On this episode of Bob’s Train Box, Bob and CTT editor Hal Miller have a look at Menards’ new O gauge Santa Fe F3 locomotive and find a lot to like about it when they run it on a layout! Bob also examines the visual advantage of controlling trains using apps on tablets and smartphones […]
In 1981, I was Director, Freight Car Engineering, for Berwick Forge & Fabricating, a railcar manufacturer. The company decided to start producing grain covered hopper cars, which seemed to still have a significant market. I developed a prototype car that weighed more than desired, reducing the available load capacity. Although we stenciled the car with […]
Railroad man Gainesville Midland Railroad conductor L. C. Birchfield is perched in a caboose cupola in the late 1950s. The railroad ran between Gainesville and Athens in northern Georgia and one time had a branch to Monroe. Seaboard Air Line purchased the road in June 1959. Philip R. Hastings photo […]
Keeping an even keel It was important for boxcar loads of grain to be level. Sometimes workers had to enter the cars and level the loads by hand, as with this carload of wheat. Jeff Wilson collection […]
Ice reefer innovation Attaching a portable precooling motor (right) with a belt to the shaft extension on the generator enabled the ice-cooled car’s own fans to precool a load while standing still. This helped keep ice-cooled cars cold when loading. Preco photo […]
PORT CLINTON, Pa. — The Reading & Northern Railroad has purchased 11 passenger cars from the fleet formerly owned by the San Luis & Rio Grande Railroad, the Colorado operation of bankrupt Iowa Pacific Holdings. Among the cars bought at auction are several notables, including the former Southern Railway steam program open-air coach Lookout Mountain […]
TREGO, Wis. — The kitchen of the car Huckleberry Finn, being converted to a full dining car, is a focal point as work continues on the restoration of the Mark Twain Zephyr at the Wisconsin Great Northern Railroad. During work on Thursday, July 22, lead carpenter Bob Heil displayed a stainless steel butter knife found […]
BUFFALO, N.Y. — The first railcar for the Flour-By-Rail Legacy Project in Buffalo’s Silo City neighborhood has arrived and is now on display. Buffalo Creek No. 3424, a 40-foot car built by the Pullman Co. in 1952, arrived at the project site on July 15 and has now been placed on its trucks on a […]
In the late 1960s and in to the ’70s, I had numerous rides on Toledo, Peoria & Western freight trains in both directions out of Peoria, Ill., where I grew up. The TP&W interchanged with the Pennsylvania Railroad and its successors 108 miles east at Effner, Ind., and with the Santa Fe 114 miles west […]
CUMBERLAND, Md. — As tourist railroads and museums emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic, they are offering new experiences to attract the public. At the Western Maryland Scenic Railroad, this effort has translated into the addition of Amtrak’s last dome car. The Ocean View, built in 1955 and retired by Amtrak in 2019, debuted earlier this […]
Steel-side classic Pacific Fruit Express’s largest class of steel reefers was the 5,000 cars of R-40-23 starting in 1947. They had improved Dreadnaught ends, fans, and steel running boards. Mainline Photos photo […]
Vest pocket streamliner Union Pacific’s original streamliner, the little M-10000 of February 1934, is at Chatsworth, Calif., on the Southern Pacific during its national tour. Gerald M. Best photo […]
