For those of who model the steam era. I am aware Grain was transported in box cars, how was this done? woe were the cars modified, loaded, and unloaded?
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I know someone offered modeled, what looks like a wooden barricade that you placed inside a boxcar so that when the doors opened nothing would come out. How it was loaded or unloaded hopefully someone with more knowledge than me will chime in.
I know I have at least one outside braced car that mentions grain loading on the side.
The door openings were closed up two thirds the way on the inside of the openings. They used whatever two by lumber they had lying around. All the cracks and small holes were stuffed with rags. Larger holes were often covered with tin cans and large head roofing nails.
There was/is a grain spout that could be swiveled out from the elevator that was used to load the car. Most elevators had a horizontal auger under the tracks, that dumped back into the boot pit. Elevators without permanent augers had portable augers and a manhole close to the elevator that dumped into the boot pit.
Due to the weight of the grain, one pile in the center of the car was all the weight that it could hold. The bottom boards were knocked out first to allow as much grain out as possible. Then they removed the rest of the boards to get in the car to scoop out the rest of the grain.
It was a dirty, labor intensive job.
Here is a good web site with some piks of grain loading box cars in use:
http://industrialscenery.blogs...rain-in-boxcars.html
Scott
@Brad J posted:The door openings were closed up two thirds the way on the inside of the openings. They used whatever two by lumber they had lying around. All the cracks and small holes were stuffed with rags. Larger holes were often covered with tin cans and large head roofing nails.
There was/is a grain spout that could be swiveled out from the elevator that was used to load the car. Most elevators had a horizontal auger under the tracks, that dumped back into the boot pit. Elevators without permanent augers had portable augers and a manhole close to the elevator that dumped into the boot pit.
Due to the weight of the grain, one pile in the center of the car was all the weight that it could hold. The bottom boards were knocked out first to allow as much grain out as possible. Then they removed the rest of the boards to get in the car to scoop out the rest of the grain.
It was a dirty, labor intensive job.
Had to be a pain. Trying to set up a few scenes . loading grain/malt from the gain house to the Brewery silo's. Along the Milwaukee Road on the bear line
@Dave_C posted:I know someone offered modeled, what looks like a wooden barricade that you placed inside a boxcar so that when the doors opened nothing would come out. How it was loaded or unloaded hopefully someone with more knowledge than me will chime in.
I know I have at least one outside braced car that mentions grain loading on the side.
thank you
@Scott Kay posted:Here is a good web site with some piks of grain loading box cars in use:
http://industrialscenery.blogs...rain-in-boxcars.html
Scott
very help full
Good scenes in the movie Picnic showing this as I recall.
"Grain Elevator" is a neat short film from the National Film Board of Canada, detailing the daily operation of a prairie elevator in Saskatchewan. Grain from this elevator is shipped in boxcars, and there are several scenes in the movie showing glimpses into the process of preparing and loading the cars. The rest of the film is pretty cool too.
Jim
Frome an article I read long ago, this was a very labor intensive job. Cars would have to be cleaned and wood boards were nailed across the doors. Then heavy craft paper was nailed/stapled to the inside walls. For Cars in dedicated service markings were painted at various heights inside the car to tell loaders the maximum level allowed for different grains based on their weight, corn is heavier than wheat than oats, etc. To load a car a hose, sometimes with a "Y" shaped nozzle called a slinger was placed inside the boxcar. The 'slinger' literally threw the grains to each end of the car.
When the cars reached a terminal elevator, the doors were opened and the paper torn away to let the grain fall into a pit. Men with shovels or a scoop similar to a dredge bucket was pulled through the grain to assist in unloading. At some elevators FMC installed a device to expedite unloading. The car was pulled onto a table over the pit and clamped down. Then the table would elevate the opposite side of the car towards the pit. Then each end of the car would be raised alternating to help unloading. When nearly all grain was emptied the remaining was cleared by hand.
I know that this is a ? about the steam era days but; In the early 1980's I worked at a grain elevator part time on the coast where they unloaded the grain cars. While most grain was in the big hoppers there were still lots of the 40 foot box cars being used at that time as they were used on the old branch lines with light rails that could not handle the big hoppers. On most of the CN box cars there was a wheat shield symbol. Here is a link to the MTH site showing a typical car; https://mthtrains.com/20-93433
It was interesting to see them unload the box cars. An operator in a control room would winch a box car on to a big platform, and clamp the couplers on each end to hold the box car tight in place, a mechanical arm would open the box car door on one side, then pull wood and cardboard liner from the door. The couplers were clamped on both ends so the car would not move and the platform underneath was like a big half circle - massive. The platform could be tilted slightly to the side, the whole platform with the box car would rotate tipping the car up so the grain would all slide out to the hoppers below. Then tip the other way to get the rest of the grain out of the other end. Looking at it from the basement bottom of the platform was amazing to see a whole box car tilted in the air. The cars were then winched out of the building and allowed to roll down the hill where they coupled to the other empty cars.
An interesting side note is that as there was grain scattered all along the empty car tracks and much loved by a variety of birds. There was a problem with folks coming onto the property laying out nets over the tracks to catch the birds that landed to eat the grain. The box and hopper cars were hard to hear when they were rolling down the line with all the other elevator noise. They had to keep clearing people off the tracks so no one would get hurt if they were not paying attention and a freight car was rolling down the tracks. I think by the 1990's the grain box cars had been phased out.
My Dad was a grain dealer and I grew up around an elevator. I hate to think of how many cars I coopered up until the time I graduated high school in 65.
There were two types of grain doors, the wood and the cardboard. I preferred the cardboard even though they took about 5 times as many nails.
Wood doors were two planks thick, usually made of oak, and really heavy for a skinny little kid. We put them four high on each car door and as mentioned earlier stapled on kraft paper to seal the cracks. In fact 3 high would have been plenty good but the railroad required 4. Th nails were double headed with about 1/2 inch between the heads. That way the doors could be held in solidly yet there was an exposed head for easier and quicker removal at the destination. We had a ladder inside the car and one leaned against the outside to get in and out after installing the doors.
Paper doors were corrugated cardboard with metal straps built in. The bottom 12 inches or so and that amount on each end would fold in. The bottom fold was laid flat on the floor to help seal the door and the side flaps were folded back to expose the straps for nailing then folded back flush with the car door sides. A 2X6 board was nailed across the top to support the loading chute. Lathes were nailed up and down the side flaps to make sure they would stay in place. Same two ladder method to get in and out after things were done..
The grain was shot to the ends of the car so there was a big pile at each end. Even at the end of a long journey the grain was less than a foot deep at the doors. Most cars were rated at 100,000 capacity. That's only a little over 1 1/2 semi trailer loads, so you can imagine there was a lot of empty air space in those cars.
Grain was weighed before being dumped in the cars. Dad had an automatic 600 lb. trip scale, which is 10 bushels of wheat per trip, and loading went pretty fast. Regardless of what some may have heard, all transactions are done by weight. Bushels are only important for bragging rights to farmers down having their morning coffee. Later, when I worked at a terminal elevator in Denver. I ran a tandem hopper 100,000 pound beam scale for loading hoppers and trucks at the same time. That system could move a massive amount of grain in a short time.
@Dave_C posted:I know someone offered modeled, what looks like a wooden barricade that you placed inside a boxcar so that when the doors opened nothing would come out. How it was loaded or unloaded hopefully someone with more knowledge than me will chime in.
I know I have at least one outside braced car that mentions grain loading on the side.
Lionel has done very nice grain loading PS-1 boxcars in multiple road names, and also roof hatch boxcars. I like the CNW version of the latter, because of the Miller beer logo on the door, being dedicated (I think) to carrying hops to the Miller brewery.
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Thank you all, the great information! For this , probably the last layout I build . The era 1918 to 1942? The C.M. St. P. and P. Rail Road, from Milwaukee to New Lisbon , and lines North, with interchanges ,with the Soo , CNW and GB&W. As Beer and its production was a Huge part of the Historical area . As a modeler I want to create a period detailed scene were I pick up grain , malt ect. and deliver it to the brewery . The details , box cars, even figures need to correct on both ends of the process. Thank you again for sharing you knowledge
I tried to model this on my layout based on some photos of the manual grain unloading process. The Atlas box car was modified so that the grain doors would fit flush against the inside car door opening.
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At the Patee House Museum in Saint Joseph MO in 2007, I saw CB&Q grain doors on Display.
This museum also has a reconstructed CB&Q Red & green Wood Depot & BR Hannibal & St Joe 4-4-0 #35 on display.
CB&Q Bill
@Matthew Jones posted:I tried to model this on my layout based on some photos of the manual grain unloading process. The Atlas box car was modified so that the grain doors would fit flush against the inside car door opening.
well done, thats along the lines of what I envisioned.
now the fun. I have a 4' table height and some of grain elevators scale out at a little over 3'. just about up to the drywall on the ceiling!
@breezinup posted:Lionel has done very nice grain loading PS-1 boxcars in multiple road names, and also roof hatch boxcars. I like the CNW version of the latter, because of the Miller beer logo on the door, being dedicated (I think) to carrying hops to the Miller brewery.
Probably from the Ladish malt plant , on the CNW near Jefferson Wi
Very interesting to an elevator modeler! Thanks to "Tripleo" and all.
