Western Railroad Discussion > What are these cars used for?

These were on a southbound today through Dunsmuir.

Robert Morris
Dunsmuir, CA
Robert Morris Photography

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There are a few more in Eugene coupled to more conventional covered coil steel cars.

The Mitsui Rail Capital site they have a page on car types but this is not shown.  What is "Flammable Lining"? I did find a site listing them as coil steel cars.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/14/19 18:28 by Railpax71.

Weight-savings not keeping the hood same height? Bigger coils on ends and smaller ones toward the middle.

Looks like the top part can be lifted off. Flammable lining is lining that is flammable, which explains the warning about getting it hot.
The question is what sort of lading requires flammable lining?

Bill Deaver
Tehachapi, CA

My contact in the Fire Dept looked up the car in his system.  He sent me the following..  "NON-HAZMAT, Special Use Gondola, Flammable Lining that is made of Rubber (type of wall)."

SouthWest RailCams
CA, NM, CO, TX, AZ
https://SouthWestRailCams.com

TESLA in the SF Bay Area uses lots of aluminum sheeting for their car bodies, and R & A Trucking hauls big coils of aluminum into their plant after transloading from UP (because Elon Musk tore out all the tracks into his plant in a feud with UP...).  When it was GM / TOYOTA / NUMMI production, R & A trucking delivered coils of steel shipped to their transload yard in East Oakland.  They do get rail service from UP delivering coils of aluminum, too, these days.  I wonder is the rubber lining is for aluminum, being it dents more easily?  Bigger coil covers due to larger, lower weight aluminum??

Still a mystery car....interesting....



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 07/14/19 23:27 by coach.

The rubber lining could be to keep the lid from putting rub marks on the coil. Back when I was a flatbedder the company had coils of bright canstock refused for having rub Mark's on it.
Michael t Kerner
Collinsville, IL

Posted from Android

If the coils are aluminum, the cover is insulated. The reason is temperature and humidity differences between shipping point and receiving point. You have to prevent condensation caused by changes in temperature and humidity.

Commodity shows to be steel. Saw a few of these last night on the Sacramento Valley Railroad at McClellan Park.

Appears this is a "cross-trough" car, with multiple troughs for loading coils (steel or aluminum) with the eye of the coil facing to the sides of the car.  Coil cars traditionally had one trough running the full length of the car, with the eye of the coils end to end, with bars to hold the coils in place.  Tests done at the Pueblo TTCI facility, and also by various rail carriers, showed that coils suffered less damage when loaded in cross-trough cars with the eyes to the sides.  In recent years, the rail industry has been ordering more coil cars of the cross-trough design.  The rubber lining on the floor of the troughs is to keep the coils from sliding within the trough.  AAR Loading Rules call for the heaviest coils to be at the ends of the car, with lighter (and presumably smaller coils) in the middle, which could explain the height differential at each end of the hood.