T.T.U.X. lenghts

First of all, Lionel got the TTX nomenclature wrong. The spine cars are really TTAX sets and they came in 5 unit platforms. As time went on and a platform or truck broke down,some sets went from five to four platforms.

Each set[ 5 or 4] is referred to as 1 car in real RR terms. The number of cars are dictated by the length of passing sidings one has on their main line. I hope this helps.

The Santa Fe actually did have ten-unit spine cars, dubbed "Fuel Foilers." They were not identical in design to the individual TTAX units, and were painted white with ATSF reporting marks. But yes, there is a prototype for a ten-unit spine car. If you want to combine yours into multiple units cars, five-unit sets probably have been the most common, though today's 57-foot cars also come in three-unit sets. 

It occurs to me that we probably should replace the old Intermodal Primer Thread, which I understand was accidentally deleted.

RM

I too miss that thread, and agree that it should be rebuilt. There were also others lost when Hoop La gave Rich "new toys". It was an accident. There was a lot of good info and photos in the first few pages. After that it was more of a "show me" topic with a mix of real and model photos and videos.

Sinclair - If you are interested in more of those Lionel units, I just took a bunch off my layout that I would be willing to sell. Drop me an email.

It occurs to me that we probably should replace the old Intermodal Primer Thread, which I understand was accidentally deleted.

Rich

Say it ain't so! 

The existence of that thread is one of the reasons there is an O Scale Freight Car Guide series and there is not a OSFCG for intermodal cars.

The Trinity ARC-5 Spine Flat Car was 5-units on 6 trucks. The number of trucks is usually even for spine flat cars. The number of flat car units is usually odd.

ATSF did have 10-unit spine flat cars for a while.

Andrew

The Trailer Train articulated spine flat cars had UTTX reporting marks while in service.

The Trailer Train TTUX reporting marks were for the single unit spine flat cars.

These reporting marks are now used on TTX Auto Carriers.

Andrew

Yeah Ted, it's true. It went about the same time that we lost some of your guides. I had it bookmarked and I was going through cleaning out old ones and clicked on it and got the forum error message "this post has been deleted".

I was able to recreate all of the deleted O Scale Freight Car Guide threads from cached versions of the original threads or my notes.  I have one thread left to recreate and it includes piggy back flat cars IIRC.

Is anyone inclined to restart the intermodal primer?

If not, I can do and O Scale Freight Car Guide to modern intermodal equipment.

Your suggestions would be most welcome.

If you don't mind Ted, I think you should pick up the ball and run. If I'm not mistaken, the member who originally started the old primer, left us for the HO world. In addition to the actual cars, it would also be helpful to include the containers and trailers that go along with them.

Thanks!!!

Ted,

BNSF Mike, who did a great job on the original primer, did move on to HO. I've thought about restarting it (given that thread's popularity, I've also thought about suggesting an intermodal subforum to Rich), but I guess don't have enough time or inclination. 

If you are inclined to start a new thread, my suggestion is to put it on the general forum and make it another "Intermodal Primer" thread or call it "Intermodal Roundtable." Your scale freight car threads are great, and I'm a scale guy and read them and even occasionally contribute. But I suspect there's a fair number of people interested in intermodal who don't have room for the scale-sized equipment. Because the old thread was focused on intermodal generally, those folks felt comfortable participating in a way they might not if the topic was scale equipment.

Best,

RM

The Santa Fe actually did have ten-unit spine cars, dubbed "Fuel Foilers." They were not identical in design to the individual TTAX units, and were painted white with ATSF reporting marks. But yes, there is a prototype for a ten-unit spine car. 

 

YEs and the prototype was 6 units long. The TTAX 5 unit sets of today was born on the SF ten Pack fuel foiler concept.

Here are a couple of pix of the curious containers once used on Fuel Foilers.

These photos were taken at Barstow, CA. 

Another question, are the Lionel TTUX cars scale?

Nope, not even close.

Re: Lionel TTUX; they remind me of a cute little kid clomping around the house in his Dad's shoes...in other words, the wheel sets are too big in relation to the remainder of the model.  This is often the case with cars referred to as "semi-scale".  And I am not knocking this reality because there are plenty of modelers on this forum that enjoy tin-plate, 0-27, etc.

The Lionel O gauge spine flat cars are S Scale length and height, but they are much wider than S Scale, yet not as wide as O Scale.

Andrew