N&W boxcars without doors

NW Mailing List nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org
Wed Nov 28 15:04:22 EST 2018


In the summer of 1954 I was employed as a laborer on the N&W's weed 
spray train, and we ran out of chemical for a day or two, so we could 
not do any spraying until a delayed tank car of chemical showed up.  To 
keep us occupied while we waited for the carload of chemical, we were 
put to work stacking "grain doors" in the Roanoke Roadway Material 
(about the most strenuous physical work that I ever did).  These wooden 
grain doors were intended to be added across the inside of a box car's 
door opening as the level of grain increased in the box car during 
loading, but I do not remember (or maybe never knew) whether the box 
cars had sliding doors also, meaning that the grain doors were there to 
prevent leaking that would have occurred with the sliding doors alone, 
or whether the grain doors were used without sliding doors.  I suspect 
the former.  Anybody know?

Gordon Hamilton

On 11/28/2018 11:20 AM, NW Mailing List wrote:
>
> Those 40'ers were long used in newsprint service, too.
>
> WJPowers
>
> On 11/28/2018 10:09 AM, NW Mailing List via NW-Mailing-List wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Was this also practiced during the steam era?
>>
>> The door-less box cars didn't make their appearance until the mid-1960s.
>> The so-called standard box car had been 40 ft. in length with 6 ft. 
>> doors -
>> but as time went by, it didn't meet the requirements of some 
>> shippers.   There
>> were instances where  tow motors wouldn't clear the six ft. doors.  
>> Then too,
>> many-a-box car would be guided to the rip track because the doors 
>> wouldn't open.
>> So as plug-door boxes and hy-cube cars entered the scene,  the 
>> forty-footers
>> ended their career hauling low-revenue limestone on friction-bearing 
>> trucks.
>>                 Harry Bundy
>>
>> ________________________________________
>> NW-Mailing-List at nwhs.org
>> To change your subscription go to
>> http://list.nwhs.org/mailman/options/nw-mailing-list
>> Browse the NW-Mailing-List archives at
>> http://list.nwhs.org/pipermail/nw-mailing-list/
>
> <https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=emailclient&utm_term=icon> 
> 	Virus-free. www.avast.com 
> <https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=emailclient&utm_term=link> 
>
>
> <#DAB4FAD8-2DD7-40BB-A1B8-4E2AA1F9FDF2>
>
> ________________________________________
> NW-Mailing-List at nwhs.org
> To change your subscription go to
> http://list.nwhs.org/mailman/options/nw-mailing-list
> Browse the NW-Mailing-List archives at
> http://list.nwhs.org/pipermail/nw-mailing-list/


---
This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software.
https://www.avast.com/antivirus
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://pairlist6.pair.net/pipermail/nw-mailing-list/attachments/20181128/122948df/attachment-0001.html>


More information about the NW-Mailing-List mailing list