BEN SWOPE: JULY 1984
A Conrail flat car with sides (above) carries a tracked crane used to unload ties from the adjacent gondolas. Conrail painted main- tenance cars like this one in gray. The Chessie System used this 15-ton Burro crane (above right) for the same purpose. It has rail- way wheels and runs on rails laid on the deck of the flat car. A
BEN SWOPE: MAY 1980
train load of modern-day camp cars moves on the NS (below left). While not as interesting as old passenger cars, they are probably a lot more comfortable for the workers. This shop-built snowplow/flanger (bottom) was used by the Milwaukee Road to clear snow off the tracks in southern Wisconsin.
conditions prevail. A plow extra could have wedge type plow car or a Jordan spreader leading, one or several locomo- tives pushing, and perhaps a caboose, flanger car, or another plow car follow- ing behind (pointed rearward, to plow on the return trip).
Modeling a snowplow extra can be ROBERT SHOOK: JEANNETTE, PA; SEPT. 18, 2005
sleeper and kitchen cars. Today many railroads place modern manufactured housing units and offices similar to mobile homes on flatcars.
Besides cars used as sleeping quar-
ters, there are camp cars designed as shower cars, cooking and dining cars. Quite often, a company-owned tank car will furnish water for washing and showers. There may also be a power car (boxcar or other closed-type car) equipped with a large generator to power the camp where no lineside elec- tricity is available.
Modeling these trains can be as easy as repainting several passenger and boxcars into company service colors. Converting boxcars into camps will re- quire the addition of windows and doors in the car sides and doors in the ends. Modeling modern-era camps with manufactured housing units can be done by some simple scratchbuilding. Camp cars are typically stationed near the project site, usually parked on company-owned spurs (team tracks, set-out spurs or a vacant yard track). Only under extreme cases are camps
RAILROAD MODEL CRAFTSMAN 73
placed on private industry tracks. When snowfall depths reach a point where locomotive-mounted plows can no longer handle it, snowplow extras are dispatched. The consist of these trains will vary from one railroad to an- other or as local and historical weather
DON SIMS, RMC COLLECTION: SOUTHERN WISCONSIN
easy, as there have been many offer- ings of snowplows in kit form or ready- to-run over the years in several scales. The most difficult part of modeling a plow extra is modeling some snow to plow away. Without snow to plow off the rails, consider plowing away dust and dirt! Some modelers have mounted track cleaning pads under a plow car, wiping dust off the rails before it accumulates onto locomotive and car wheels. Couple another track cleaning car behind the locomotive and you will have yourself a true work train. Jordan spreaders are much like a road grader on rails. These machines have plow wings that are hinged to the
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