Friday, April 15, 2016

A Train and Its Freight (M-BAPC-15)

While in the layout room working on content for my Mid April post (coming soon), I decide to change things for you the reader. In this post we are going to take a look at a train and explore in detail about each locomotive and carload of freight. Railroads exist to haul goods, so let's explore that more shall we.

M-BAPC-15
Manifest Bay City (Bay Yard to Port Huron CN Canada that originated on April 15th, 2016.)
- This is a unique manifest that runs twice weekly with traffic destined purely for CN interchange to Canada and New England. This is due to the interchange connection timing on the CN. The rest of the week all CN traffic rides the M-BAPH or Q-GRPH.

2 locomotives (6,000hp)
 11 Railcars ( 10 Loads / 1 Empty)

    MCIS 4052 (EMD SD40-2 3,000hp)

  MCIS 4059 (EMD SD40M-2 3,000hp)

RBOX43689 - loaded corrugated board
Origin: Mackinac City, Michigan
Destination: Brunswick, Maine

BNSF727059 - loaded aluminum ingots
Origin: Spokane, Washington
Destination: Oshawa, Ontario

GACX47801 - loaded sugar
Origin: Upper Huron, Michigan
Destination: Aurburn, Maine

WCOX7440 - loaded corn
Origin: Bay City, Michigan
Destination: Buffalo, New York

CN406569 - loaded paper rolls
Origin: Charlevoix, Michigan
Destination: Drummondville, Quebec

CGEX1147 - loaded soybeans
Origin: Grays Lake, Michigan
Destination: Burlington, Vermont

MCIS9320 - loaded malt barley
Origin: Gerhard, Michigan
Destination: Hailfax, Nova Scotia

MCIS7940 - loaded paper rolls
Origin: Charlevoix, Michigan
Destination: Toronto, Ontario

MCIS7943 - loaded paper rolls
Origin: Charlevoix, Michigan
Destination: Toronto, Ontario

MCIS5344 - loaded corrugated board
Origin: Mackinac City, Michigan
Destination: Woodsville, Maine

NS469806 - empty reverse route
Origin: Mackinac City, Michigan
Destination: Ayer, Masachusetts 

As you can see by each car the primary commodities on this train happen to be paper products and agricultural. Locals out of Bay City along with trains from Mackinac City help feed this eastbound flow. Depending on the connection and day of week, the train may be more tankcars and covered hoppers then the very present boxcar we see. This is prototypical practice as days of week, season, and industry demand all drive what you see on railroads. As modelers we can all represent this on our own layouts whether big or small. The key is establishing the purpose of your railroad and building the story around it. Hope you have enjoyed this type of post. Feel free to let me know your thoughts, and I can look to plan to them throughout the year. 

Have a great weekend!

GM








7 comments:

  1. Excellent post Greg! Man those cars look good weathered. Who did those ;-)! As a side note, not a big fan of the Highball Graphics reflective tape. Microscale is more in "scale" thanks for sharing!

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  2. Agree - going forward sticking with Microscale and going to try out the Smokebox Graphics ones.

    Great job on the weathering!

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  3. Hi Greg,
    I like this type of post very much! In my mind the operating scheme goes hand in hand with car types and industry's. It's neet to hear how other folks "run" their railroads.

    Best, Scott

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  4. Appreciate the feedback Scott, already listing ideas of similar type posts for the future. Best part -just the tip of the iceberg.

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  5. Well done, buddy, I like the variety of 'home road' cars between full repaints and some patch jobs. Great weathering too, very plasible!

    ~RGDave

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  6. Thanks Dave, that is exactly the balance I am going for. Yes the weathering is has been fantastically by a great friend.

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