Western Railroad Discussion > Car markings explanation needed

Here are the abbreviations and numbers on a couple of hopper cars I was recently parked near.  I can figure out some of it, but an expert's explanations would be great.  Grime and graffitti may have caused me to mis-read some, but it's close to what's there.
Hopper #1 (former CSX, now private):
LD LMT 202 300
LT WT 59 400
LO (or L0)
Rule 88 extended 4 10  
EXW 10-7 H 13-1
EW 9-5 H 14-3
CUFT 4800
Hopper #2 (unknown origin):
LD LMT 199 100
LT WT 63 900
EXW 10-8 H 8-3
EW 9-7 14-3
CUFT 4750 

Griggs Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Here are the abbreviations and numbers on a couple
> of hopper cars I was recently parked near.  I can
> figure out some of it, but an expert's
> explanations would be great.  Grime and graffitti
> may have caused me to mis-read some, but it's
> close to what's there.
> Hopper #1 (former CSX, now private):
LOAD LIMIT (tons) > LD LMT 202 300
LIGHT WEIGHT (tons) > LT WT 59 400
> LO (or L0)
> Rule 88 extended 4 10  
> EXW 10-7 H 13-1
> EW 9-5 H 14-3
CUBIC FEET (volume) > CUFT 4800

Not certain about the others but the EXW/H I believe to be various physical dimensions.
 

Griggs Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Here are the abbreviations and numbers on a couple
> of hopper cars I was recently parked near.  I can
> figure out some of it, but an expert's
> explanations would be great.  Grime and graffitti
> may have caused me to mis-read some, but it's
> close to what's there.
> Hopper #1 (former CSX, now private):
> LD LMT 202 300 Weight limit of car and load.
> LT WT 59 400  weight of empty car
> LO (or L0)
> Rule 88 extended 4 10  
>
EXW 10-7 H 13-1  (extreme Width) Widest part of car, and the height above the rail where the widest part is.

> EW 9-5 H 14-3
> CUFT 4800
> Hopper #2 (unknown origin):
> LD LMT 199 100
> LT WT 63 900
> EXW 10-8 H 8-3
> EW 9-7 14-3
> CUFT 4750 

It appears reasonable to assume the car was a covered hopper, not an open hopper. LO is the AAR mechanical designation for covered hoppers.
"Rule 88 extended 4 10" indicates that the car's mandated 40-year life was extended to 50 years in April, 2010. The car can now be in interchange service for 50 years after it's built date.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/06/15 13:39 by steeplecab.

Not shown here but CAPY is usually shown too, for nominal capacity of the carbody. For example 200,000. All weight figures are pounds not tons.
WT LMT is weight limit of the trucks and will always exceed CAPY.
LT WT is the weight of the empty car, to nearest 100#. Many commodities are sold by weight, and the car is weighed in transit by the railroad, subtracting the LT WT to determine net weight of shipment. Also sometimes used to determine weight for freight charges.

These two hoppers were of the older what we call "263 cars" where the newer ones are "286 cars". The "263" indicates total allowable weight on rails which is obtained by adding the "light (empty) weight" to the "load limit" which equels 263,000 pounds. Some of the older 263 hoppers (UP in particular) have been re-stenciled to make them 286 capable; I don't see that the trucks or anything else were changed to make them have the higher capacity.

Dick Samuels
Oregon Pacific Railroad 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/06/15 17:15 by EMDSW-1.

"CAPY" hasn't been included in car data since sometime in the 1980s and has been painted out on many older cars since then.

I'll use Mr. Patch's comments, because he's fairly close to accurte on what he's written.  Mt comments are in boldface:


toledopatch Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Griggs Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Here are the abbreviations and numbers on a couple
> > of hopper cars I was recently parked near.  I can
> > figure out some of it, but an expert's
> > explanations would be great.  Grime and graffitti
> > may have caused me to mis-read some, but it's
> > close to what's there.
> > Hopper #1 (former CSX, now private):

> LOAD LIMIT (pounds) > LD LMT 202 300
> LIGHT WEIGHT (pounds) > LT WT 59 400

You may have gotten one or both of these numbers wrong.  The load limit (maximum weight of the lading only), plus the light weight (empty car) should add up to a number that is consistent throughout a given serie, in most cases.  In this case, it is 261700 pounds; it should be an even 263,000 pounds for a nominally "100-ton" car.  (In your second example, the numbers correctly add up to 263,000 pounds.)

> > LO (or L0)     LO is the Mechanical Designation for the car--it means you're looking at a covered hopper car, in this case.  These designations are not required to be stenciled on cars any more (which I think is a shame, for sentimental reasons).
> > Rule 88 extended 4 10    This may refer to an extension given to the lifetime of this car beyond the 40-year age limit .  The "4-10" is the date; I don't know if the car was originally built 40 years before that.  The build date, by the way, is every bit as important to some people as anything else that's been mentioned here.  You can find that in the bottom line of a black box (the "consolidated stencil") that usually appears toward the lower right corner of a car's side.
> > EXW 10-7 H 13-1    This is the extreme width of this particular car (10 feet 7 inches), which may be present at various heights, the highest of which is 13 feet 1 inch above the top of the rail.
> > EW 9-5 H 14-3  This is the width of the car at its eaves, basically the top of the sides on this covered hopper.  It's narrower than the extreme width (think about it--the ladders and other such extend out beyond the width of the actual sides), but appears higher on the car than the extreme width.

Now, if you were looking at a flat car, you'd have a dimension for the length of the car added to these.  And if you were looking at a box car (or refrigerator car), there would also be dimensions for inside length (IL), inside width (IW), and inside height (IH).  The doors would also have their width and height stencilled on the doors themselves.

The inside length would also appear on conventional gondola cars and bulkhead and center-beam flat cars.  Gondolas would also have the width and height dimensions.  Coal cars would have pretty much the same markings as your covered hopper cars, since the inside length varies and is irrelevant.

> CUBIC FEET (volume) > CUFT 4800  This sounds like an old Seaboard-family aluminum covered hopper.  You didn't get the reporting mark and number off the car, did you?

 

Carl Shaver
Lombard, IL



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/07/15 13:36 by CShaveRR.