hopper door operation

[NW Mailing List]

Akers' account in turn brings back memories to me of my experience 
unloading coal hopper cars during the three summers (1952, '53, and '54) 
that I worked as a laborer in the N&W locomotive shop in Durham, NC.  In 
a small shop such as Durham a laborer would sooner or later perform all 
of the various duties of that craft.  Some of my choirs took place at 
two short coal unloading tracks at this shop , each with a hopper 
underneath.  One track was for "yard" coal and the other track was for 
"road" coal.  The difference was that the "yard" coal had fewer "fines" 
and would burn cleaner than the "road" coal, which was probably like 
"run-of-mine" coal.  Of course the "yard" coal was used by the switcher 
locomotives to reduce pollution in urban areas.

After the yard engine would spot a car with either type of coal over the 
appropriate track hopper we laborers (or usually a laborer) would go 
into action.  There was no car shaker here!  I have knocked open both 
latches on a hopper door only to have less than a wheelbarrow load of 
coal come out of its own  accord. I could stoop down and look at a solid 
black wall of coal in the hopper opening. My recollection is that this 
only happened with the "road" coal, and particularly cars that had been 
sitting loaded in the yard for some time where, presumably, rain washed 
the "fines" down into the hopper pocket where it packed against the then 
closed doors.  Our solution was to take large wooden mallets and beat on 
the sides of the cars with varying results.  Sometimes the coal right 
over the car's hoppers would eventually discharge leaving a block of 
coal at each end of the car that mallet blows would not discharge.  The 
solution in this case was to climb the ladder on the car with a long 
steel rod.  Once on top of the remaining coal pile we would jab the rod 
into the top of the coal just back of its face and rotate the rod 
backwards in order to pry off a vertical slab of coal (hoping, of 
course, that we would not go down with the loosened coal).

An associated chore was to dry sand for the locomotive sand boxes using 
a fairly large coal-fired stove with a conical sheet of metal around 
it.  We would shovel "wet" coal into the top of the conical sheet and 
any sand that was dry would fall through the small annular opening 
between the bottom of the conical sheet and the hot stove. We would then 
shovel the dried sand into the top of a tank that would later be 
pressurized to blow the sand through a hose into the sand boxes on the 
top of the locomotives.  Naturally, this operation had to be under 
cover, a true place for "sand house gossip." Finally, try to visualize 
the comfort level shoveling sand in a small house with a hot coal-fired 
stove in the sweltering Durham summertime.

Finally, I would operate the "Norfolk skip hoist" to lift a hoist load 
of coal from below the track hoppers to the top of the locomotive tender 
where it would be dumped into the tender's coal bunker.  The hostler 
would monitor the build up of coal in the bunker and move the locomotive 
as necessary to leave an even pile of coal in the tender.

Gordon Hamilton


On 9/24/2023 9:06 PM, NW Mailing List wrote:
> Oh my, this conversation brings back memories. My mom owned and 
> operated a coal and feed store in Rural Retreat, from the early 40's 
> until about 1956. She would 'buy' a hopper car full of coal, and have 
> it parked on the siding, long removed, that ran southwest from a 
> switch near the Depot. This siding extended past the south side of the 
> Section House to where a truck rental business is located today. I 
> recall them hammering the hopper door to open, allowing some of the 
> coal to fall out onto a pile on the ground. Then, when an order for 'a 
> half-ton' would come into the store we would shovel it into the back 
> of the pickup and deliver it to some little house in a holler 
> somewhere. We would keep removing the coal a little at a time, and 
> more would fall out to replenish the pile. We would often use a sledge 
> hammer to break up the big lumps into smaller lumps suitable for the 
> numerous 'Warm Morning' and other coal stoves abundant in the area.
> The store name changed from T.F.Kidd and Son, to Akers Store in about 
> 1946. I don't think Mom ever got paid for many of those loads. I have 
> been curious about the cost of leaving the coal car parked for so 
> long, as it could take months to empty it, a ton or so at a time.
>
> Frank Akers at AY
>
> On Sunday, September 24, 2023 at 05:32:56 AM PDT, NW Mailing List 
> <nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org> wrote:
>
>
> As nearly as I can make out from pictures, there was a section of 
> angle that spanned each pair of hopper doors.  The doors were held in 
> the closed position by latches affixed to the outer sides of the 
> hopper walls that held the angle.  My question is how these latches 
> were released when it was desired to discharge the coal.  I see no 
> evidence that the latches were connected from one side to the other, 
> but it seems that if only one side were released, the weight of coal 
> trying to push that door open might put considerable stress on the 
> connecting angle?  Was the operation of these latches performed by men 
> with pry bars moving them off of the angle?  For multi-bay hoppers, 
> how would only opening a subset of the doors affect the coal 
> discharge?  I've seen lots of footage of rotary dumpers in action, but 
> the plain ole opening of bay doors seems to have escaped me.  Does 
> anyone know of any video showing this operation?
> Thanks,
> Jim Cochran
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