Intermodal Modeling


There seems to be a couple levels of model railroader out there.

The first is the one who scrounges and builds a lot of his own stuff. It makes me feel old, but when I was a kid Model Railroader actually ran articles on scratchbuilding your own steam loco. It used pre-made wheels and motor but much of the body was made of brass, carefully cut and formed by the modeler. These guys scratch build cars and buildings etc, etc.

The second, and probably most common modeler is the ordinary Joe, I guess you'd call him the middle class modeler. He's the fellow buying Athearn blue box freight cars, plastic buildings and locos in the $50 to $150 price range. He may be into DCC and/or other electronics, but he's built his system over time, and it took some doing to get there. I'm guessing most of us folks here fall into that group.

The third group is the high end modeler with lots of disposable income. These are the guys collecting expensive Lionel. They like G scale locos that go for $1K each. They buy brass with sound and DCC and have it custom painted. The true high end modelers hire somebody to build their layout for them.

In truth, the 3 groups probably blur together. But when I look at products and read ads, they do seem to target one of the 3 personalities. When I see locos that cost $500 and passenger cars that are $60 each, I know I'm not the person they're trying to sell this stuff to.

How about group 4 & 5?

4 being the scratch builders who don't scrounge, but, take something like an Athearn SD40-2 and bash a Kaslo cab onto it.

5 the person who buys all the el-cheepo train sets and sets the up to run in circles and is perfectly content that way.

Huh...?
 
I'm hoping to get to modeling the intermodal hub I'm in and out of daily. Its a simple operation, and relativly small, One Top loader lift, One side lift for trailers, and two Capacity yard trucks. Theres two thru tracks, PY01 and PY02, PY01 is 2500' and PY02 is around 1800' Theres about 350 parking spots for loads and 250 for Empties/chassis.

Mine will be scaled down a bit, but should capture the general feel. I'd love to get that dcc controled crane but.. money, and etc etc etc
 
If you're really into intermodal, you should join the Modelintermodal group on Yahoo. A lot of knowledgeable people there, both as modellers and in real life. You can probably get any question you have answered there.

Kennedy
 
BNSF and UP usually pulls single well car to 3 pack or 5 pack spine car. Most of the trains that you see are going to Chicago. Some are in mulitple sections.

And some of those get handed off to CSX and NS to continue on to NY. Depending on the train, it could be all containers, all TOFC, or a mix. CSX's Q110, the UPS TOFC (Willow Springs to N. Bergen), sometimes has cars carrying non-UPS trailers on it. I know some of those are UPS leased trailers, but I've seen some that don't appear to be the case, so sometimes I wonder if CSX will tack on some TOFC that aren't UPS specific.

Kennedy
 
Kennedy I'm signed up to the yahoo group already :)


Ken L I have permission from the Railyard Mgr and NS t otake photos, the only problem is, I go into work @ 5 pm, by the time I get my work done, its dark!
20040707PIC12.JPG
Thats a Couple years old. The crane in the left of the picture burned a year ago Nov. so they have purchased a new Taylor THDC 975 'big red' which is very nice!
 
WOW! I wish I could get one!!! FINALLY SOME ONE OTHER THAN ME CAN SPELL San Bernadino!!!!1
Well modeling it, your learn it...

San Bernardino (you missed the R :eek: ), but I remember it easy, as a friend from High School's last name was Bernard, lol
 
This is the intermodal terminal module I built for use at my club. The facillity started off at 8 feet long but has doubled in length over the years and now includes a small auto loading ramp at the west end.

I am by no means an expert on prototypical intermodal terminals. Heck, I've never even been to one. I used articles from Model Railroading and their two books on Intermodal modelling as references and used A LOT of modeller's licence to do the rest.

There are two 8' long loading/unloading tracks with an overflow track infront. Currently the yard uses one Mi-Jack overhead travelling crane and two side loaders to move containters. Two large overhead ship cranes are currently in the ideas stage. I will build them eventually!

A shipping facillity like this would normally move containers from the ship to trucks to a storage area and then onto trucks or rail cars. Due to space restrictions, I load directly from the ship to the rail cars or highway trucks.
 
Fred great setup!! I wish the autoracks could be modeled with the doors 'open' instead of always closed.

Eugen I checked out alot ofy our 128 photos, thats a NICE layout. you should be proud.
 
Oh yeah Fred I almost forgot to compliment your IM terminal [nice job!], I got distracted trying to find a pic of a giant gantry crane. Do you plan on doing a facade of one of those too?
 
wow, those pictures brings tears to my eyes. I'm gonna try to figure out how to model those king size Gantry crains stacking 2 or 3 high in a yard is a little two low for me
 
How about group 4 & 5?

4 being the scratch builders who don't scrounge, but, take something like an Athearn SD40-2 and bash a Kaslo cab onto it.

5 the person who buys all the el-cheepo train sets and sets the up to run in circles and is perfectly content that way.

Huh...?


I'd consider both those to be part of the middle of the road group, people who will spend a reasonable sum of money on the hobby, but not go hog wild. I was only talking about the money spent, not what they do with it.

I would offer a couple comments on your examples though...

In #4, what you're talking about is kit bashing, or customization or super detailing, whatever you'd like to call it, but it's not scratch building. Scratch building is literally building something from scratch. I think the NMRA has a definition of what you can use, something along the lines of commercial wheels, motors, and couplers. The rest is to be made from basic items only, stripwood, brass styrene etc. True scratchbuilding is a very challenging art that's not common any more.

As for #5, there's nothing wrong with buying an "el cheapo" train if it runs OK. The problem is that most of them don't. It ends up frustrating the hobbyist, and we lose a potential model railroader.

When folks are looking to buy a model train, I suggest they visit a hobby shop and buy a decent quality set. I'm not talking DCC & Brass, or top of the line LGB, just something like Athearn that will run reliably and work well.
 
paying no attention to the WARNING

Ron THAT is a very usefull website:eek: ( Library of Congress)# 19
And your right.....I am already almost addicted to it:eek: :D ( aspecialy the black/white pictures!!)
This website IS very dangerous, be aware!;)

Jos
 
Ron THAT is a very usefull website:eek: ( Library of Congress)# 19
And your right.....I am already almost addicted to it:eek: :D ( aspecialy the black/white pictures!!)
This website IS very dangerous, be aware!;)

Jos

Jos
My Dad and I were looking for pix of a bridge I might scratch build for our layout. We googled the basic info... nothing. We yahood the info... nothing! I found the Library of Congress page and typed in Philadelphia bridge and, Ta-Da!, we found it. About 20 photos of it and other drawings. this will help in drawing the plans and maybe a trip out to the site with my own camera will help me get the feel for the whole area.
 
I just read a review of that $600 container crane in the new issue of MR, and apparently it will not handle 40 foot containers. That's a definite drawback for anyone modeling US container terminals. 20 foot containers are common, but 40's are certainly a big portion of the container traffic.
 
Their video (on the walters site) shows it handling 40's.. thou the boom doesnt extend..it appears to be grabbing them in the middle only, but I figure a bit of kitbashing should fix it eh?
 
If the crane is lifting where the IBCs are located, it should be lifting where they would be if the container was a 40' one. In other words, all of the holes where lifts are at are at the 40' marks. You don't really lift a 53' container at the corners, I don't think.

Kennedy
 



Back
Top