I always seem to have difficulties converting metric units into those that we used when I was a kid. The situation was similar for some U.S. measurements, too, especially pints and gallons vs the Imperial measurements used here in Canada, before metric took over.
As for American freight cars, the steel plant where I worked always seemed to have a string of U.P. plugdoor boxcars (can't remember if they were 50' or 60'ers) parked in one of our mills that shipped out steel coils.I didn't work in that mill, but I'm pretty sure that there was some sort of cross-border arrangement with the company that used that type of steel. I don't ever recall seeing Canadian cars in that area of that particular mill.
When U.S. Steel bought the Hamilton, Ontario plant, they stuck around for only a few years, then went back to the States. An acquaintance told me that U.S.S. was interested mainly in Stelco's order books and the "recipes" for the wide range of steel products that we made.I recall the books for those alloys that I had access to, and regret not swiping them when they tore down the mill in which I worked. Our mill only rolled steel, but the books contained not only the "recipes" but also handling and heating processes for some specialty grades.
An event that's been stuck in my head for years actually involved those processes...the stripper building, where they removed the moulds from ingots, was directly across the tracks from our mill, and in the summer, the sides of most mills were open (sliding panels). The switchman 'phoned me to ask where (and also how many) ingot buggies were to be spotted at each location. This was the usual practice, but when I next looked over to the stripper building, as the last mould was being removed, I saw the switchman, firehose-in-hand, hosing-down the ingots on the ends of each buggy where he was going to have to make the cuts.As soon as the water hit the hot ingots, the surface of them began to spall-off. By the time the heat moved into the mill, several ingots had been pretty-well destroyed.When I checked the book for that grade of steel, it was for armour plate, which had a time/temperature limit for charging requirements - if it was delayed and the temperature dropped beyond a certain point, it was scrapped. Some of it did get charged in time for reheating.
I don't know if the switchman was merely suspended or fired, but it was certainly an expensive mistake for the company.
Wayne
zugmannWe regularly get CNIS boxcars here. I always thought the IS was for international service
There may be some "directional bias" here. The Canadian roads have series of cars for international service. The US roads do not.
Since the questions was do US cars going into Canada and Mexico have to have both US and metric data, the answer is no, they do not. There is no UPIS or BNIS pool of cars.
Dave H. Painted side goes up. My website : wnbranch.com
We regularly get CNIS boxcars here. I always thought the IS was for international service - and they couldn't be reloaded domestically - they had to return north when unloaded.
Am I wrong?
It's been fun. But it isn't much fun anymore. Signing off for now.
The opinions expressed here represent my own and not those of my employer, any other railroad, company, or person.t fun any
FRRYKidWhen were cars that travel between Canada and the US first required to carry dimensional data in both pounds and kilograms?
Short answer, no. There aren't specific "international cars". Pretty much any car in interchange service can go across a border.
Canadian cars of the 1970s--and 80s, that I saw, and photograhed, carried the same dimensional data format, using pounds, feet, etc, as American equipment. The only concession was Canadian National's use of the French spelling of "Canadien" on one sdie of the car out of respect for the large French speaking population of Canada's eastern provinces.
This metric business must be a recent developement. If you're modeling the 1970s, "fugedaboutit"! Mexican cars ALWAYS carried their data in the metric system.
Rapido needs to do some Canadian NSC 40 foot boxcars with the eight foot sliding doors as used by both CN and CP, in newsprint service. Hmm. Maybe a dozen. Rather than be limited to a few roads cars just delivering newsprint, I am going to do a paper products distributor, that handles products for business and industry, arriving in cars from the paper producing companies all over North America.
Got yet another question for my Forum friends: When were cars that travel between Canada and the US first required to carry dimensional data in both pounds and kilograms? I have a printing plant on my 70s layout that receives newsprint that would come from north of the border. I know modern cars need both as I have seen tank cars with both systems parked on some repair facility tracks here in town but I don't know if that would apply to my era.
Thank you for any assistance that can be provided and for reading my post.