Freight House Part II

A bit of a preview about some other things I'll be posting soon, but the main reason for this picture was to test out a new mock-up for the freight house.

The freight house was located at the Whiting Street Yard on the Berlin Line, and is quite large.

This is the north end of the freight house, truck side.

The south end, also truck side.

And this is the track side.

There were three tracks servicing the freight house, although the specific layout means that only the back half of the tracks could be bridged by plates. It appears that there were 17 spotting locations per track, not including the open platform at the far end. The track closest to the Freight House is 845 ft. long, or enough for about 20 to 21 40-foot cars.

The single track that is between the yard and the freight house appears to be the scale track for a 42 foot, 100-ton scale. I'm assuming this was used to weigh cars loaded at the bulk tracks. 

The bulk tracks swing behind the yard, and include a 15-ton pillar crane and a concrete unloading (undoubtedly used for cars among other loads). One of the bulk tracks continues across Whiting Street as a siding for Stanley Tools, the third of three Stanley plants in the city.

So after realizing how many spotting locations I'll need at a minimum, I was considering whether I would have that much space. As it turns out, if I stick with a prototype layout of three tracks, I can. I might have to space the tracks closer than the usual 2" on center that I've been using, but that's actually more prototypical and looks better too.

I also figured that 1947 (or 1946) would be the busiest, and that the traffic would decline as we operate in future years. So here's a compiled listing of the arranged service from New Britain for several more years. 

April, 1949 (11 spots):

Alexandria via PRR-SOU (YN-1 to BG-3)

Chicago via ERIE (AO-5) (Tue, Thu, Sat)

Cincinnati via L&H-CNJ-RDG-WMD-B&O (AO-5) (Tue, Thu, Sat)

East St. Louis via PRR (YN-1 to NE-1) (Tue, Thu, Fri)

Philadelphia Transfer via PRR (YN-1 to NE-1)

Pittsburgh 11th St. via PRR (YN-1 to NE-1)(Tue, Thu, Sat)

St. Albans via CV (YN-1 to NM-4)(Tue, Thu, Sat)

Utica via NYC (AO-5 to RI-2)(Tue, Thu, Sat)

Cedar Hill Transfer (YN-1)

Inbound from Cedar Hill Transfer (Daily), and Maybrook (Tue, The, Sat)

April, 1950 (8 spots):

Hornell via ERIE (YN-1 to BO-1)(Tue, Thu, Sat)

Philadelphia Transfer via PRR (YN-1 to NE-1)

Pittsburgh 11th St via PRR (YN-1 to NE-1)(Tue, Thu, Sat)

Springfield via B&A (YN-1 to 1/NS-2)

Cedar Hill Transfer (YN-1)

Inbound from Cedar Hill Transfer (daily), Hartford (Mon, Wed, Fri) and Maybrook (Tue, The, Sat).

The Springfield move is interesting, it goes south to Cedar Hill to then go north up the Springfield line.

April, 1951 (8 spots):

Hornell via ERIE (YN-1 to BO-1)(Tue, Thu, Sat)

Philadelphia Transfer via PRR (YN-1 to NE-1)

Pittsburgh 11th St via PRR (YN-1 to NE-1)(Tue, Thu, Sat)

Springfield via B&A (YN-1 to 1/NS-2)

Cedar Hill Transfer (YN-1)

Inbound from Cedar Hill Transfer (daily), Hartford (Mon, Wed, Fri) and Maybrook (Tue, The, Sat).

Jumping ahead a bit to Oct, 1956 (11 spots):

Baltimore via PRR (YN-1 to BG-1)

Cleveland via L&H-DL&W (YN-1 to BO-1)

Hornell via ERIE (YN-1 to BO-1)(Tue, Thu, Sat)

Newport, VT via B&M-CP (YN-1 to NS-4)

Philadelphia Federal St. via PRR (YN01 to BG-1)

Pittsburgh 11th St via PRR (YN-1 to NE-1)(Tue, Thu, Sat)

Scranton via L&H-DL&W (YN-1 to BO-1)

Springfield, MS via NYC (YN-1 to NS-4)(Tue, Thu, Sat)

Spencer, NC via PRR-SOU (YN-1 to BG-1)

Cedar Hill Transfer (YN-1)

Inbound from Cedar Hill Transfer

The busiest in my era for some reason is actually from September, 1952 (24 spots):

Baltimore via PRR (YN-1 to BG-1)

Cumberland, MD via L&HR-CRP-RDG-WM-B&O (AO-5)(Mon, Wed, Fri)

Holyoke via B&M (Extra, NS-4)(Mon, Wed, Fri)

Hornell via ERIE (YN-1 to BO-1)

Philadelphia Federal St. via PRR (YN01 to BG-1)

Pittsburgh 11th St via PRR (YN-1 to NE-1)

Scranton via L&H-DL&W (YN-1 to BO-1)(Mon, Wed, Fri)

Spencer, NC via PRR-SOU (YN-1 to BG-1)(Mon, Wed, Fri)

Springfield, MA via B&A (Extra to NS-4)

Cedar Hill Transfer (YN-1)

East Hampton, MA (NY-2, Extra)

Hartford (Extra)

Holyoke (NY-2)

Northampton - Williamsburg, MA (NY-2, Extra)

Westfield, MA (NY-2)

Inbound from Cedar Hill Transfer, Easthampton, Hartford (Mon, Wed, Fri), Maybrook Transfer (Tue, Thu, Sat), Meriden, New York (Harlem Station), Northampton, Westfield, Williamsburg, plus truck from Berlin and East Berlin.

Not sure why Holyoke is listed twice.

No way I'll be able to accomodate the 1952 schedule. I just don't have the space for that. But with the triple track I can manage 18 spots, or 15 loading, 3 unloading spots. The crews will just have to switch out cars as they are unloaded.

However it pans out, it appears that the freight house will be a more significant industry in operations than I thought. Each morning it will need 5 to 10 empties, plus the incoming loads. Outbound will be anything between 3 cars to clearing out all of the house tracks.

It's also entirely possible, and perhaps probable, the the cars that are loaded only 3 days a week are spotted only on those days. Since the railroad pays a per diem, they wouldn't want a car just sitting there, but a New Haven owned box car could. Otherwise they probably staged the load in the freight house the first day, and loaded it the second day once the empty was spotted.

Freight House Traffic

I'm a bit away from having the freight house operational, as I haven't actually built the Whiting Street Yard yet. But as I was going through some paperwork I realized that I have everything I need to set up the freight house properly.

In the Freight Train and Package Car Schedules, there is a section in the back for Arranged Package Cars. This section tells you exactly what cars are inbound, and what is outbound at the freight house, including what train picks them up.

For example, for New Britain there are cars for the following destinations in September 1947:

Picked up on ANE-1

• Chicago via the PRR
• Philadelphia Transfer via PRR
• Pittsburgh 11th St. via PRR

Picked up by AO-5 (All Tue-Thu-Sat except Waterbury which is daily)

• Cincinnati via L&H-CNJ-RDG-WMD-B&O
• East St. Louis via NYC (OA-5 to Bridgeport then EI-2 to State Line)
• Hornell Transfer via ERIE
• Scranton via L&H-DL&W
• Utica via NYC (OA-5 to Bridgeport then EI-2 to State Line)
• Waterbury

Picked up by YN-1

• St. Albans via CV (YN-1 to Cedar Hill then NM-4 to New London) (Tue-Thu-Sat)
• Cedar Hill Transfer 

Picked up by HDX-5 (Tue-Thu-Sat)

• Middletown, CT - the car is from Harlem River, transferred via HDX-5 to Hartford, then HDX-7 (the Valley Local) to Middletown. So I could actually coordinate this with Chris for his sessions if we wanted to.

Inbound cars are from:
Cedar Hill Transfer on NY-2
Maybrook on OA-2 (Tue-Thu-Sat only)
New York (Harlem Sta.) on NY-2

So I'll need 3 unloading spots and 12 loading spots at the freight house, which always for the same destinations. Cincinnati, E. St. Louis, Hornell Transfer, Scranton, Utica, St. Albans, and Middletown be at the rear of the tracks, because they are pulled only on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday.

Because the freight house is double-tracked and they would use bridge plates to access all of the cars, the house tracks will need to accommodate 8 cars each. This is perfect to know right now because I'm working on the layout of the yard.

Note that it's possible to have more volume than one car per destination or origination, the crew would just need to switch out cars when there is a surplus. I doubt there will be a surplus for the cars pulled only 3 times a week, because they would be daily jobs if the traffic warranted.

This information is also helpful when I get around to creating waybills for the through freights, because I have the information for all of the freight houses that are feeding those freights.

But wait! There's more!
As a bonus, here's the information for Middletown, CT which Chris will need for his layout:

No outbound destinations are arranged. Inbound traffic is from New Britain as noted (which would arrive the next day, or Monday, Wednesday, and Friday), and Cedar Hill Transfer daily (on the Airline local). All of the other freight houses on the Valley or Air Line aren't listed.

LCL by Truck
This doesn't mean that the freight house or bulk tracks don't ship out. Just that there aren't arranged destinations. So if an industry not served by the railroad needed to ship out, they would have to have the freight agent order a car. However, unless the load will nearly fill the car, it wouldn't be terribly cost effective. Instead, it would go via truck service (which is in the following section in the schedules) to a centralized freight house to be loaded in that direction.

• From New Britain that would be truck route A-11 to Hartford.
• From Cromwell, Middletown and Portland, A-6 to Hartford.
• Wethersfield to Cromwell is A-4 to Hartford. Middletown to Amston and Colchester would be N-1 to New Haven
• The rest of the Air Line and the lower Valley, N-13 to New Haven.
• Deep River to Saybrook would be trucked to New London on route M-1. 

These trucking routes also brought in LCL to the same freight houses that weren't served directly by arranged freight service.

These smaller LCL loads that are handled by truck would be added to the trains that have arranged routes where possible, including those that would then be transferred to truck.

"Peddler Cars"
The other option is for an industry that has several small loads to multiple destinations. As long as they can fill the car enough to make it economical, the industry would ship from the freight house via a single car to multiple destinations. I have some O&W freight house that shows that this was a regular approach for several of the industries there.

Switch Hardware

So here's a little more on the switch hardware, what I know and what I don't.

It started with this photo by Jim Karl, in August 1949. 

One of the things that jumped out at me, pretty much from the beginning, is the track and switch hardware, and the trackwork itself. Part of this probably has to do with how much track, and how few trains you see nowadays railfanning. But it's also in the forefront of photos like this, just as model trackwork often is in layout photos.

Later on, we came across this slide from moments earlier.

What's front and center is the switch hardware for two crossovers.

We can clearly see the small signal box (with the rounded cover) in front of the rear switch stand, along with the junction box where the signal line goes underground. On the front ties is the rodding that uses a crank and a connecting rod that is as large as the connecting rod from the switch stand itself. When you zoom in on the first picture (I need a better scan, but you can see it on the original), there is a small curved metal connection at a right angle at the end of the point closest to the signal box. This is where that connecting rod is attached to the points, and is much smaller than the connecting rod from the switch stand and the rod that runs along the tracks. Just to the right of the switch stands, on the adjacent track, is a small cylinder with wires apparently welded to the tracks. Part of a signal circuit? The crossing gates at this time were still controlled manually so it couldn't have been for those.

The following picture shows the rodding coming from a signal box on another switch at an unknown location on the New Haven. It's much smaller, and you can also see the strap steel brace that keeps the two ties in alignment (this is also visible on the first picture, next to the signal box that is on the left side of the tracks since the switch rodding is taking up too much space on the right side.

I will also note that the rodding that runs alongside the track is only on the crossover that connects the Berlin Line to the Highland Line. None of the other crossovers have them. At this point I'm not entirely sure what they are for, but I do expect that I can model their appearance.

Although Alexander Models has a signal box, it's the wrong one. Details West has a switch stand set that has the signal box (SS-914, although I think SS-915 also has the details). For the switch stands themselves, the Rapido ones are a no-brainer for me because they were modeled after the New Haven switch stands, starting with the tall stand that's in Bill Schneider's front yard.

For the point rodding, the British modelers seem to have an edge. Here's a great page with more detail. Here's another using Model Signal Engineering parts. Here's an excellent post about using the Wills (Peco) rodding.

For those who enjoy fiddling, here's an installation in 4mm (slightly larger than HO at 3.5mm) with functioning rodding. It doesn't actually throw the turnout, but moves when the points are moved, which is the approach I'll take if I decide to make it "operational." Check out the video at the bottom of his page.

You can find the brass etched details at Brassmasters and the Wills (Peco) point rodding kit is a popular non-working plastic option, available at Model Railways Direct or via Walthers. There is also an extension kit.

C&L Finescale has working point rodding for 7mm (O) scale.

For other track details, I've been using a mix of parts from the Microengineering turnouts themselves, joint bars from Precision Design Company and Proto87 Stores.

I have the Proto87 stores tieplates and spikes as well, for scenic elements. You'll want to click on this to see a larger version to find them...

I-2 #1300 at the station

So, I had a great time at the Springfield show, and had somebody stop by to tell me they enjoy my "occasional" blog. So I figured I ought to actually post something. And no, I don't intend this to be a one-time thing!

I have actually gotten a few things done in the basement, and have a few projects in the works. Actually, when I think about it, there is probably quite a bit to report on. So I'll get to that shortly. In the meantime, here's a classic Kent Cochrane photo.

This shot of I-2 class #1300 with an 8-car racing special is facing eastbound on an unknown date c1946/7. Note the large wrench leaning against the line pole. I still need to pick one up. The shot offers a pretty good view of Siderowf Paper Company in the background.

The baggage car is being loaded with (storage) mail and will go to Hartford on Train #463.

Also of note is an ATSF Bx-11 box car, #124518. The original Bx-11 box cars had radial roofs, but this is clearly a peaked roof.  From 1941 to 1944 they were being rebuilt with Murphy roofs, many raised by a foot which is quite obvious as seen in a photo on the Proto48 Modeler site. This car received a more modest 6" increase in height. A Westerfield #4600-series kit will be my starting point for this, with a new roof.

Other details are the speed limit sign (we see the back) and just in front of that is the back of the ring post, similar to a whistle post but with an "R" instead of a "W."

The rodding that parallels the track in the foreground runs under the track just in front of the locomotive and continues alongside it to the switch mechanism. I don't have a good picture of the end roughly where Kent would have been standing. My assumption is that it is some sort of locking or switching mechanism for the crossover, since Kent is standing on what is the Berlin Line, and the locomotive is on the eastbound main, Track #2. There is no evidence, nor any notation on the valuation maps that there is a derail here. I don't know if a hand-thrown crossover could use rodding to throw the other end of the crossover, but I suspect not. To start with, it would have to actuate the hand throw at the other end. Instead, I suspect it was a locking mechanism since throwing this crossover fouls the mainline. However, if there were locks at both ends, then I'm not sure exactly how that would work either. Perhaps somebody can shed some light on this?

Working with MicroEngineering Turnouts

A recent post on the Canadian Model Trains post asked about curving commercial turnouts. I can only comment on using MicroEngineering turnouts because that's all I have on my layout.

MicroEngineering turnouts specifically note that this is possible in their instructions. Here's how I've been using them, with some additional modifications.

Unfortunately the turnouts are all installed, so I can't show you the the underside of the webbing, etc, but here's the basic process.

1. Curve toward the diverging route. This will make the radius on the diverging route sharper. ME only manufactures #6 turnouts. You can curve it the other way, which makes more of a wye than a curved turnout and doesn't work quite as well.

2. Leave the areas through both the hinged points and the frog straight (it works better and is prototypical). In other words, only curve the section between the frog and hinge, and the portion beyond the frog.

3. Cut the webbing on the outer rail of the curve, along with the inner tracks, leaving the webbing intact on the inner rail only. I cut the webbing between every other tie. You can do all of them, but the more you curve the turnout, the more of a gap you'll get between the diverging rail and frog.

In addition, I make a few other modifications. First I try to eliminate the short sections of rail just past the frog.

To do this slide the short pieces of rail out of the turnout. Then remove the ties from the next piece of track, and cut the main rail short enough to allow the other rail to reach all the way to the frog (leaving a gap of course to avoid a short). This eliminates a joint and the need to solder a feeder to this small section of rail. 

Notice that the short pieces of rail to the inner tracks left of the frog have been eliminated.

Where needed, you can nest the next turnout up to the frog. 

1. Prep the first turnout by removing the small piece of rail after the frog on the appropriate route.

2. Measure the outer rail on that route to determine the correct length. Using track cutters, press the rail very hard against the ties on either side of your cut, and cut the rail to length. This will prevent it from lifting the rail when you cut it, which will at best mean that you have to figure out how to reassemble the turnout, at worst it will break off all of the scale spike heads that hold the rail in place and you'll need a new turnout.

3. Cut out all except the last two ties behind the frog.

4. On the second turnout, remove the first two ties, then slide the rail into the last two ties on the first turnout. Solder the outer rail to strengthen the turnout and maintain electrical continuity. 

Here's an example:

The points of the middle turnout is much closer to the frog than the points of the turnout on the left.

Using this same technique, you can create crossovers. The length of the turnout beyond the frog places the track centers at about 2". This is less than many people use, but more prototypical (still too wide). So if you're going to use this approach it's best to work it into your layout plan from the start.

In this case, you'll leave half of the ties on the diverging route on each turnout so you can slide the outer rail from each turnout into the frog on the other turnout. You'll also need to shorten the ties between the two turnouts, some all the way to the edge of the tie plate to clear each other. 

I don't worry about the gaps between the middle of the ties. I fix that while ballasting.

Crossover.

Note that the middle two turnouts are also nested end-to-end, eliminating the short sections of rail.

The outer two turnouts are not nested, and those sections of rail remain.

And here are two nested back to back with a handlaid diamond crossing.

Still have a few ties to add.

You might be able to tell that some of the wing rails is an experiment in using CMVW plastic ones from their turnout kits.