My friend, Joe Atkinson, and I need to model several ballast hoppers for our layouts. We’ve been researching the different cars and found models to recreate the rolling stock, but one critical component missing were four ballast gates required for each car. 

We were told Shapeways may be the answer and indeed they were. We were able to find a dealer, Boxcar Models, who had exactly what we needed. We placed the order and within a couple weeks Joe received the gates. 

These are amazingly easy to make and look great as well. Not to time consuming either

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=byR8tBw8J8E

This is part 2 of Preliminary Operations Planning for the ATSF Paradigm Division. This part shows the results of re-positioning trains to match the schedule sequence for 00:01- 06:00 AM. The biggest change has been to change where trains reside in the lower staging yard based upon their location (north, east or west).  This sequence was chosen since it has the most trains run in a 6-hour period/trick.