Adding Wood Chip Gondolas to the Roster

New Additions to the Layout

Woodchips are generated by lumber mills and separate purpose built woodchip mills in many areas of the U.S. and Canada. Most are used in paper or cardboard manufacture. While I have a paper mill on my layout, I chose not to model the wood chip portion due o space constraints.  Currently wood chips are received at the mill in the Yard and the loads removed after a set number of days before being returned to the yard as empty's.  Wood chips are received from either an off-site source, or from the Muskoka saw mill (on the layout).  As I discussed in another blog entry, I currently have four wood chip car resin kits manufactured by Alpine Railway Shops of Kettleby, Ontario, which were marketed as being representative of rolling stock used by CN and BCR for saw mills and paper mills. I have several additional car kits which are modeled after the BNSF cars to also handle chips.

A common variation of CP’s woodchip gondolas rebuilt from a 52′ gondola with extended sides.  Bill Grandin photo.

I recently found myself with three 52' gondola kits which I have tried to sell at several railroad shows, but unfortunately no takers. So rather then seeing them sit for months until the next show, I decided to try my hand at kitbashing these kits to resemble a photo I had seen of a CP rebuilt gondola that was placed into wood chip service. These would become lettered in the ONR, although to the best of my knowledge the ONR never had any cars that even approached this configuration.

From what I have been able to research, in the 1970's, CP Rail began to convert some randomly selected old boxcars to woodchip cars; this was done through the early 1980s.  These cars were made by cutting away the old roof and adding an extension. Later cars did not receive the extensions to the sides.  They also took an unknown number of 52' gondolas and extended the sides.

The story for my cars is that CP rebuilt these wood chip gondolas with extended sides from a standard gondola.  After some years of use in the north, CP parked them on a siding for lack of use.  The ONR then purchased them and repainted them to a woodchip only service marks that you see.

Proto 2000 Gondolas getting ready for conversion

Adding bracing for wall extensions. I didn't like the looks of this so the other two cars were done by adding bar stock

No matter how carefully you cut, there are always gaps. Next step some sanding followed by painting

Finished product in chevron scheme

Finished gon in the progressive paint scheme and added Wood Chip Service Only. Note I carried all of the ribs forward on this car after realizing that the gon looked odd with only alternating ribs. Still need to make a load for this unit

New Power for the Paper Mill

The long anticipated SW1200RS from Rapido has arrived and I immediately had to try it out at the paper mill.  All I can say is what a beautiful piece of model railroading engineering and manufacturing.  I purchased the unit with DCC sound, as the price difference isn't enough to go for a non-DCC unit, and DCC version includes sound.  For anyone who has followed the development of a suitable Canadian version of the SW1200, designated by the trailing letters RS, there has been on-going controversy for some time as both Rapido and True Line Trains announced intentions to build this model.  It was actually an interesting story as it developed, as Rapido announced their intentions and showed production samples, while TLT announced their version and showed a photo of an OMI model as their unit.  In any event, Rapido delivered the goods and TLT (as of a May 2017 web site posting) has not.  Knowing the quality of work that goes into a Rapido model, I spent my modeling $$$ and ordered CN 1341, with the idea that this would become my main power for switching at the paper mill, similar to use of the SW1200RS units at paper mills in Marathon and Iroquois Falls, Ontario. 

A little history for the SW1200RS, which comes from the Rapido website.  General Motors Diesel (GMD) delivered the first example of what would come to be known as the SW1200RS model to Canadian National in September 1955. As its dieselization progressed, CNR needed a compact, lightweight locomotive to replace steam power on branch lines and other over-the-road assignments (freight and passenger) not requiring a full-fledged mainline road switcher. General Motors’ 1,200-hp SW1200 switcher model, in production since January 1954, combined the right size and muscle, but needed modifications for use out on the road.

First impressions out of the box...Rapido just continues to produce detailed, quality products which get better each model produced.  Starting off it is very well packaged and the model rides snugly in its plastic cocoon.  A detailed instruction manual (more on that to come) is included and one of the first things you see after opening the box.  Sound is very good and matches what I have seen with my RDC unit.  Engine noises are very throaty and nice chugging sound on acceleration.  Lots and lots of detail included on the model.  My only initial complaint after running it for about 30 minutes is a slight jerky movement at very slow speeds although it's getting better with more running.  My other concern is that the motor seems to have a slight whiny sound when the sound is off and you can hear the engine running alone.  Hopefully both of these problems will continue to work themselves out of the unit.  

The instruction manual is a typical Rapido manual.  Too much frivolity and joking for my tastes.  I understand that maybe a couple of humorous lines of text breaks up the monotony of a technical manual but let's focus on tech issues and specifics to the loco rather than more attempts at humor.  For example I searched and could not find if there is anyway to turn off the side lights on the trucks but I did find the oblique reference to Quantum Physics while dancing the Watusi.  Nice to know but my question remains unanswered.  Maybe a little more thought given to some tech drawings such as showing the 21 pin socket and less jokes.

I am quite please with the unit after running it on the layout.  Now comes the hard part, how much weathering should be done to give it that proper industrial locomotive feel versus how it currently looks.  I choose to loosely model the 1341 using the 1305, which was used at the Abitibi-Consolidated mill in Iroquois Falls, Ontario.  Abitibi acquired the 1305 in January 1994 (ex CN 1305) and a photo taken in 2003 clearly shows that the CN noodle is long faded away and the CN red is heavily faded.  Sounds like a topic for another posting if I decide to weather the unit to this condition.  The last photograph I have of these unit was after it was repainted into the green/black scheme and was serving the Resolute Forest Products (last reported as DESX 1305) in Thorald. 

Modeling a Paper Mill - Part 4.3 New Warehouse Addition

In the last post, I talked about how I added another building within the cellulose portion of the mill.  I had another project on my to-do list, which was to expand the Walthers stock kit warehouse building so that I could load more boxcars with finished product.  When I initially designed the paper mill, the warehouse was to be two Walthers kits joined together, which would allow at least five (5) 50-foot boxcars to be stored for general rail loading and leaving the truck bays intact.  However, two buildings took up a large amount of space, and the paper mill modules were going to be restricted to a 12 linear foot area.  So after running with a warehouse which could only accommodate 3 boxcars, something had to be done.  After all, the paper mill can only survive by increasing it's outflow whenever demand is present.  Remember, it's 1985 on the layout, so consumers are still reading their daily newspaper and the paper mill is constantly busy meeting the demand for paper rolls.  While business has started to see a slight decline in big city newspaper demand, small local and regional papers continue to flourish and demand has increased.

Accordingly, two new tracks were laid into a portion of the grounds which was being used for storage of miscellaneous items and equipment, including a small transformer yard.  The plant manager, after presenting a capital investment plan to the bean counters, was able to procure the funds to add track and place it under roof to avoid those harsh northern Ontario winters.  This meant that the electrical substation had to be moved onto the roof of the warehouse, which while a little bit of a stretch, is not too obvious or out of place.

I had purchased several pieces of laser-scribed basswood several years ago from  Monster Modelworks, but never got around to using them for a project that I had intended to scratch build in N scale.  While maybe the sheets and brickwork are the wrong scale for the purist, I opted to use the three sheets that had been purchased rather than buying sheets in HO scale. After all, the main purpose was to house boxcars, and I wasn't looking to model something exactly like a building that doesn't actually exist on the prototype.

Several weekends ago, I started to take measurements and started to draft what my addition would look like.  As I was doing so, I realized that the addition would likely have to cover the existing windows on the Walthers papermill kit, so I decided to remove the windows and make the addition high enough to accommodate the tallest of boxcars while at the same time covering the windows.  Removing the windows without breaking them took some finessing the plastic from its glue, but everything came out without any significant damage. So after joining the three sections of wood, a little cutting was in order to re-install the plastic windows into the new addition.  

Structure is complete and it's time to think about finishing the roof as well as the area by the doors. I'll add a circular tube at the top of each door to simulate an overhead door.

While I originally was going to install a platform at door height of the boxcars, I opted to install a concrete walkway at ground level and only finish a small portion of the doorways.  Some drums and workers were added, but since you can't see very far into the building, I decided to forego and real detail. Again, the building was built to house boxcars and really meant to be a storage space for loading and unloading purposes.

View from the other side. Tracks in foreground are yard storage of empty boxcars waiting to be loaded and excess tank cars ready for other parts of the Mill. 

Modeling a Paper Mill - Part 4.2 Construction Progress

Between travels for work and time spent this fall preparing the yard and house for the winter months, I have not had as much time to spend on the layout.  However, I have been able to do a little painting and install some scenery materials so that the paper mill doesn't look as bleak and empty as before.  And of course I've had some re-do's, as I wasn't satisfied with the way some of the roadways turned out.  Apparently trying to model a very fine, crushed stone roadway with fine ballast was harder than I previously remembered it to be when just trying to do small roadways.  Large areas that could be a roadway or just an open area just seem to show even the finest of gravels rather than a well worn gravel and dirt roadway that I was trying to achieve.  So between roadways and some ground scenery, some color is appearing and the modules are beginning to take the form that I wanted.

When I had some free evenings and paint was drying in various portions of the two modules, I also dug out some tank kits that I had accumulated for the mill and began to build them.  And of course, all tanks should be set inside some sort of spill containment structure, so I have also been rummaging through the scrap styrene box to fine appropriately sized pieces to build containment structures.  My recent work has been to start adding some pumps and piping; I found some great HO sized pumps on the Shapeways website and will be adding pumps and piping shortly.

Initial construction; still need to add piping to each of the three tanks as well as the 3 tanks in the background

The biggest project undertaken was scratch building a new building within the cellulose portion of the mill.  Based on a general visitor guide I obtained in 2001, I believe that this building is actually part of the bark boiler complex on the Temiscaming mill  I liked it due to some unique angles that are present, as well as the ability to accommodate the placement of several stacks I built using the Walthers refinery kit.  So it has now become part of a background building for the specialty cellulose mill.  For my building, I added a rail unloading shed at ground level, which I'm fairly sure is not present in the prototype, but allows some more spots for tank car off-loading.  It also allowed me to spot some storage tanks in between some of the tracks which will be used as part of the chemical products group alcohol plant.

Start of the specialty cellulose mill. Still need to cut the angled middle and bottom panels. Hardest part was cutting the windows to the correct size. Several catwalks and stairwells will be added to the left side of the Bldg (not shown in picture)

Bldg is now partially done; major components are in place, however, work still needed for the piping and exits along the left side of the Bldg

Windows still need to be worked on and some sort of backing put into place so that the windows and styrene don't deflect and bow; many of the pieces used are leftovers from other projects

Working through some of the details

Additionally, I have been able to ballast most of the track in the paper mill, as well as setting the switches permanently.

Modeling a Paper Mill - Part 4.1 Construction Progress

If you have stuck with me this far and read through the other posts, let's take an overall look at my construction progress.  As of this writing, the newly revised track configuration is just about completed, although I'm waiting on some additional pieces of track to finish track work to the small engine house.

As I discussed in another entry, one aspect of my first paper mill design was a lack of tracks to load paper bales and rolls and no suitable amount of space to store empty or loaded cars ready for pickup.  The old design used the Walthers paper mill kit as the primary structure, although I long realized that the brick building is at best a suitable building for a warehouse and/or loading tracks and not really to house the paper machine as Walthers seems to imply with their advertising.  That building, while nice in detail, really lacks a suitable amount of space to install a loading track with any real storage capacity.  The best I could manage was two (2) 50-foot boxcars inside and one boxcar peeking though the end.  My three store age tracks were not much bigger, allowing me only to keep 4-5 cars present, and at the other end of the mill.  Clearly all of this had to change.

When I decided to redo the paper mill modules, the two key elements needed were more loading space and more capacity for yard tracks.  I also wanted to have only one track where chemicals would be loaded, although I came to designate certain areas within that one spur for different chemicals.  Here's a basic summary of what was completed:

• The inbound and outbound Yard tracks are each now single tracks with a capacity of 9 cars.
• The primary warehouse track has been lengthened to hold 6 cars.
• Warehouse #2 track will hold four (4) boxcars.
• Warehouse #3 track will hold seven (7) boxcars.
• The chemical and slurry tracks were combine to one track, each with 3 to 4 loading/unloading spots.

Progress as of Oct 1, 2017

View of the road crossing to the warehouse; paper machine building in the background. Lots of work needed to finish the pavement, which was created using black dyed spackle to form the roads and parking area

View from the warehouse looking north. I fill the gap between tracks using construction foamboard, which is rough cut to match the configuration of the tracks. I then add the colored spackle mud to fill in gaps and create a small amount of relief or contour.  Ground foam and fine dirt will go on next.

View looking south; warehouse in background

Same view as above but foamboard has been partially painted to show where static grass and weeds will be applied

Oct 15 Progress

After adding foamboard to each of the areas, it's time to paint and add texture to the paved areas. The first coat is a craft paint from Michael's in basic black. I then use several coats of craft paint in a pewter gray color, adding fine dirt in between to add some texture to the asphalt surface.

Modeling a Paper MIll - Part 3 Rail Services

The Spruce Creek facility receives most of its bulk raw materials via rail.  I have purposely chosen not to include truck operations in my modeling, as I lacked the space to include a large enough loading area for trucks and opted to set my warehouse building at the end of the module, so that I might have more storage track space. 

Rail traffic for the four mills consists primarily of boxcars, chemical slurry tank cars, and chemical tank cars.  When I began to design my mill, one of the first items I noted that the prototype had was a number of storage tracks that were present, either within or outside the mill itself.  The second item was that, with the exception of the Temiscaming mill, each mill had its own or several switcher engines.

Switching Power

One the most interesting aspects of the mill I find is the power used to move the various boxcars and tankcars and the number of movements needed to keep the operations running smoothly.  I chose to replicate my mills power based on the various types of equipment that have been used at my four prototype mills.  The following is a rough list of engines that have been known to operate at the different mills in the area and is simply used to illustrate the variety of power over the years.  

The next decision was how the mill would be switched. Paper mills receive a large number of cars on a daily basis when in operation, which can tie up the local switching crew for the better part of a day or more.   For a start-up operation, this would have strained the resources of the crew, so the decision was reached early on that KLR crews would go to the mill, drop any empties and pick-up the cars ready for transport from the yard, while a two-person yard crew would work at least one shift to move cars within the mill.

I decided to go with similar engines and power requirements as were typically seen at my four example mills.

	Engine #	Type	Notes
Iroquois Falls	1203	S4	Ret. from ONR 1973; sold to Abitibi Pulp & Paper
	1310	RS3	Sold from ONR in 1985 to Abitibi Pulp & Paper
Smooth Rock Falls	104	S4	Mattagami Rail; formerly Quebec Iron & Titanium
Kapuskasing	108	RS23
	109	RS23	Former Devco #201
	168	GP7	Mattagami Rail, ex ACR 168
Temiscaming			No known dedicated engines; services provided by CP and RaiLink via the branch line (Temiscaming Sub.) from Mattawa to Temiscaming, Quebec (approximately 41 miles).

Currently, the Spruce Creek mill is serviced by an S4 (former Boston & Maine ) and a Mattagami GP7 unit.  With the introduction of the SW1200RS by Rapido in 2017, a unit in CN's black and orange paint scheme may become the newest switcher.  Ideally, when funds allow and a model is available, power will be replaced by an Alco RS23.

Inside the Mill

Let me first start off by saying that I firm believer that modeling an industry should be realistic to the prototype but also fun to operate.  After all, who wants to operate on a layout or switch an industry if they’re not having fun.  So I subscribe to the thought following what the prototype has done is the simplest and most realistic way of achieving your goal. This may include modeling only some of the basic buildings one might find in a paper mill, as well as following the general track arrangements, or modeling each and every building if it is needed to support a variety of rolling stock which is received. 

The idea of keeping the track plan simple and close to the prototype became very apparent during a review of my first mill track plan.  My first design was based where I had cited various buildings and where they fit best, rather than based on any logical flow from a manufacturing standpoint.  That was a mistake, as the initial design created the situation where I would need to build a crossing within the facility just so that I could access both my chemical delivery track, as well as the warehouse tracks using different movements.  So it was back to the drawing board and a little more review of the aerial photos I had from several of the northern Ontario mills before planning the track work.    What really jumped out at me was that each of the mills had sufficient yards within or immediately outside of the mill, such that empties and filled cars were shuttled to and from the yard from the active loading or unloading areas.  When switching was completed, the plant switcher was generally returned to its engine house or bay.

Location	# Yard Tracks	Notes
Iroquois Falls	6+	Exterior to Plant; between Cambridge Ave and Ambridge Drive; use of a Wye
Smooth Rock Falls		Unknown within mill; Access via rail along 4th Street
Kapuskasing	5+	Yard tracks adjacent to ONR main; parallel to ONT-11
Temiscaming	6	Yard tracks well south of the mill; Small wye towards south end and near river

Car Loads

Let’s take a look at what the Spruce Creek plant produces, what the various raw materials that are needed, and how often rail cars enter the plant.  Similar to the Temiscaming mill, I modeled operations to include three main mills that manufacture different forest products, including specialty cellulose, high-yield-pulp and coated bleached board (containerboard) as well as a chemical products facility.   The chemical products division produces a variety of products made from spent sulphite liquor (primarily alcohol, resin or lignin based).  

It goes without saying that modeling four operating plants takes up a large amount of space, which typically is not available with a model railroad regardless of which scale you're modeling.  However, I have used photos from the Kapuskasing and Temiscaming mills as backdrop, which is how I incorporate each of the mills.    

The Spruce Creek Pulp and Paper Mill is located on two 2’ by 6’ modules in the center of the room.  Starting from the left side, my buildings include a power plant, the pulp mill, alcohol plant, acid building, kaolin building, specialty cellulose mill, board mill and the warehouse.

High Yield Pulp - the pulp mill is a manufacturing facility that converts wood chips or other plant fibre source into a thick fibre board which can be shipped to a paper mill for further processing. Pulp can be manufactured using mechanical, semi-chemical or fully chemical methods (kraft and sulfite processes). The finished product may be either bleached or non-bleached, depending on the customer requirements.  In our mill, kraft pulp is produced using softwood pulp, while the "B" mill can produce either softwood or hardwood pulp.  Similar to the Boardmill, final products are shipped via both rail and truck.  The Kraft mill also produces large amounts of lignin liquor, a byproduct of the digestion process. This material can be shipped out in tankers, dried, or fed to other bacterias to make yeast.  The Kraft mill also uses other chemicals such as sodium hydroxide (caustic soda) and sulfuric acid. Kaolin (slurry form) is brought in to make glossy paper. Kaolin is often supplemented by calcium carbonate (lime) slurry and titanium dioxide.

The Chemical plant consists of products which are made from the spent sulphite liquor generated within the facility.  The plant can be divided into an alcohol division, resin division and lignin division.  Most of this operation takes place within numerous tanks situated within three central buildings.  Due to their relative size, I chose to model only the fronts of the buildings and blended the building into the photo backdrop.

Refined from wood pulp, specialty cellulose is used in a range of applications across many industries – cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, personal care, food, coatings, electronics and energy.  Specialty cellulose is manufactured in both rolls and bales.  Similar to the chemical plant, this area was modeled using only the front of the building set against the photo backdrop.

The Boardmill Division produces high quality paper and manufactures newsprint for publishers of daily newspapers and commercial printers, as well as controlled bulk paper for mass-market paperback book publishers and commercial printers.  Coated bleach board is a product used for a broad range of commercial printing, publishing and packaging applications.  Newsprint production uses wood fibre obtained from four separate sources, including thermomechanical pulp (TMP), recycled pulp, groundwood pulp and kraft pulp. Kaolin is used to make glossy paper. While chlorine was used to bleach the paper, in recent years it has been replaced by sodium chlorate.

Rail Traffic

One of the other key aspects I looked at when designing my mill was how much traffic did a typical northern Ontario paper receive and could I support anything close to that. For example, both the Kapuskasing and Temiscaming mills generally receive rail traffic at least 5 days per week.  Aerial photographs are readily available for the Kapuskasing mill, and show that it has at least 5 storage tracks which appear to be able to easily hold forty (40) fifty-foot boxcars easily.  There are several additional tracks within the property which can also accommodate 15-20 cars easily per track.  If a typical train load is 20-30 tank cars and boxcars, I knew that there was no way to accommodate that much storage for my modelling. 

Another aspect that goes hand in hand with this was how much yard trackage would I be able to accommodate within two modules, given that this would become the easiest way to move traffic around with the yard switcher.  With the exception of the Temiscaming mill, each of the other mills discussed previously have been supported by a fairly large amount of trackage either on or just off the mill property.  It was very common to see numerous strings of boxcars just waiting to be pushed into the warehouse tracks, however, stored just along the property boundary.  Warehouse tracks were typically designed to support multiple boxcars, with the area under roof supporting at least 3 tracks and it was quite common to see 4-5 boxcars on each track.

The next step was to determine which types of rolling stock would be needed at the mill.  Paper mills take in and also ship out of lot of things, which may typically include: 

Rail Car	Inbound	Outbound
Boxcars	Scrap paper	Paper Rolls, Kraft or bleached paper	Various sized boxcars paper rolls and bundles bleached kraft bundles, scrap paper
Gondolas/Hi-cube Hoppers	Wood Chips
Bulk Head/Pulp Wood Flats	Pulp Wood Logs (cut to lengths of 4 to 6 feet long)
Tank Cars	Kaolin Chlorine  Limestone Slurry Caustic Soda Sodium Hydroxide Sodium Hydrosulfide Sulfuric Acid Lignin liquor	Tall Oil by-product Lignin Liquor Turpentine by -product	Chlorine (pulp bleaching); Clay slurries (note: Kaolin would be used for glossy papers)
Gondola		Scrap Iron
Bulkhead flat cars	10-foot pulpwood		Single-stacked cross-ways
Hopper	Coal, although most facilities burn some sort of wood waste
Covered Hoppers	Salt Cake, Calcium Carbonate, Lime, Sodium Chlorate, Corn Starch		Calcium carbonate – off loaded near the fourdrinier building for coatings; replaces kaolins

 Rail Spurs

 For my operations, I opted to go with the following arrangement:

• Warehouse (1 interior track within the Building; 2 interior tracks in adjacent Bldg.); each track to hold 2-3 boxcars
• Rotary chip dumper (1 track); able to store one hopper
• Chemical Plant (1 track – min. 5 loading/unloading spots)
• Engine House – (single track off of the outbound storage track)
• Yard Tracks (2 tracks, one for outbound cars and one for inbound; able to store 8 cars min.)

Engine house - Iroquois Falls, ONT