Conrail's Amoskeag Northern Line | The 1:3 scale CR H34 Ballast Hopper Project

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The 1:3 scale CR H34 Ballast Hopper Project

Written by Ian MacMillan

Tuesday, 15 April 2008

CR 51782 by Mike Rose from CRCyc

We are in need of some additional work cars for the club, and one that I thought we could really use is a ballast hopper that could be hauled by one of the several A cars that members have. A quick look at materials around the house, and being a huge CR fan, it was decided that a H34 was a must!

The H34 series hoppers were the typical ballast hopper for Conrail and could be seen all over the system and is one of my favorite CR MOW cars.

Pretty simple in design the cars were similar to PS1 hoppers with positional gates on 4 discharge bays. The gates were set with a large bar to go center rail, inside rail, or outside rail, and then the bays were opened to place the ballast around the ROW.

The car turns out to be around 1:3 scale, coming in at 5.5' high, 10' long, 6' wide and weighs aprox. 1700 pounds. To keep from requiring articulated trucks, the wheelbase is set at 8' with a single axle. The frame is made out of angle iron. Price for the steel comes out to about $500, not including mounting hardware. The car will be able to hold about 1 ton of material in the hopper. The bottom will have 1 gate on each side, both positionable by a steel bar like on the full size car.

Body:
The sides for the car in the first idea on this were 18ga 4’x8’ sheet steel. Steel is pricy, but not too bad. A 4’x8’ sheet is about $52 right now at the time of writing. Figuring I would need about ~4 sheets, that would put me at $200 for just the body. Looking at Lowes I found that 1” 4’x8’ marine plywood was ~$24 a sheet. While I originally thought, “na the steel will be better”, the ease of replacement became an issue. I figured that in the service the car will see, the steel and the wood would have about the same life span. Wood would be easier to replace due to availability in its size at any hardware store, and is cheaper. The steel would be about the same weight for the size compared to the wood, and allow for welding for repairs….but the availability of club members having a welder maybe slim. While I will own the car 100%, it will be used by the club, and needs to be easily repairable by anyone who may cause extensive damage to it. 1" marine plywood it is.

1:3 H34 Drawing

Air Brake System:
Brakes… Well the clubs current dump trailer…weighing in at a whopping 2 tons does not have brakes. The traveling speed is minimal, and sufficient braking distance by the A car operator is used. It’s not the safest method, but it has worked so far with no issues or complaints of handling from the A car operators. Also by CVRTC policy, since this “trailer” does not have riders on it, brakes are not required. However, since I can see us hauling several cars as the years go on, it makes sense to add a braking system, especially if I become really insane and make another car or two. My 1954 Fairmont A5-C is already going through an overhaul to include a straight air system for trailer cars. On the A5-C is a 10 gallon tank that is filled via a 12 volt 140 PSI compressor. A ½” air line runs from the tank to a ball valve attached to the brake handle. When the operator moves the handle, the ball valve handle opens and the “train line” is charged. On each end of the A5-C is a “brake line” hose with quick couplings. This quick coupling attaches to trailer cars who have a brake cylinder in the center of the car. The cylinder pushes on a brake lever that applies the brakes. The harder the A5-C brakes, the harder the cars do. Pretty simple, pretty easy to maintain, and pretty reliable.

Opening and closing doors:
I had been discussing with Ed Kapuscinski on options for the ballast doors. I had pretty much already had opening the doors figured out, but closing them while there was still material in the car was an issue. He finally came up with the idea to have the doors shut via an air cylinder. Since the car will be designed with an straight air brake system controlled by the A car towing or pushing it, it would be easy to add another 10 gallon air tank off of the brake reservoir to drive the door cylinders. The door tank would have a back flow valve on it, so when the brakes are tripped by the towing car, it does not drain the door tank. Operating the doors will be very simple. The doors ride on a track that is connected to a boat trailer winch. The operator winches open the door to the position he wants it, and unloads. When he wishes to close the door, he opens a valve and the air cylinder closes the door.

Paint will be the basic CR MOW primer gray. Templates have already been made for the CONRAIL lettering and logo for the sides.

I expect to begin working on this project shortly after the Hobo Trackcar Meet in June.

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