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New member 1 post gowithn New member 1 post
gowithn

I have n-scale coal cars that will leave the mine but go where?  What are some industries that would accept coal car for their operations.  Where could I see examples that I could model?  Also what to do with logs from the mill?
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Blane Active Member 64 posts
Blane

Need some more information

Depending on your era and geographic areas, there can be quite a few industries that take either coal or lumber. Are you looking for larger industries or smaller industries? Would you consider interchange as a form of industry for these commodities heading off-layout?

Blane
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musgrovejb Prolific poster 1,730 posts
musgrovejb

More Info

Need more information. 

What time period are you modeling?  (Less industries that need coal deliveries today than the early to mid 20th century for example)

What geographic area?

What type of railroad?  (Narrow gage, standard gage, Short-line, Class-I, etc...)

How many cars?  (A few coal and log cars mixed in with manifest freight or unit trains)

Are you wanting to keep things prototypical to an actual railroad, location, etc...?

Joe

Modeling Missouri Pacific Railroad's Central Division, Fort Smith, Arkansas

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLENIMVXBDQCrKbhMvsed6kBC8p40GwtxQ

 
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Mark Nieting Active Member 94 posts
Mark Nieting

Coal cars

Most coal, especially after WW2, wouldn't stay local. It would move long(er) distances to chemical, coke, or power plants. Consider offstage destinations or an interchange.  Or look up the old John Armstrong idea of loads-in-empties-out between a mine on one end of the layout and a power plant on the other, if the layout is big enough to make it seem sensible.
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Virginian and Lake Erie Super User 9,242 posts
Virginian and Lake Erie

A great deal of coal from the

A great deal of coal from the Virginian went to ocean ports and traveled to South America, and via costal freighters along the Atlantic coast to various places. At one time lots of coal was exported to Europe as well.

I believe a recent article I read said that the average distance coal traveled was 400 miles and it generally stayed on the home road with some exceptions.

Rob in Texas

MRH Blog / Prep for an Operating Session / Delving Into the Past / The Club Blog / Youtube / etmrc.org
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187 Regular poster 207 posts
187

Logs from the mill?

Logs are coming from the woods to a sawmill to be turned into boards or to a mill that peels them and turns them into plywood or to a paper mill that runs them through a chipper on their way to becoming newsprint. Blayne
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RSeiler MRH Author 3,754 posts
RSeiler

Staging

The coal cars from your mine can go to staging tracks, probably your best option. 

Randy

Randy

Cincinnati West -  B&O/PC  Summer 1975

http://model-railroad-hobbyist.com/node/17997
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jmt99atsf Super User 753 posts
jmt99atsf

Freight Car Forwarding

There are many ways to do this (including commercially available paid & free freight forwarding computer programs) and here are a couple that I have used to get started. If you have or can get a copy of Bruce Chubb's "How To Operate Your Model Railroad, " you will find a fairly good discussion and methodology for how to do freight car forwarding. Other than that, there is the big database of industries that I believe the NMRA OPSIG put together (I downloaded it from the Shenware site) that gives you industries over a pretty wide number of years in their actual places to use for industries both on and off your layout.
Blog index:  https://forum.mrhmag.com/post/jmt99atsf-blog-index-12219303
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Coal and steel rr Regular poster 351 posts
Coal and steel rr

http://appalachianrailroadmod

http://appalachianrailroadmodeling.com/
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