Fall has arrived, snow has arrived so that means the winter modelling season has begun. I wanted a little more “beef” for my mining industry area. I am building the industry to fit the cars I already have. I have collected a number of smaller hoppers similar to ones used in the Fraction sand And potash industry. I also have a number of larger hoppers used on Canadian railways and for Canadian industries. If you have not followed my blog, I collect cars with Canadian railway names, or references to Canada not too many of the major players.

During part of the time I lived in Flin Flon, ‘fracking’ in the oil industry became more prominent. Not too far down the road is a sand deposit that was suitable for the purpose. The sand was quarried, trucked back to Channing (just outside of Flin Flon) put into hoppers of various shapes and sizes and sent south and then west to the oil patch. I found models of the same cars, bought a bunch to run around the layout I had then. 

Move forward a few years and I need a reason to keep running them on my new layout. Glacier gravel is my solution. Kit bashing started And I am well on my way to building a facility to bring sand and rock to a facility to process and load into those hoppers.

I have turned the ore processing facility and rearranged the silos, and then hack and slashed glacier gravel into what you see. I placed a couple of cars on the tracks to give an idea of what cars get spotted where.