I had been developing these plans for a long time. Soon I'll be buying used cars for these puposes. Use olde Cars For: * Boxcars on cinder blocks as storage sheds. * Boxcars put together to make a restaurant, (Victoria's Station?) * Flatcars as pedestrian or tractor bridges over a small gully on a dirt road / trail? * Flatcars and Gondolas made into excursion cars for tourist trains. Start with the base unit add benches, doors and safety fences etc. * Gondolas at junk yards for appearance but never used in a train. * Flatcars used to display fancy / cool loads / vignettes but maybe not in trains. * Flatcars and Gondolas: I will be using them to carry signs like: "Happy Birthday" or "Happy Holyday" * Tank cars?, Covered Hoppers?, Autoracks? : I can't think of any practical 'reuse'. Please do share your ideas.
Covered hoppers are sometimes used as storage hoppers for industries, when jacked up high enough. I remember a photo of a Santa Fe hopper used in exactly that way, posted here on the board. Same could be done with an old tank car, for bulk lube oil or other liquids, or even as an advertising sign atop an oil seller's business, like putting a B-17 on top of a roadside restaurant. Autoracks... multi-level parking structures for vehicles in a space-challenged scrap yard? Or an improvised parking lot in a small space?
For the covered hoppers, Micro Trains did that in N scale as a kit a few months back with a 3 bay hopper. Might be worth looking at for ideas. Have seen 2 bay hoppers up on stands like that as well used for sand storage in engine terminals (DeLuxe did a kit for this in N 20+/-) years ago too). Probably more ideas out there too
@BNSF FAN Thanks! I will look those up. The 'GandG' likes to save money. Most likely we will fill it with Mystrium as that works quite well for increasing friction coefficients. Hmm, since we don't have any grades or long heavy trains maybe we will do one just for looks. ♣ Thanks again. I wonder. I guess, in theory, maybe I can strip down one of my 'N Scale' covered hoppers. Hmm. Put that on my work bench ideas list.
Old tank care were used (at least in italy) as water tanks to refill steam locomotives, instead of purpose build one. Can't see why not used like this elsewhere.
Old open hoppers filled with rocks have been ueed as windbreaks. Big Ten curve, Moffat Route, west of Denver.
I use old (70's manufacture) freight cars as test beds for spray painting. An old boxcar body will show me if I've mixed paint to thinners ratio correctly. Once I'm happy that the spray gun is working correctly I will then point it at my project.
The "old box car on cinder blocks" is one of my favorites. It's the yard office on my railroad. If you can find any old Kurtz Kraft 40' box car kits, they work great and are cheap and easy to build. The nice thing about the Kurtz Kraft kits is that they were made with flat molds. It makes cutting holes for windows much easier. Mine has shelves and storage on the right end and a desk and wood burning stove on the left end.
Custom freight car loads are one of the coolest thing on a layout. I'm cheap and like to scratch build things out of stuff you find around the house. My wife and I have had Australian Shepherds for 20+ years. They need lots of mental and physical activity. We always have a roll of bags whenever we are out with a dog someplace just in case... The rollers the bags come on make great pipe loads, like the Frisco gon. Popsicle sticks can be used for all kinds of things. The crate on the flat car is made of popsicle sticks and a little strip wood. Leftover or cut off pieces of flex track rail can be weathered and turned into a MOW load. Code 70 looks a lot better than the higher profile rail for this.
@HemiAdda2d Windbreaks. Who woulda think? I'll bet there are more thoughts along that line. @minesweeper Water tanks - I'm thinking of using maybe one of my N scale for those? @308GTSi Paint testers - works for me. @Skyraider Great! Boxcar, At Everyone, Thanks!
There's a Santa Fe covered hopper in Crowell, TX, that is in agricultural storage use. There are quite a few others out here but I can't remember where. Some of the others I've seen were high enough to drive a truck under.
Hi All! When I visted Oneonta a bunch of years ago, there was a feed company who use old covered hoppers to store ingredients and such. Pipes were addedto the outlets and Air was used to make the grain or what ever flow out into the facility.I am looking for images. In New Jersey near the Raritan Center a construction company used ex-Reading Offset side hoppers to dispense aggravate into trucks, they were mounted up high. Then down here in Florida, in Haines City along the ex-ACL CSX line there is at least two old tank cars on concrete forms and they were used for fuel for the plant. Oak Island ( the ex-LV yard in Newark, NJ) used a bright red 2-Bay PS-2 hopper for loco sand. If I can find a box of images I cannot locate I know I have much more .... Bruce Archer D&H and LNE Modeler
That would be nice! Tip: if you want to find it faster, stop looking for it. You'll trip over it when you least expect it...
BNSF up at Berne, WA actually still uses and old TTX flatcar to access the siding there! I've driven across it-in snow! Lot's of old flatcars in use for small stream bridges, half cut boxcars for sheds, old tankcars up on pedestals for oil storage, etc.
Tiny Homes This blog has quite a list of freight and passenger cars converted to 'tiny homes'. https://www.strasburgrailroad.com/b...xt=Who knew there'd be,and now old train cars. Would you live in onte? I would if it could be 2 or 3 coaches / boxcars with windows and such.
I can't find a picture online (and any pictures I took are buried deep in my parents' attic) but for many years the 'pier' at Scorpion Cove on Santa Cruz island in CA consisted of a 50' flatcar strung between the shore and a single concrete piling. I always wanted to model it, but Santa Cruz never had any rail infrastructure; that wheel-less flatcar was probably the only piece of RR equipment on the entire island.
