In 2017,what would be a common industry that would use loads of steel by rail? I'm using the Atlas coil steel cars.
Thanks to all for your responses.
Al Hummel
Original Post
Replies sorted oldest to newest
Pipe manufacturers ....
Washer/Dryer/Refrigerator/Freezer mfrs (e.g., Whirlpool, Maytag), automobile/truck accessory/component mfrs (making catalytic converters, exhaust components, fuel tanks, frame rails, etc.), railroad car mfrs, agricultural machinery mfrs, residential/commercial HVAC mfrs (furnaces, ductwork, A/C housings, etc.), metal roofing mfrs,defense contractors (ship builders, armament, ammo, etc.), cookware mfrs (pots, pans, flatware)
and on, and on, and on.....
to name a few.
KD
(Good cognitive exercise!)
Coil cars are for protecting cold-rolled steel. This is high end flat roll such as car bodies and perhaps appliance shells. Generally this is very thin gauge and very smooth to take nice finishes, hence the protection. This is the "cadillac" product of the steel industry. When I still worked in the industry, no mini-was capable of making these products for a few reasons. One they generally made their steel from scrap rather than ore and it was often contaminated with impurities and alloys that would not allow to be finished properly. the mills could get the varioius properties much more accurately. Second a cold strip mill is expensive, big, and precise to maintain gauge very accurately. Mini-mills did not have such facilities. Finally most modern cold-rolled is heat-treated to create certain characteristics that allow for deep-drawing (forming into fenders and such) and to give it high strength. Then it is often coated on one side to prevent rust when assembly. One side coating is sophisticated technology. Coating lines and heating treating facilities are also big and expensive.
Hot-rolled on the other hand is thicker gauge and rougher. Such things as bathtubs, chassis for vehicles and applications where very smooth, pretty finish is not needed. These generally ship in open gons or even sometimes on flat cars.
Shipping building uses heavier stock which is called plates, and is generally at least 1/2 inch thick. This is often shipped on flats or in gons laid flat on the bottom. These plates are often as long as the gon or flat. Again this is mostly shipped unprotected. The same types of steel are used to fabricate into girders for construction.
On a related note, a small stamping plant making parts might get coils by rail and would not be that big a facilility if it was making smaller parts.
Don't forget the box cars to ship out the finished products.
An alternative is to not model the actual Industry, but model a Transload facility instead. If this is an enclosed warehouse building that the coil car is pushed into (which is most likely the case, for coil steel) you don't even need to model the unloading gear, never mind worry about who/what the 'end user' Industry is!! 
at the Litho plant I work at (we shear,coat and print,then send the metal to another plant of ours to be formed into jar caps) use a lot of coils, but sadly the rail siding was abandoned long before I started there.
I was the assistant plant manager for a steel drum company in Baltimore. We has a rail siding directly into the plant for delivery of coiled steel which supplied the stamping press side to make the top and bottoms and also the steel to make the drums.
Attachments
Images (1)
AGHRMatt posted:Don't forget the box cars to ship out the finished products.
And, at welded pipe manufacturers .... flat cars loaded with pipe, which are varying, interesting loads.
PRRJIM
Great post and I enjoyed the info on steel.
Last month I toured an automobile assembly plant outside Jackson, MS and the only thing they made was stamping out body panels from coil steel. Chassis, trans, seats, dash, engines; everything else came assembled as units and assembled.
Way different from Ford in Henry Fords day where they made iron and steel and cast engine blocks.
Charlie
Choo Choo Charlie posted:PRRJIM
Great post and I enjoyed the info on steel.
Last month I toured an automobile assembly plant outside Jackson, MS and the only thing they made was stamping out body panels from coil steel. Chassis, trans, seats, dash, engines; everything else came assembled as units and assembled.
Way different from Ford in Henry Fords day where they made iron and steel and cast engine blocks.
Charlie
We have done a complete 180 since those days... now we tend to purchase all the modules and stick a label on it at the plant.
Another product, usually in a raw state, are billets and rounds, that would be reheated and further processed in a mill. Shipped a lot of times in gondolas. Another part of the steel industry is the distributor who would have various types of products. There is one in Ambridge, Pa. near the NS line with a siding going up to it from the throat of the Conway yard. Crosses a bridge- would be cool to model.
That siding in Ambridge is the remains of the "Economy Branch". When I was a kid it still got as far as 8th St in Ambridge and serviced a feed/fertilizer supply and a lumber yard up there. There was industry all along it and it looped around serviced the plants up along old rte 65 such as Spangs (armco) Pipe Plant and A.M. Byers.
A steel warehouse in a larger city will receive loads of steel by rail. They will do some light processing, such as de-coiling, flattening, and shearing the metal into sheets and plates. Then they ship it out by truck to various steel fabricators and manufacturers around the area to fulfill their orders. Don't forget to have a few flatcars loaded with beams, channels, angles, re-bar, pipe, square & round bars, and other metal shapes too. A steel warehouse will usually stock it all.
Yes, "back in the day" when I was selling industrial chemicals I could spend a whole day just in Ambridge. I really liked Neville Island, I could get two day's worth of sales calls in one day !! I like that little branch up in to Ambridge, though. I vaguely remember AM Byers and their Bessemer converters. I think they were one if not the last wrought iron mfr. It might have been smokey but it was fun !!
When I worked for the Providence and Worcester, one of the jobs ran up and down the NEC (North East Corridor) under the wires trying to stay out of the way of Acelas and NE Regionals.
One stop in CT was for Stanley Bostitch. We dropped off steel rolls for them to make staples. Always wondered how many staples could be made from a roll of steel coils .
That string of hoppers is on the overflow track. if you look close another 150' down the track is another turnout leading to the plant.
Paul
Attachments
Images (2)
Franklin Industries takes in old railroad rail and makes steel fence posts out of them. 
Many years ago I was in Franklin(nice town) and called on Franklin Steel and the PA explained to me what they did. Glad to see they are still there -so much is gone.
Corten in a type that will flash rust. Used for items such as interstate lamp poles. After the initial rust there isn't anymore rust. needs no paint
Dick
