Now that Spring is really happening around here, I have spent very little time in the basement. As the hot weather looks to be returning soon it may become an escape from the heat for a month or so until the concrete warms up.
On the vehicle front; I did find a website that offers quite a few late 40’s early 50’s pick up trucks at a reasonable price. I think by the time I get the dump hoppers fabricated there won’t be very much clearance below, so a small truck is probably all that will fit.
And speaking of the dump hoppers. A fellow FEBT member Douglas Landon posted a never before seen picture of the Pukey Coal & Wood delivery trestle in Rockhill Furnace in the EBT yards. Douglas was around the railroad in the 60’s when it first opened for tourist service and documented a lot of structures that have since disappeared. Here are two shots of the trestle he took…
In the above shot, one of the two dump hoppers is clearly visible. It’s shape and position is different from what I imagined, but close! Knowing that all the timbers are 12" x 12", it won’t be too hard to scale this picture. That will be my next rainy day project. What is really cool, is this shot shows the lever mechanism used to open the chute. As would be expected for this era, it is not complicated at all and will add a nice touch to the foreground on my trestle.
Another shot he sent me by text shows the trestle in the distance with a few hoppers spotted on it…
Now, if I can just convince Douglas to find the prints and scan them again in higher resolution so they can be zoomed in on, I might really have a good source of data. Not sure he can do that but it’s worth a shot.
EDIT to add: I spoke with Douglas this morning. These ARE NOT his photos, he found them on the web years ago. Photographer unknown and no opportunity to re-scan in high resolution.