transporting and unloading 1928 Buicks by rail

great video, thanks for posting!

Very cool. Thank you.

Gerry

Cool- a long way from the triple stacked auto carriers of today. Would  love to have one of the cars too.

Loving those old Buick's.  Wishing I had one in my garage.  Thanks for posting the film.

Nice video thank you for posting.  The cars are nice but I want that old pickup they drove to the dock

Clem

Thanks for posting.   The Buick in the upper berth on the wooden A-frame was interesting along with the lowering operation.

Nick 

Neat historic gas pump at the end of of the tape !

machinist posted:

Thanks for posting.   The Buick in the upper berth on the wooden A-frame was interesting along with the lowering operation.

Nick 

I wonder how they lowered the rear of the car? Maybe something built into the rear of the boxcar.

They show a hand cranked lift/jack on wheels that is rolled in and lifts the car off the blocking.

franktrain posted:

machinist posted:

Thanks for posting.   The Buick in the upper berth on the wooden A-frame was interesting along with the lowering operation.

Nick 

I wonder how they lowered the rear of the car? Maybe something built into the rear of the boxcar.

The rear of the car was not elevated.  The front is raised so that the front of another car will fit underneath.  As cars got larger, later boxcars had racks inside so the upper cars could be raised a little more.

There was such a fantastic array of American made medium price makes available that year...Buick still had mechanical brakes and, if 1928, a vacuum fuel pump. A selection of competitors had hydraulic brakes and mechanical fuel pumps. Giant leaps forward! Everything from Auburn to Windsor were better choices. I'd have to count them up ..10-20, or more.

Labor intensive process, but at least they were protected.  Later on, in the 60's railroads though they could get away with using OPEN auto carriers.

The "Parade".  Back then, would a "new" car would have a few more miles on the odometer than today?

...and did it come with a full tank of gas?

Check out that collapsible rear platform.  Back then a trunk was REALLY a trunk.

And they were ACTUALLY water cooled.  Ethylene glycol?  What's that?  

Note that changing a flat tire involved more than just a wheel swap.

You actually "pumped" gas then as well.

Finally, what was the life expectancy of these cars in terms of miles?

>>

Thanks so much for that step back in time.  I love all the now-obsolete equipment shown in use.  I always wondered how the men got the autos out of those rail cars.  Looks like a few Fords joined the parade at the end!

Bob posted:

franktrain posted:

machinist posted:

Thanks for posting.   The Buick in the upper berth on the wooden A-frame was interesting along with the lowering operation.

Nick 

I wonder how they lowered the rear of the car? Maybe something built into the rear of the boxcar.

The rear of the car was not elevated.  The front is raised so that the front of another car will fit underneath.  As cars got larger, later boxcars had racks inside so the upper cars could be raised a little more.

Thanks for the photo & explanation.

Nick

Those look like Milwaukee Road ribbed-side automobile cars in the photo that shows the car with a open doors.

Great to see how autos were unloaded back in the day. Thanks for posting this historical video.

Scotie, thanks for posting the video!  What an informative, gorgeous, and enchanting film!

George

Nice video Scotie!  Wish I could go back and get a 1928 Buick coup!

Very informative, thanks for sharing!

I'd love to have a few of those boxcars show up one day with cars from the past.

>>I'd love to have a few of those boxcars show up one day with cars from the past.

Rod Serling, where are you?

There were something like 3,500,000 cars built in the US in 1928 (most of them in Detroit), of which I suppose the great majority were shipped to dealers and distributors by rail. That adds up to a lot of man-hours involved in loading and unloading auto-carrier boxcars.

Not all of them were built in Detroit....two very good cars were built in N.Y. State, Franklin and Pierce-Arrow, Ohio had Peerless, Jordan, Chandler, and Stearns-Knight, Indiana had Auburn, Stutz, Graham-Paige, Elcar, and Duesenberg, and Missouri had Gardner and Moon, Diana, and Windsor. Wisconsin had Nash and Kissel (with Franklin, favored by Amelia Earhart).  Illinois had Velie, and, l think Roamer, and l have missed some. They really used to make things in America.

Yes, indeed -- and Packard in Warren, Ohio. 

here's how some cars were delivered in Alaska in 1948/1949

http://www.alaskarails.org/pix...ars/AMHA-cars-1.html

Packard started in Warren, but soon, 1900's, moved to Detroit area, where most were built, although a few, rebadged Studebakers, in its last gasps, were built in South Bend.