to the prototype PC&F car, maybe the Accurail plug door, steel, ice reefer could be a starting point. Replace the ice hatch roof with a 40 foot, diagonal panel, overhanging, boxcar roof. Fabricate vent mechanisms and heaters from styrene. Paint and decal. These cars were also made in brass and can be found at brass prices.
John, do like the BAR did and ship newsprint in the cars that did not get rebuilt with sloping floors for bulk potato loading!
The following photo is in an old issue of MR magazine. This Respondent from Ask Paint Shop says the car was included in the 9800-10300 series.
Quoted from page 139 of MR March 1999 issue
MR also has a kitbash article detailed in the December 1989 issue, p146-150. "State of Maine" heater cars in red, white, and blue - O scale models of Bangor & Aroostook and New Haven
My Model Power reefer has been painted the roof and both ends black. I consider it a typical reefer in the late 1930s.
From the Barriger Library:
5084001 by John W. Barriger III National Railroad Library, on Flickr
4195001 by John W. Barriger III National Railroad Library, on Flickr
4195002 by John W. Barriger III National Railroad Library, on Flickr
4195003 by John W. Barriger III National Railroad Library, on Flickr
— and a car washer for freight cars:
4195004 by John W. Barriger III National Railroad Library, on Flickr
4195006 by John W. Barriger III National Railroad Library, on Flickr
4195007 by John W. Barriger III National Railroad Library, on Flickr
Regards, Ed
cv_acrThat's really hilarious that that guy calls that an "accurate" model.
It probably wouldn't take much to patch out the ice hatches and repaint the roof to match the others. Looks like I should renumber both of them. Changing POTATOES to PRODUCTS would be a bit more challenging and I'm not sure its worth the effort. If what I read about the original series is correct, they were labeled as POTATOES cars and it was the later ones that said PRODUCTS. I wish I could find a prototype photo labeled as POTATOES. That might give me a clue as to what the proper numbering should be. I found these photos of car 2573:
3946498646_540530da5f_z.jpg (640×427) (staticflickr.com)
State+of+Maine+Boxcar.jpg (600×337) (ogaugerr.com)
Looks like it might be a museum piece. From the photos I have looked at, it appears the 2000 number series are plug door boxcars and the higher numbers are regular boxcars.
It seems an odd coincidence that two companies would come up with differing versions of these cars but both settled on number 3246.
UPDATE: I found a reference that indicates car 2573 is in Conway, New Hampshire.
BN7150 Can this Model Power product be improved in any way?
Can this Model Power product be improved in any way?
I got one of those too. Mine came with the original horn hook couplers. It will require some work, changing couplers, wheels, and weathering but it could be made acceptable. Since this is a 36' wood reefer and the other two are 40' steel, it just doesn't look right if put in the same consist.
John-NYBW The State of Maine Potatoes Box Car now Done Correctly | O Gauge Railroading On Line Forum (ogaugerr.com) I since found this article about an O gauge version that purports it to be the first protoypically accurate model. It says that POTATOES appeared in the red stripe only in the earlier version of these cars which also had BANGOR AND AROOSTOOK RAILROAD in the white stripe. Later versions dropped RAILROAD from the white stripe and changed POTATOES to PRODUCTS in the red stripe. If that is true than both of these cars should say PRODUCTS.
The State of Maine Potatoes Box Car now Done Correctly | O Gauge Railroading On Line Forum (ogaugerr.com)
I since found this article about an O gauge version that purports it to be the first protoypically accurate model. It says that POTATOES appeared in the red stripe only in the earlier version of these cars which also had BANGOR AND AROOSTOOK RAILROAD in the white stripe. Later versions dropped RAILROAD from the white stripe and changed POTATOES to PRODUCTS in the red stripe. If that is true than both of these cars should say PRODUCTS.
That's really hilarious that that guy calls that an "accurate" model.
John-NYBW The first one had an all black roof and ice hatches. The second one was simply a plug door car with no ice hatches indicating to me it is a mechanical reefer.
The first one had an all black roof and ice hatches. The second one was simply a plug door car with no ice hatches indicating to me it is a mechanical reefer.
No, it's just an insulated boxcar. No mechanical refrigeration.
The potatoes don't really need to be kept cold, but they do need to be kept *from* getting too cold in the winter...
Note in the photo of the SOO car a few posts up the ice hatches are open. The cars are being run with no ice and vented. So the ice reefer is only being used as an insulated box.
John-NYBW Here is the odd thing. Both are numbered 3246. The only way this would make sense is if the ice cooled reefers were converted to mechanical reefers and the second one is just a later iteration of the same car. Was that something that might have been done with the ice cooled reefers or is one of these cars non-prototypical?
Here is the odd thing. Both are numbered 3246. The only way this would make sense is if the ice cooled reefers were converted to mechanical reefers and the second one is just a later iteration of the same car. Was that something that might have been done with the ice cooled reefers or is one of these cars non-prototypical?
One (or both) is clearly just the wrong car.
I can't find any photos of any BAR 3200 series cars online, but here's a nice example of a 2000 series car:
http://rr-fallenflags.org/bar/bar2024o23.jpg
Please note particularly:
- insulated plug door
- no ice hatches on roof
- side vents with opening control rods at the upper corners
- underslung boxy structure hanging underneath the car is actually a charcoal or alcohol burning *heater* to keep contents from freezing in winter
It's not an ice reefer, and it's most definitely not a mechanical reefer. It's an insulated/heated box.
One other point I forgot to make in the OP was that the Train Miniature box label states it is a reefer for whatever that's worth.
Correction to the above: Intermountain DOES NOT produce a model of the PFE R40-14. One may be had by replacing the ends of an R40-23 with round (W cornered) ends of a 4/4 dreadnought pattern.