Delaware and Hudson Hoppers

Saw a westbound at Ayer yesterday about 4:45 PM. Interspersed with slurry tank cars and old B&M gondolas were a large number of old D&H hoppers, apparently once yellow/orange, now very faded and dark gray with grime. What does PanAm carry in these and where do they go to/from?

Another question; I see lots of white Guilford boxcars but few of the gray. About how many were ever painted in Gray?

The hoppers are for MOW service. Guilford painted more gray boxcars than they painted white,only one entire series of boxcars was painted white around 1985 (the B&M 79000's) which was about 100 cars,and a few 3200 series B&M PC&F cars,(later one SIECO car), no more than about 10.
One of these was the LIVE FREE OR DIE boxcar, BM 3249, which now sits out of service at Lawrence Yard. One D&H boxcar was painted white also, D&H 27073. Many more Maine Central boxcars were painted white, most of these were the 27-29000 series "waffle side" cars, about a dozen FMC cars, one PS-1, one 35000 series Berwick car,and at least one double-plug door car, most of which are all now retired from regular use. Several hundred MEC boxcars however, were painted gray. These were the "bleeding G" cars, which railfans chided Guilford for the runny paint on the white "G", what they don't know is that these cars were not painted by Guilford, they were painted by GE Railcar in Sayre, PA. in 2004. A few other MEC cars were painted gray before that at the Waterville shops, even at least one waffle side car, but the paint did not run on these cars, though it did fade more quickly then the GE painted cars.
Hope that's not too confusing!

Mick,
who painted the boxes into the Pan Am scheme, was that Waterville or an outside company?

I'm 99% sure Waterville did all of the Pan Am cars.

Yes, they were done at Waterville.

GE rightfully deserves any snickering they've received for the "bleeding G" cars, but it's also worth noting that some of the Pan Am boxcars painted at Waterville have started to fade quite badly. Some of them, in fact, are already more faded than blue B&M boxcars that were painted in the 1970s. I recently saw a Pan Am boxcar coupled to a B&M Blue boxcar, and the Pan Am car was substantially more faded.

I don't ever remember to jot the number of the car down, but there is one seriously purple-blue Pan Am boxcar that often visits Verso in Bucksport. Normally, I couldn't care less about the Pan Am schemed cars, but that one really stands out.

Like this?
http://mec407.rrpicturearchives.net/sho ... ?id=380488


For comparison, the normal color looks like this: http://mec407.rrpicturearchives.net/sho ... ?id=308339

MEC407 wrote:Like this?
http://mec407.rrpicturearchives.net/sho ... ?id=380488


For comparison, the normal color looks like this: http://mec407.rrpicturearchives.net/sho ... ?id=308339

Actually, I think it's MEC 32012:
http://nellschoo.rrpicturearchives.net/ ... id=1409594
It was at Leeds Jct. and Danville Jct. last week.
-Alan S.

I usually say its based on whatever color is on sale that week. lol.


But regardless of the color, those cars are the WORST to ride.

At least in the posted photo, the color of MEC 32012 looks a lot like that of the HO 40' boxcars Athearn sold as B&M models in the 1950's and 1960's!

Athearn, or maybe atlas, I don't remember...was selling PAR and B&M painted boxes a few years back. The PAR blue and the B&M blue were either th same color or so close I couldn't tell them apart. I don't know if that was modeling license or accurate representations. I've never seen a good B&M box next to a PAR box so I can't say for sure.

KSmitty wrote:Athearn, or maybe atlas, I don't remember...was selling PAR and B&M painted boxes a few years back. The PAR blue and the B&M blue were either th same color or so close I couldn't tell them apart. I don't know if that was modeling license or accurate representations. I've never seen a good B&M box next to a PAR box so I can't say for sure.

This made their batching easy. No matter what color of blue they had left over, they could use it for either B&M or PAR. :D

John

Getting back to the covered hoppers...
Before they were put in MOW Service to haul ballast and old ties, some of the old D&H hoppers were leased annually to the Tilcon quarrie down in Plainfield, CT for shuttle service between Plainfield and Waterbury. Around 2006 Tilcon switched over to trucks 100% on this run since PL-1 was not reliable enough in their opinion. The railroad felt the revenue generated between the lease and the haulage was not enough to generate nightly service like Tilcon wanted, and the cars were getting really old so maintenance was becoming a headache. Keep in mind, it is just crushed stone, so the value of the commodity is nil and shippers in bulk commodities base their analysis on Rate Per Ton, and thus it is easy for a local trucking operation to just cut the rates on this type of commodity.

ProRail wrote:Getting back to the covered hoppers...
Before they were put in MOW Service to haul ballast and old ties, some of the old D&H hoppers were leased annually to the Tilcon quarrie down in Plainfield, CT for shuttle service between Plainfield and Waterbury. Around 2006 Tilcon switched over to trucks 100% on this run since PL-1 was not reliable enough in their opinion. The railroad felt the revenue generated between the lease and the haulage was not enough to generate nightly service like Tilcon wanted, and the cars were getting really old so maintenance was becoming a headache. Keep in mind, it is just crushed stone, so the value of the commodity is nil and shippers in bulk commodities base their analysis on Rate Per Ton, and thus it is easy for a local trucking operation to just cut the rates on this type of commodity.

PL-2 was the job that ran to Tilcon at night... or was supposed to : )