Big John Hoppers

chessie Jan 31, 2001

  1. chessie

    chessie TrainBoard Supporter

    6,183
    6
    79
    I saw a NS hopper car today that obviously had been repainted into NS, however, it still had the words "BIG JOHN" on the side. So how many of these exist and what are their sources????

    Harold

    ------------------
    Harold Hodnett
    Fan of NS, CSX, and their predecessors!
    Now Open! The North Carolina Railfan Web Site
    http://www.trainweb.org/ncrail/
     
  2. Mankind

    Mankind Guest

    0
    0
    0
    Not sure how many are left, but they're former Southern cars.

    Paul #3

    ------------------
    [​IMG]
    Have A Nice Day!
     
  3. Justin May

    Justin May TrainBoard Member

    123
    0
    20
    Harold,
    Best question to date for SOU fans and Covered hopper nuts like myself. Well what you say could have been one of two hoppers, the first now NS 269065-269498 which are classed HCS-22. These hoppers have 12 trough hatches, 8 discharge gates and a cubic capacity of 4948. The car is 61'11" in length and has a total capacity of 206200 lbs. These are repaints and slight rebuilds of the origianl SOU order 8575-8999. Originally built by Magor Rail car division of Fruehauf (yes the trailer people [​IMG] ) The SOU order was also 61'11" in length and had an enlarged capacity of 5325 cu. ft. totalling 200000 lbs. These hoppers stayed in SOU colors for some time until NS rebuilt the entire fleet for increased unloading efficency- termed the Pegasus Project, which in partnership with ADM and Staley, helped reduce unloading times and guareenteed 50 car unit trains to the grain producers mentioned above. The project entailed creating a system of allowing both discharge gates to be opened at the same time by the use a splicer. This reduced unload times and has been completed on 250 cars as of 1994. Well hope this gives you some insight on these great BIG cars and as always have a good one, Justin May

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]

    [ 04 February 2001: Message edited by: Justin May ]
     
  4. chessie

    chessie TrainBoard Supporter

    6,183
    6
    79
    Justin,
    Thanks for the info. It appears the car # is 269242, class HCS-22. I will get a picture posted tomorrow. I remember photographing these in their Southern livery.

    Harold
     
  5. chessie

    chessie TrainBoard Supporter

    6,183
    6
    79
    O.K.... here it is:
    [​IMG]

    Harold
     
  6. GP30

    GP30 TrainBoard Member

    3,527
    2,337
    81
    Overland <ade these for HO scale in Brass for a little while, not sure if they still produce 'em or not :confused: .--pat
     
  7. Justin May

    Justin May TrainBoard Member

    123
    0
    20
    Nice picure Harold [​IMG] I look forward to seeing more on your website. Justin May

    [ 06 February 2001: Message edited by: Justin May ]
     
  8. chessie

    chessie TrainBoard Supporter

    6,183
    6
    79
    The website has been a slooow process... especially since the server does not support all FP2000 extensions. :mad: Oh well, it won't win any web designs, but it will get my pictures out to folks who can enjoy them! The digital ones are much easier to post, mostly involve just resizing the original images.... the color prints are much more time consuming, and I have well over a 1000 of them :eek: I have a goal to get some each week, and so far I am able to do so [​IMG]

    Harold

    P.S. I do take requests.... It gives me more incentive ;)

    [ 06 February 2001: Message edited by: chessie ]
     

Share This Page