Re: [CBQ] Rochelle Sand House

["Nelson Moyer" <npmoyer@hotmail.com>]

Randy Danniels sent me a photo of sand being delivered to the sand house in Burlington, IA in a box car. If I remember correctly, two workers were shoveling sand out of the box car into a metal hopper just inside the open door of the sand house. While not shown, the hopper fed sand into the heater, where it was dried, and delivered to the sand tower tank by compressed air. This was probably BN era, circa 1974, after the wood sand hopper was removed from the roof and the roof was rebuild as a gabled roof with green shingles. I can’t find the photo in my files, and I don’t know when or how it disappeared, but maybe he would be so kind as to post it here, as it represents sand handling in the diesel era.

 

In the early steam era, a large sand house was located across the tracks from the sand tower, but I’ve never found a clear picture of that sand house. At some point, probably as steam traffic declined, that large sand drying house was razed and the small brick sand house with the wood sand hopper on top was built between the service tracks between the sand tower and the coal packet. That arrangement is shown in the photo I posted, and the one I’m modeling. Some partial photos suggest that as least part of the top of the hopper was enclosed, but the photo I have doesn’t show that. Perhaps photos with the partial enclosure was at a different location. Since the Burlington sand hopper was open, I believe sand was delivered in gondolas and moved to the raw sand hopper with the clamshell crane used to fill the coal pocket. Sand was gravity fed down to the dryer, then piped to the tank atop the tower my compressed air.

 

The roof of the sand house isn’t shown clearly in the photo I posted. Another photo, the one showing what appears to be a partial roof covering, shows a low sloping roof from the eves to the wood hopper. I don’t see that in the photo I posted, but there are no roof drains, gutters, or downspouts visible, so a flat roof is improbable. The roof covering is unknown, but I see no evidence of shingles or sheet metal roofing. I chose to model a low sloping hip roof covered with tar paper.

 

There is some uncertainty about how sand was fed into the tower tank. Dave Becks HO scale drawing shows the fill pipe from the sand house going to the top of the tank, but none of the photos I have show that arrangement. The photo I posted has the fill pipe going to the bottom of the tank, where presumably it entered the bottom of the tank and continued to near the top, where it discharged dry sand. I like to hear from anyone who can provide more information about how the sand tank was filled.

 

The sand delivery pipe rigging was counterbalanced with lead balls like the coal chutes. The lines seen on the delivery pipes are the pulldown line, and the looping line for activating the valve opening the valve in the cone at the bottom of the tank to allow sand to flow by gravity or a combination of gravity and compressed air. The delivery pipe fit into the bottom of the cone in a way that allowed both vertical and horizontal play.

 

The sand house has a stovepipe running up the side to just over the top of the sand hopper on the roof. The photo shows smoke coming from the stack. The sand house must have had a heating unit to dry sand and a compressor to push it up to the tank. I would guess that fuel oil was used in the 1950, rather than coal, but the wheelbarrow parked beside the sand house suggest they were coal fired, with coal brought over from the coal pocket next door.

 

Since much of this is speculative, I’d like to hear from anyone with additional photos and real world information on the coal pocket and sand house and tower in Burlington in the 1950s.

 

Nelson Moyer

 

From: CBQ@groups.io <CBQ@groups.io> On Behalf Of Ken Martin via groups.io
Sent: Monday, August 19, 2024 1:35 AM
To: CBQ@groups.io
Subject: Re: [CBQ] Rochelle Sand House

 

Rich,

 

I have no idea what is in the sand house in Rochelle or how they dried the sand.

 

Here is an old sand dryer in the Leadville, CO sand house. It is an apron surrounding a stove.

 

If I remember correctly wet sand is thrown between the apron and stove and as it dries it falls through the apron and gathered.

 

Ken Martin

 

On Aug 18, 2024, at 7:33 PM, Richard Gortowski via groups.io <rgortowski=aol.com@groups.io> wrote:

 

This is an image of the sand house I need to scratchbuild for my layout for Rochelle, IL. This is how it appeared in 1949.  I'm embarrassed to say I have no idea of how this worked and what type of equipment would be housed in the building.  I'd appreciate any information on how this process worked.

 

Thanks,

 

Rich G.

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