I'm an N scaler and am modeling an early 1980's freelance railroad which utilizes the old CRI&P St. Louis to KC route. I'm very interested in running some prototypical unit coal trains that would have served Union Electric's Labadie, MO power plant during the late 70's - early 80's. I have found a few pictures of Ortner 5 bay red and yellow hoppers on the internet (MoPac trains carrying southern Illinois coal), and I also ran across some Trainboard threads regarding UCEX and AMEX hopper cars. I would really appreciate any information that would help me with my research and with building some unit trains. It is my understanding the RI ran 55 car unit coal trains between Kansas City and Labadie for a few months before through service on their route was terminted, but I have no additional details on motive power or hopper cars used for these trains. Thanks for the help!
It was either the Rocket or Remember teh Rock that did a story on this very topic. 55 car trains is correct,couldnt tell you the hoppers, but GP35.38, and I think even 40's were found on these trains. Ill look through my things and see if I can find the story.
Did Rock interchange coal trains with D&RGW? I know they interchanged several manifest trains in Denver, but what about coal?
Chances are they interchanged with IC & other lines in St Louis for southern IL coal. (IL seam coal seems to be good for loco boilers). You could also have a mix of southern IN lines. For loco use, the coal would be transferred into company owned hoppers to cut car costs. This is close enough to get into KY & TN coal mines, so you can have a mix of L&N coal. Orange L&N cars appear to have metal grade coal. I have seen pictures of unit trains delivering cars to Gary area steel mills.
Not sure about the Labadie cars but I do know that several of the former RI coal hoppers went to the UP and were later acquired by the Paducah and Louisville. I saw at least two in the past few years painted oxide red with ROCK ISLAND lettering bleeding through. Might be nice to model some of those and work them into your consists perhaps? Good luck! Hope to see your results!
I have proof that Rock coal trains travelled over the 'Grande! http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Coal-Trains/Brian-Solomon/e/9780760333594/?itm=1&USRI=coal+trains Page 145 shows a sweet shot of Rock blue (blue coal hoppers!?!) behind Grande Tunnel Motors at Rollinsville. Can anyone guesstimate, from the 18 Nov 1978 photo, what train this was, and what cars (in N scale) would approximate the cars in the photo?
http://www.rockisl.com/Galleries/Galleries.htm Heres a good site. Jeff Prince has a lot of pictures. No Blue and White open hoppers. But he does have the Black and Blue ones. Oh yeah found the book I mentioned. Its Remember the Rock Vol 1 no 1 and no2 for the story on the KC line.No 2 includes this little blurb :in April 1978 the Rock started hauling coal trains from Plateau Mines in Watts,Utah to Union electric Labadie Mo. Mopac had the main line into there but the Rock had a spur and started running 55 car trains and ran them about every 10 days.This service ended in summer 79.Article doesnt say what kind of cars and no pictures of any coal trains.
I was a bit excited when I saw the picture, I didn't realize it was a Rock Island coal block, handled as D&RGW train 742, which handled odd-lot coal from Craig & Phippsburg, to Denver CO. D&RGW didn't hand Rock complete unit trains of Rock cars. Oh well, it still is cool! Fireball, I plan on modeling the blue cars in N scale. What decal set is appropriate for 100T triples?
Hmmm I dnt know. I have never seen a blue open top. The ones I know are the black ones. Jeffs site is pretty good, but you can try RITS.They have a yahoo group now.Ill snoop around and if I find something Ill post it.
