[N&W] Re: Question about coal tipple chutes

[nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org]

On every tipple I have seen or read about, the chute faces in the direction
of the car travel, that is, the front of the car gets loaded first, with 
the back end
of the chute going towards the rear of the car.

Leslie Eversole
____________________________________________________________________
Contrary to the common response to your first paragraph, in fact it is 
true, there really are lots of stupid questions and yours has been one of them.

OK OK ... I always wanted to do that ... Just joking ... just a little 
humor ... back to the biz at hand.

Anyway and however ... the answers to your questions are THE CHUTES CAN 
HANG BOTH WAYS and IT MATTERS TO THE LOADOUT OPERATOR.

There's a zillion ways to rig a coal loadout and a wide variety of 
conveyors and chutes. Among older loadouts (which I am presuming is your 
interest -- modern chute technology can be muy different), some loaders 
actually loaded right off the end of the conveyor dropping unimpeded 
straight down into the car. With a fast running conveyor and a missing mud 
flap (deflects the coal from flow at end of conveyor to down in the car), 
much of the coal would pitch over the side of the car to the ground ... so, 
for your model RR scene, pile some coal over there ... the real RRs sure 
did. In fact, when there were no cars to load but the mine was jumping, 
most loadouts deflected the conveyor to dump the coal off to the side in a 
predetermined pile ... from whence a front end loader -- or ten men with 
strong backs -- would later dump or shovel it into an MTY hopper or ten.

Anyway, if the loadout owner cares enough and has enough money, he'll pop a 
chute on the end of his conveyor and that will help his operator direct the 
coal more accurately into the coal cars. Some chutes faced straight down, 
others were canted and some were bi-canted.

Chute loadouts (such as those of which I think you speak) routed the coal 
through fairly simple conveyors and chutes. Some of them (most, I'd guess) 
dropped the coal off a conveyor (over the track) down to an inverted "Y" 
chute which directed the coal into a forward facing chute and a rear facing 
chute. The loadout operator controlled the flow in both chutes -- both 
open, both closed, fwd only, or aft only. In between chute tweaks, the 
operator bottled samples from each car of coal for later analysis, reached 
out and hit the chute with a long crowbar to make it feed better and 
intermittently sipped soda pop and spit baccie juice. The loads were fairly 
even and Tennessee Eastman paid in full. This particular loadout loaded 22 
cars per day (or was it 25?) ... the mine operation and car loadings were 
geared to that number of cars on normal days. Normal days were most days, 
but sometime the RR could not deliver enought MTYs, so ... the coal kept 
coming and was piled high on the ground for later manual loading.

Oh yeah ... about your question ... the direction of the chutes: The 
loadout operator with bi-canted chutes will switch from the forward chute 
loading the tail end of the first car to the aft chute to begin loading the 
front of the second car ... that's roughly about as the coupler passes 
beneath the yoke of the chutes. The speed of the cars thru the loader is 
maybe 0.5 MPH ... or less ... depending on coal flow rate ... and some 
small deals are very slow. Also, it's hard to vary the speed of the cars 
thru the loadout (especially when movement is controlled by a brake rider 
and not a winch or locomotive), so, the bi-canted chutes allowe continuous 
car loading even when the chute is directly over the space between the cars.

I have seen the operator stop the cars from rolling and briefly run both 
chutes at the same time -- into two different cars or into just one car on 
the fly. Or, like the operator pointed out, sometimes he directs the coal 
straight down to the track below ... uh, by accident. At a typical busy 
loadout, there is no sign of RR ties under the rails in the vicinity of the 
loadout because the spilled coal generally is even with, or even mounded 
above, the rails. The operator and his buddy (the guy hanging on the MTYs 
... he's riding the brakes down the load track) know when the boss will be 
by and will do their best to get those mounds of coal cleaned up as if they 
never happened.

BTW ... not to say it's never happened, but I saw no signs of a chute 
damaged by digging into a car, tho I did see a car loaded with coal up to 
the mouth of the chut ... an error. The operator had to stop everyting and 
walk out into the car and shovel the coal so it would not slide over the 
car sides as it rolled down the track. In no time, the phone rang with the 
mine boys wondering what the hell was going on ... why had the conveyor 
stopped. Apparently, they've done the job so long that without thinking 
about it, they can tell when the loading process gets out of rhythm ... 
even from a thousand feed away, deep down in a mine.

In the early 90s, I shot video of most of what I just rambled on about (tho 
I could not bear to take a pix of the operator drinking the RC with the 
baccie in his mouth ... yeeecccch!). Of course, my video was taken on the 
Clinchfield/CSX and I cannot swear that is how they did it on the N&W. In 
any case, that's how I came by what I think I know. Also, I know there are 
better answers out there. And, modern loadouts with concrete silos, hidden 
chutes, computer controlled loading, engineerless loader operator 
controlled locomotives, locotrol type speed control, and rapid flood 
loaders present a whole different technology to model.

Also ... Since you're working the often frigid N&W country, one of the 
primary uses of that winch and cable is on near or sub freezing days to 
first let the cars roll down past the chutes and then pull them back up for 
loading, usually two at a time. The reason for this is that on freezing 
days with more freeze anticipated for these cars, either on the down hill 
coast or the winch back up for loading, the operator will spray the inner 
sides and bottom of the cars with an antifreeze solution so the coal will 
leave the car when commanded to dump. If the car is heading to a Florida 
power plant, likely no antifreeze. However, if the car is heading to a 
mountain power plant that's in freezing weather OR if the car is heading to 
a nearby processing plant where the coal will be dumped and processed 
before reloading, in those situations the cars would get an antifreeze 
bath. You don't need to model the antifreeze process because you could not 
see the spray, but you can show the antifreeze container attached to the 
loader, which could carry the antifreeze manufacturer's emblem.

If you model the mountain power plant or coal processing plant, be sure to 
add in a few radiation heaters ... maybe 200 feet worth ... looks almost 
like a small tunnel made out of sheet metal ... glowing heaters running 
along the car sides the whole way. Also, in both facilities, you can model 
the car shaker ... in 1:87 you'd hardly see the vibrating movement, but 
nothing beats the sound effects of a good car shaker. BTW ... the 
antifreeze and heaters are needed for both bottom dumping and rotary 
dumping of cars.

BTW ... thanks to all who replied to my questions about the N&W steam 
passenger locos running from Monroe thru Lynchburg and about the track crew 
that got run over in the tunnel.

That is all ... light 'em if you got 'em ... Bob Loehne

The original comments and questions follow ...

 > OK, this is a stupid question, but I am not sure of the answer
 > and need to know. I *think* I know, but....
 >
 > I have a coal tipple located on a 1.3% downgrade. The scenario
 > is that the hoppers will be run under the tipple by gravity under
 > control of a winch cable, drag chain, car brakes, or locomotive.
 > In an case, the cars are going under the tipple in the downgrade
 > direction.
 >
 > Which way do the chutes hang?
 >
 > Like this: \ downgrade-->
 >
 > Or like this: / downgrade-->
 >
 > Or does it not matter.
 >
 > I suspect it is the first of the two, because then the chute
 > can't dig into an overfill and get torn off, it will hinge up
 > and ride over.