Erie Hoppers

Roo,

There is a BNSF railroad line at the end of my street, mostly coal traffic & I had seen hoppers with mostly 1, very rarely 2 , differently colored ends & I was told that they indicated the end with the rotary AAR, Type-F coupler, that allowed the whole car to be dumped in a rotary dumper, all without uncoupling each car. These 100+-car unit trains always had the different colored end on the same-end (front-end on all cars or rear-end on all cars).

But your car looks a lot older than the newer cars I see around me & I am not sure if such markings existed for older cars.

 These are just my opinion.

Thanks,

Naveen Rajan

Sadly, I have a feeling these hoppers were painted that way because they looked cool.  I have never seen any prototype Erie hoppers painted in such a way.

Naveen,

Although that rotary dump video is very informative, the 1930s era 2-bay hopper showed by the original poster, was WAY BEFORE rotary couplers were developed. Such 2-bay hoppers were used prior to the 1930s, all the way through the late 1960s, and did NOT have rotary couplers.

"Sadly, I have a feeling these hoppers were painted that way because they looked cool.  I have never seen any prototype Erie hoppers painted in such a way".

Friends.

I have looked up a few sites before I posted here and I have the Morning Sun Erie colour guide book and could not see any evidence of Erie using "Blue" ends on their hoppers.

Like Bob, I also had a sneaking suspicion that MTH painted them like that as a selling point.

Then I thought, a long shot I agree, that maybe Erie wanted to advertise Anchracite coal (Blue Coal) like the Reading did.

So unless someone comes up with another theory it looks like I am going to live with the colour instead of repainting them and tell my operators either the truth or make up a story! I think I will tell them the truth and tone the colour down by weathering. For the price I paid I am happy with the cars and I needed more hoppers they will be made welcome to the Y.V.RR and who wants to look at a sea of black hoppers in their yards all the time!

Thanks everyone. Roo.

It is possible that they were dedicated to carrying anthracite.  Anthracite or hard coal was colored blue to distinguish it from bituminous or soft coal.  Anthracite was used to fuel home furnaces because it produced much less smoke.

But that is a lot of blue!  The PRR added a yellow dot to some of its hoppers that it operated in a unit train,

Jan

I just spent an hour looking for that right picture. I didn't find it. I did come across the Erie Triplex and some cool old photos. I would bet that MTH had some reference to the ends being colored like that. I do see some hoppers with colored ends that would seem to be re-marked for later roads. I would guess they carried on the original paint scheme?

I believe that the Erie Railroad used artwork of these Blue hoppers and boxcars in an advertising campaign and Mth made the cars which are unprototypical in the real world. (but I could be wrong)

Well someone has another set for sale on ebay. I can't find the ebay number as this person doesn't ship to Australia .

He wants a lot more than I paid for mine all I wanted was another set of Erie hoppers I didn't know I would be still talking about how gorgeous or a rarity they are, (his words not mine). Mine will be running Coke to the Steel Mill I don't care what colour they are and the boxes are in the trash bin. Roo.

MTH Premier 20-90140 Erie 6-Car 2-Bay Offset Hopper Car Set, MINT NIB

According to OGR rules, no live links to Ebay thus the reason why the post before this one was deleted...sorry guys!

Alan

As far as I know all Erie 2 bay hoppers with offset sides had flat ends not peaked.

Speaking of apocryphal hoppers, when I was first changing from semi scale to scale offerings, I came upon mth PRR offset 2 bay hoppers.  Almost bought them as they looked cool, but they were not accurate for PRR. So I waited and bought Atlas gla 2 bay hoppers.  But those Erie hoppers are kind of cool so unless you want to be accurate as far as type of hopper and colors, why not?  It's your rr. 

Yesterday we had a running session and the blokes liked them of course at the moment they are not in use they haven't been converted to 2-Rail that will have to wait till next week.

On Thursday I had six grandchildren Looking/running trains after 2 hours I had to stop everything I was a nervous wreck and the system was completely mixed up with cars and locos everywhere the operators yesterday thought it was funny and laughed about it I did to. You have to let the kids play sometimes.I should have taken a photo but was to busy watching for accidents.

Thanks everyone for responding to this thread I would make an offer on the second set of hoppers on ebay but he wants to much for them.

Roo.

Funny thing is the Huber "Blue Coal" colliery (breaker) in Ashley PA was served by the CNJ.

I too have seen end panels painted on hoppers to indicate cars in dedicated service or to indicate rotary coupler end but never any in light baby blue.

And as folks have indicated the notched end or peaked end cars ("heap shields") really weren't favored by northeastern coal roads, whether anthracite or bituminous.

Me, I'd shoot the ends with some Scalecoat II black paint and weather them and no one would be to the wiser 

they probably saw this MTH car...

and figured if these will sell, why not.

"Me, I'd shoot the ends with some Scalecoat II black paint and weather them and no one would be to the wiser  "

Yep, I'm going to do that when I strip the cars to convert them to 2-rail.

Roo.