There have been a number of articles on containers in Mainline Modeler as
far back as 1989. Most were by Jim Kinkaid or John Nehrich. According to these
articles, all containers were bottom unloading. Some were controlled discharge,
some were just dump. Most had water tight top doors, to protect the cargo they
were carrying. Coke containers had open tops, as the weather would not affect
them.
Containers were made by Youngstown Steel and Door Co., Penn and NYC RR, ACF
and Pullman-Standard. There were many different styles and sizes of contaners.
One article states that Youngstown was the most popular. I beleive the most
popular size was a container that was 8' tall, 7' long, 4' wide. This is about
the size Bill is selling. Coke containers were usually about square, 8' tall,
7' long and wide.
Items that containers carried were dolomite, limestone, sand, abrasives,
ferro-manganese, silcon, silica, chromium, calcium carbide, bricks, coke,
cement,and mail. Yes, mail. One article states that mail was hauled between
New York and Chicago. Seven containers were loaded with mail at Grand Central
Station, two others came from the General Post Office. Trucks brought the
containers, one container per truck, to be loaded onto the car at 33rd Street
yard and it took three minutes to transfer each continer to the car. In
Chicago, the containers were set off onto the trucks at the Twelfth Street yard
in a matte of 21 minutes. The container carried 50,000 pounds of mail, while
an ordinary mail car could only handle 30,000 pounds. It does not state what
size the containers were, but must have been larger than the standard size as
stated above. The article does not state, but I assume that there was one
container per car. Probably about 20'long, or longer.
Containers for hauling bricks were somewhat smaller than most containers.
They had bottom doors and weather deflecting tops. They could haul 3000 bricks.
Unloading was done by lifting the contaner a few inches off the floor, open the
doors, then slowly lift the contaner. Very few, if any bricks, were broken.
There were some containers made by L.C.L corp that were refrigerated. These
were 108" long, 83" wide, and 100" high. Milk was also hauled in containers.
these were tanks about 20' long, were loaded onto a truck trailer. Now I'm
getting beyond the scope of the containers Bill has.
Cement (not concrete, concrete is cement, sand, stone, and water) was
hauled in round containers. These containers never left the car they were in.
They were loaded and unloaded by air pressure.
Containers were usually hauled in gondola cars, flat car or specially made
container cars. These container cars look like a gondola, but the ends were
usually flat with just angle bracing. Some container cars had steel frame work
in the inside where the containers would fit tightly into. From pictures I
have, the containers were made to fit a certain car. They fit in tight so there
was not much movement.
This may or may not answer some of the questions about containers. I am not
an expert, just read some articles.
Roy J Meissner
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