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Those last two box cars that I referred to were being released from Cadillac service. The cars were sent back home to be inspected and if good enough condition, have the Evans Loaders removed as scrap (Eola?) and the box car put back into general service. The release of these two cars meant that the Q fleet for handling setup autos and trucks was entirely in bi-level and/or tri-level cars. Trailer Train owned the flats and the Q (and FW&D) owned everything above the flat car deck including the tie-down devices. Box cars in parts service were also equipped with a set of racks for handling parts that the owning railroad purchased. Of course after the first trip the racks probably never were in the original car again. How the railroads ever got into purchasing racks in the first place has always puzzled me. The racks were pretty much manufacturer and even plant specific. Therefore if a car assigned to Ford Engine at Dearborn was transferred to Ford Axle at Sterling, the racks stayed in Dearborn. BTW the railroads and the truckers were pretty much convinced that a automobile company material handling engineer had never seen the inside of a box car or a trailer. Fred Crissey __._,_.___ Posted by: "fhc925@frontier.com" <fhc925@frontier.com> __,_._,___ |