...your mine sits on the end of a short branch line, and is a stub-end with no runaround tracks. the outbound tracks curve around behind it, and then there's the three houses and whistlestop station and the mainline that makes up the twon of "Miller".
Then a 5.5ft drop to the floor, but you don't care about that. Behind your branch line, is another one that connects the Monon with the fictitious Naptown & White River. Oh, and that short branch you are on? it's a 3.5 to 4% grade. (I haven't measured it, it's older than I am) The good news, your lcoomotive is always on the downhill end, removing concerns for runaways. Teh bad news, it means you are constantly pushing entire trains up a 4% grade. Now, NWR trains operate in 12-15 cars usually, but there may be tiems where you have to not only move the outgoing train, but also pull off the incoming empties as well. (And don't bother pointing out that the track layout sucks through there, you know, your secretary is tired of knowing, the road crews know, and the dispatcher who has to try to work around you, the coal train, and the fact that the mainline drops from two track to single track right there knows too).
So, knowing the kind of operating conditions, what are you using for a Mine switcher in 1959? This is HO scale, and both roads on your branch have dieselized, so that is an option. Or would you rather use steam, because you are producng the fuel yourself? This is your engine, the host roads are just to haul out the coal, you'll be using this to move loaded cars into the outbound tracks, and put empties into the tipples. There's no "wrong" answer, but I'm looking for something that can be DCC'd and is cheap enough I can donate it to the NWR club without a lot of pain.
-Morgan
Easy, a heritage series Y3 would be my first choice. Or if that is too long of a loco I would go with a Mikado. ( I hear that the Trix mikado pulls the best)......Mike
None of the above..
It would be cheaper to do the following.
I would have a truck dump built and rip out the track and use the former roadbed as access road to and from the mine to the truck dump..
I would eliminate the need to buy any more locomotives for this operation and would save on locomotive,freight car and track maintenance.
I could possibly eliminate a train and 5 man crew by having the local switch the truck dump.
I think the bean counters and upper management would agree..
Larry
Conductor.
Summerset Ry.
"Stay Alert, Don't get hurt Safety First!"
BRAKIE None of the above.. It would be cheaper to do the following. I would have a truck dump built and rip out the track and use the former roadbed as access road to and from the mine to the truck dump.. I would eliminate the need to buy any more locomotives for this operation and would save on locomotive,freight car and track maintenance. I could possibly eliminate a train and 5 man crew by having the local switch the truck dump. I think the bean counters and upper management would agree..
Your customers would also likely appreciate the cheaper shipping costs and faster delivery time too.
NittanyLion BRAKIE: None of the above.. It would be cheaper to do the following. I would have a truck dump built and rip out the track and use the former roadbed as access road to and from the mine to the truck dump.. I would eliminate the need to buy any more locomotives for this operation and would save on locomotive,freight car and track maintenance. I could possibly eliminate a train and 5 man crew by having the local switch the truck dump. I think the bean counters and upper management would agree.. Your customers would also likely appreciate the cheaper shipping costs and faster delivery time too.
BRAKIE: None of the above.. It would be cheaper to do the following. I would have a truck dump built and rip out the track and use the former roadbed as access road to and from the mine to the truck dump.. I would eliminate the need to buy any more locomotives for this operation and would save on locomotive,freight car and track maintenance. I could possibly eliminate a train and 5 man crew by having the local switch the truck dump. I think the bean counters and upper management would agree..
Get an Alco! Get an Alco!
sfb
steamfreightboy Get an Alco! Get an Alco! sfb
Double post.
How about a six axle unit because of the grade? SD7 (or9), RSD5, AS616 for example.
Use an SD7 with extra ballast ike the PRR on the Madison incline.
Flashwave steamfreightboy: Get an Alco! Get an Alco! sfb I'm beginning to get the slightest hint that maybe you are a bit of an ALCO-holic.
steamfreightboy: Get an Alco! Get an Alco! sfb
I'm beginning to get the slightest hint that maybe you are a bit of an ALCO-holic.
I wish! I just got my first yesderday, a proto 1k RS-2. Man, she looks nice...
Unfortunatly, the decoder I bought died when I tried running it. Dang
If you are the rail operations manager for a coal mine, then you wouldn't pick any power, because the coal mines don't pick the power, the railroad does.
If you are the railroad operations manager and have a coal mine on your territory then you wouldn't pick the power because managers don't pick the power, the power bureau or dispatch office or mechanical office picks the power from what was already on hand.
If you are the railroad operations manager and have a coal mine on your territory then you wouldn't purchase the power because managers don't purchase the power, those decisions are made on system level by general superintendents and vice presidents and voted on by the board of directors.
Which power they choose to buy depends on what power the railroad already has and what the goals of the railroad are. You could support any choice you wanted for any engines you wanted, everything from surplus 2-8-0's to 2-6-6-2's, to 2-8-8-2's to Shays to RSD's to RS's, to GP's to SDs to AS616's to AS16's to SW7's to F's. Virtually every scenario could be supported with a prototype example.
I would go with AS616's or AS16's because I like them.
Dave H. Painted side goes up. My website : wnbranch.com
I would go with an Atlas RS-1. Any RR will do. Just paint out the name and number and add your own number, then weather it. You wouldn't even have to put your mines name on it. A loco this old would simulate a used purchase from a major road that kept it in good shape.
Elmer.
The above is my opinion, from an active and experienced Model Railroader in N scale and HO since 1961.
(Modeling Freelance, Eastern US, HO scale, in 1962, with NCE DCC for locomotive control and a stand alone LocoNet for block detection and signals.) http://waynes-trains.com/ at home, and N scale at the Club.
Alright. so a guy at a club found reference to a B unit with hostler controls that he REALLY wants to do. So I think I will wrap for now, if it's not a B unit I will probbalygo with an RS1. Maybe Bachmann will hurry up woth theirs...One quick question though. Were the majority of mine-wned switchers dieselized by 1959, and what were they using int heir steam days?
Remembering that only a small fraction of mines had their own switchers, most of them being very large mines or consolidated breakers. In 1959 a GP7 or an RS3 would be a brand spanking new unit. An F unit would be 10 years or less old. There wouldn't be surplus F7B's because they would all be "new" road power. Think of it this way, SD60's are two or three times older today, than an F7 would have been in 1959. On all but a handful of class 1 railroads, steam was more or less dead.
If it is an engine that is owned by the coal mine for service just in the coal mine, then it would probably be some sort of switcher, an Alco or Baldwin. In 1959, Baldwin would have been out of the locomotive building business for 3 years.
So we are dealing with a sort of marginal operation, loose car railroading, not unit trains to coal powered utilities but shipping to the dwindling number of local coal dealers that served cities and towns. Even converting over to truck service costs money that you (the mine that is) do not have. For some movements around the mine you probably would have a motorized motor and winch and thus, let the railroad that serves the mine do whatever shifting around is needed when they pick up or drop off.
But if you need an engine for shifting around the mine, you would be very unlikely to invest in a fairly new engine so that rules out the SD 7 or 9 that was suggested -- that was still mainline power in 1959. And remember that a long engine takes up some precious track space that you might lack. For pure shifting the engine does not have to be large either
My hunch is that your choices are these
1) lease something from the line that serves the mine-- no repaint needed. While an early F unit makes sense -- in that railroads had seen that F units on local freights were outdated once the GPs came in --- they were also good trade in fodder in 1959 because the trucks and traction motors were still good. And all the reaons why F units were impractical for local switching apply to mine shifting as well. A pre-first generation switcher, maybe pre WWII -- one of those very early Alco HH series maybe. A Baldwin makes perfect sense because by 1959 the railroads realized their lack of MU capability made them something of a white elephant yet there was still plenty of pulling power and longevity. And EMD or EMC SW1 is the right size but they were still working for their original owners in '59.
2) Buy something on the used marked and paint if for the mine. Once again the early Alco and Baldwin switchers were probably somewhat plentiful in '59. Another possibility is a former military engine, war surplus, that sort of thing -- often they had unique cabs that looked more European for clearance reasons. A GE 44 tonner is a possibility too. The local industry in my home town bought up the switchers that had originally been built to serve a major dam project, possibly the Pine Flat Dam in California. Once the dam was done the engines were surplus. The size is perfect for a mine.
3) steam? Well if the mine has the kind of staffing to actually do its own steam service and repair, not impossible, although I think your scenario would involve inertia and lack of funds to buy a diesel rather than some loyalty to the coal business. Once the major railroads dropped steam, a lot of short lines and industries lost the service crews and shops they used to keep their own steam running. If you are thinking of steam, try to find a copy of Ron Ziel's Twilight of Steam book which gives examples of old tried industrial steam that kept working into the late 50s and 60s.
Dave Nelson
dknelson So we are dealing with a sort of marginal operation, loose car railroading, not unit trains to coal powered utilities but shipping to the dwindling number of local coal dealers that served cities and towns.
So we are dealing with a sort of marginal operation, loose car railroading, not unit trains to coal powered utilities but shipping to the dwindling number of local coal dealers that served cities and towns.
True unit trains did not exist in 1959. The majority of coal would be moving to power plants, steel mills, industrial users and for export. The retail coal market would be dwindling. From the modeler's perspective it might look like a unit train, a solid train of coal cars loaded from a single mine, it techinically would not be a unit train (all the cars on the train on one waybill).
That would be like a current day mine buying a SD90AC as a mine switcher.
Circa 1959 is the end of Class I railroad steam-to-diesel transition.
To provide visual contrast vs. Class I spanking-new diesels...
Consider a smaller "coal short-line steam switcher" (perhaps with a slope tender or a camelback for that 4% grade) now cheaply/readily available, at salvage cost, for a coal hopper interchange with Class I diesel mainlines -- To the world beyond the layout.
Add this to the local-market coal/trucking distribution, and have both ideas in motion.
Conemaugh Road & Traction circa 1956
tgindy A "coal mine short-line steam switcher" (perhaps with a slope tender or a camelback for that 4% grade) would be cheaply/readily available, at salvage cost from larger railroads, for a coal hopper interchange with the larger diesel-transitioned mainline.
That's different than the original question. If you have a steam engine and the connecting class 1 has retired steam then there will not be any place to maintain the steam engine unless the coal mine builds $25,000 worth of shop facilities for the $2000 used steam engine. Unless the mine railroad is a common carrier, it will not interchange cars with the class 1, it might deliver or make available cars, but not interchange.
Really this whole question is framed wrong. It sorta assume everybody just woke up one morning and a coal mine materialized alongside the railroad tracks and now we are figuring out what to do to switch it. The coal mine was probably there for the last 100 years. So what they would do in 1959 is the same thing they did in 1958 which is the same thing they did in 1957, which is the same thing they did in 1956, etc., etc. The engine they would use in 1959 is the same engine they would use in 1958 which is the same engine they would use in 1957, which is the same engine they would use in 1956, etc., etc.
The real question would be something like this:
The coal mine uses an old ______ steam engine (pick which type) that has been in service since 1918. That steam engine has a) broken down, b) needs maintenance soon and the class 1 no longer has steam facilites, c) is too small to handle the 70 and 90 ton cars now being supplied by the connecting railroad. So the railroad operations manager at the mine has to a) replace it in kind, b) replace it with a similar sized diesel, c) replace it with something better, d) build shops to keep the steamer going, e) lease something from the connecting railroad, f) let the connecting railroad take over switching.
Depending on which type of engine was previously there and the choices made in the first part will determine which choices are made in the second part.
dehusman The coal mine uses an old ______ steam engine (pick which type) that has been in service since 1918. That steam engine has a) broken down, b) needs maintenance soon and the class 1 no longer has steam facilites, c) is too small to handle the 70 and 90 ton cars now being supplied by the connecting railroad. So the railroad operations manager at the mine has to a) replace it in kind, b) replace it with a similar sized diesel, c) replace it with something better, d) build shops to keep the steamer going, e) lease something from the connecting railroad, f) let the connecting railroad take over switching. Depending on which type of engine was previously there and the choices made in the first part will determine which choices are made in the second part.