40ft box cars with grain doors

[Gary_Evans]

Back in the 50s and 60s before grain hoppers were used, railroads used
40ft box cars to haul grain after the cars had been cleaned out and grain doors
were installed. Does anybody know if there any of these boxes on the
DLS?

 

[bendorsey]

A softcover publication by Kalmbach called Industries Along the Tracks volume 1 (tho it isn't marked as volume 1) has a section on grain.

It seems to show sheets of plywood being placed inside the normal boxcar doors for grain haulage. There might not be any visible difference in the boxcar unless some sort of sign was placed on the sides of the car indicating what was being transported.
This had to be a some what messy operation. Particularly when unloading as not all the grain will freely flow out the doors. Someone had to get inside and shovel the remaining grain out.
Some boxcars had hinged doors installed on at least one (possibly both) ends. To empty the end door latches are released and the opposite end of the boxcar or wagon lifted up until the grain flowed out. A considerably less messy and quicker process I'd think.
Unfortunately you can not lift one end of a train car in Trainz (or I've never figured out how and I've been trying for several years).
The introduction of covered hoppers made this so much easier and less messy.

Ben

 

[normhart]

Hum, a quick study of the pictures on a google search seems to indicate that this could possibly be as simple as a commodity for boxcars with open doors.

http://www.trainweb.org/oldtimetrains/CNR/grain_elevator_Port_Arthur.htm

As near as I can tell there wasn't much if any difference visually once the boxcar is loaded and the main doors closed.

One photo seems to indicate using 2x6 or 2x12 boards rather than plywood over the door openings.

 

[whitepass]

Some box cars did have grain doors built in and part of the flour could be moved up so it looked like a hopper car on the inside, from the out you could not see anything. Some cars from the 1930s did have hopper like shoots under the doors that do show, one is on my to do list.

 

[RHKluckhohn]

Grain-door Boxcars

Prior to the use of covered hoppers, which became [FONT=&quot]general around 1960, grain was moved almost only in boxcars, equipped with grain doors.

The grain door was a temporary appliance, filling half to 2/3ds the car door, many with an unloading port at the bottom with a flap door. The car was filled through the upper gap. As noted above, cleaning out the car involved men with shovels and brooms. The cars were usually dedicated to food service or clean freight to minimize the preparation time and effort.

In some cases the grain doors belonged to a service company and would be stacked at the receiver's, then freighted back to the elevators. There's yet another commodity for you!

Toward the end of their use, grain doors were typically heavy cardboard with wood or steel reinforcement. Plywood had been used up to that point from its invention and before that grain doors were built up from lumber according to plans created by the railroad's engineering department. There was an article on the process and modeling it in a Milwaukee Railroader magazine within the last few years. I have it in a stack and can hunt it up if anyone's interested.

:B~)[/FONT]

 

[JCitron]

Here's one showing the boards inside the door.

 

[bendorsey]

Ya know railroaders are a pretty inventive lot. Seems odd it took until around 1960 to think up covered hoppers.

Ben

 

[whitepass]

Railroads do not like one commodity cars and a grain car would only be used for about 4-5 weeks a year. The new covered hoppers came about I think do to plastic, plastic is shipped as pellets the size of a BB so you can use the same car for grain and plastic. I have also seen photos of grain in hopper cars for storage.

 

[Gary_Evans]

Thanks guys. This was a great historical recap of grain doors but back to my original query: are there any on the DLS?

 

[simulatortrain]

Covered hoppers were first built in quantity in the 1930s and were used for cement.

 

[Gary_Evans]

Apparently there are no open-door box cars with grain doors on the DLS. Now, how did I ever figure that out at my advanced age?

 

[RHKluckhohn]

No, I haven't seen any. Let's hope somebody comes up with one<many.

:B~)

 

[JCitron]

I'm wondering if something like the plywood interior couldn't be made into a commodity. This might mean modifying a boxcar or two by adding in some attachment points to hold the second commodity, meaning the boards. The grain could then be added as a commodity to the boxcar but with a limited quantity so it doesn't leak out the seams.

Just thinking...

 

[whitepass]

You would only see the "grain doors" on loading or unloading.