Railroad Cars

Passenger cars. Passenger train cars include passenger-carrying cars such as sleeping cars that have berths for overnight travel, coaches that have individual seats or benches, and diners that provide meal service on long distance routes, as well as baggage cars and mail cars.

Passenger cars were modeled after road coaches. Early cars were made largely of wood. All-steel construction was introduced early in the twentieth century. The development was accompanied by many improvements in design and material, including automatic couplers, and electric and fluorescent lights. Automatic air brakes, wrought-steel wheels, and roller bearings help make high-speed operation safe. Air conditioning and many other improvements have been incorporated for passenger comfort. Modern cars, for both local and long-distance service, have an entrance at both ends of the car. Flexible connections between cars give passengers access to any car of a moving train.

A railroad passenger may dine, read, sleep, talk with other passengers, or enjoy the passing scenery through windows. He may also be informed of points of interest en route over loudspeaker systems.

Freight cars. Railroads are used to carry anything that needs to be transported – regardless of size, weight, or makeup, be it solid, liquid, or powder, mineral or organic. This diversity of commodities explains a great variety of freight-car types.

Simple, functional – that’s the flatcar. Essentially a platform on wheels, flatcars can carry large, tall and heavy loads – lumber, stone blocks, vehicles, machinery – items unaffected by weather and temperature. In the case of extra long freight (such as rail or pipe), two or more flatcars can carry the load. A modern method of reducing delay and avoiding damage to goods is by the use of containers. The goods are packed into the containers at the works or factory, and the containers are then moved to the railroad where they are placed onto flatcars.

In its most basic form, the gondola is merely a flatcar with sides – but what a difference sides can make! The gondola can handle bulk material like gravel or coal.

Initially, flatcars and gondolas dominated the railroad scene, but railroads had a special need for cars that could protect freight from rain and snow. The type of car most common, and also most versatile in the variety of goods it can handle, is the boxcar – the work horse of the freight car fleet. The evolution of an early wooden boxcar into an efficient vehicle for mass transportation of materials and manufactured goods is the result of several improvements. The Bessemer steel-making process together with the adoption of the automatic coupler and air brake in the late 19^th century allowed for cars of greater capacity and longer trains. Resembling the boxcar in outward appearance, the refrigerator car is used to transport commodities that require refrigeration. The earliest attempts at railcar refrigeration were blocks of ice in a boxcar. Modern refrigerator cars use mechanical refrigeration and improved insulation. For most food products, the refrigerator car provides the ideal combination of moisture and temperature.

The floor of a hopper is sloped toward hoppers which help funnel the material to the hatches through which the commodity is unloaded. Hoppers transport bulk commodities such as coal and ore. In America the covered hoppers are used to transport grain, cement and dry sand. Most hoppers have a capacity of 60 tons.

Tank cars are used to transport liquid commodities such as chemicals, acids, gasoline, and kerosene. Unlike flatcars, gondolas and boxcars, tank cars spend half their transit time empty. Regardless of this drawback, tank cars are in high demand. In the 1950s tank-car construction was improved through all-welded tanks and an increased use of aluminum. These and other technological improvements, such as high-pressure tanks, allowed railroads to carry larger quantities of liquids per car.

Special-service cars carry a specific type of freight. Their design is such that it would be impractical to use the car to haul anything other than its intended freight. The auto-carrier is among the most common special-service cars. Today’s automobile carrier cars are known as auto-racks. Because of vandalism, auto-racks are built with panels on their sides. Each bi-level car can carry 8-10 automobiles.