Atlas has recently announced 6 bay cylindrical hoppers. Are these prototypical? What kind of materials were these used for? http://www.atlasrr.com/Images/HOFreightCars/ho36baycylin/1107/Cylindrical Hopper 6 bay Frisco.jpg
Re: firsco - 6-Bay Cylindrical Hopper Yes! This was an early design by ACF of what eventually became the very successful ACF "Center-Flow" car. Frisco had 25 of them: SLSF 81000 - SLSF 81024. Built by ACF in 1962. The hopper body was of aluminum construction and was unpainted. They ran on ASF "Ride-Control" 100-ton roller bearing trucks. I don't know if these were used for some special lading or if they were in general covered hopper use. Ken |-| PS: I have the first Atlas release of this model - SLSF 81015. Nice model, though it tends to wobble as it rolls. It's also huge! (as was the prototype).
Re: firsco - 6-Bay Cylindrical Hopper I also have several of the first model. I believe they were only released as part of a 3 pack with a caboose and a 2 bay cement hopper. The new version is upgraded with see-thru roofwalks, etc. Therefore it should be a dramatic improvement. Bob Hoover FriscoFriend
Re: firsco - 6-Bay Cylindrical Hopper OOPs! I also meant to mention that the car was also available in I believe two road #'s in O Scale. Awesome shelf model! Bob Hoover FriscoFriend
Re: firsco - 6-Bay Cylindrical Hopper I recently nabbed the Atlas 3 car set on ebay for $12 what a steal! Anyway, does anyone know why and what these were used for
Re: firsco - 6-Bay Cylindrical Hopper See my posting in this thread from 11/19/07. I posted a builders pic of these cars. This cylindrical hopper was an early design by ACF of what eventually became the very successful ACF "Center Flow" car. Frisco had 25 of them: SLSF 81000 - 81024,built by ACF in 1962. The hopper body was of aluminum construction and was unpainted. They ran on ASF "Ride-Control" 100-ton roller bearing trucks. I don't know if these were used for some special lading or if they were in general covered hopper use. The cylindrical design was expensive to build. ACF soon modified their "Center Flow" design into what has become a very common covered hopper in many sizes and capacities that looks totally different. Ken
Atlas re-released this car in an updated form about a year ago. The upgrades included metal see-thru roofwalks and sepearate truck swing hangers that had to be installed. The new version is much more realistic looking and quite frankly a beautiful car. While living in Tulsa I would see cars painted BN green that looked like these spotted at the Bama plant north of town that made biscuits for McDonald's. At the time they were hauling flour.
