Why Erie Car Repairs Cost Less
Heavy freight-car repair operations the Erie are now being conducted in plant permitting the railroad to control car repair costs in the years ahead. The design and location of the new Meadville, Pa., car shop play important parts in controlling the costs.
The plant is laid out around two production tracks which can be tooled for heavy repairing of up to 14 cars each 8 hr. It is anticipated that repairs for the Erie freight car fleet can usually be handled on one shift. Either track, or both, can be set up for production-line repairs. It is expected that such repairs will normally be to cars of the same class. Generally, cars requiring the same type of work will be put through a line consecutively.
The site chosen for the new shop is the division point almost midway on the Erie's New York to Chicago main line. This simplifies the movement of bad order cars to the shop. The site also has the advantage of being close to the plants of many suppliers.
Meadville yard also provides an area where bad order cars can be accumulated and classified to make a production line operation possible. Switching locomotives could be available around the clock, if necessary.
Floods resulting from Hurricane Diane in August 1955 severely damaged the Erie's now-abandoned freight-car shop at Dunmore, Pa., near Scranton. The shop was on a branch line near the east end of the railroad. The cost of repairs to an obsolete building, and the inconvenient location of the Dunmore plant, led to a decision to relocate at Meadville.
The shop building is sheathed with over 100,000 sq. ft of corrugated aluminum. Walls of the main repair shop and fabricating shop have one or two courses of translucent corrugated plastic siding. This permits maximum utilization of natural light during daytime operations. The two high-ceiling work areas are also illuminated with high-bay mercury-vapor lamps. The main repair shop has auxiliary fluorescent lighting mounted on side walls under the crane rails. Smaller work areas, offices, and locker rooms are lighted exclusively with continuous fluorescent fixtures.
Floors throughout the shop are reinforced concrete. Heating in the fabricating shop is provided by gas-fired infra-red units mounted on the ceiling. Smaller work areas, the lumber mill and storage room and the storeroom are heated with direct-fired space heaters. Shop offices and locker rooms are heated with finned radiators using low-pressure steam.
Acetylene, oxygen, compressed air, and a-c and d-c current are supplied through service boxes at close intervals along the production tracks in the main shop. Cars are moved by a series of winch-type car movers.
Trackage for storing 149 cars is within the shop area. Capacities of the repair areas are: stripping, 33 cars; main shop, 18 cars; sandblast and undercoat area, 12 cars, and paint shop, 10 cars. This means 73 cars can be undergoing repairs at any one time.
The operation although known as a car-repair shop, has space and facilities for fabrication and assembly of new cars. The main repair and assembly shop is 600 ft long, 100 ft wide. Through it run two repair tracks. A third dead-end material track extends down the center from the stripping area or north end.
The six-track outside stripping area has adjustable permanent scaffolds and equipment for straightening car sides and ends. At right angles to the north end of the 60,000-sq-ft main repair and assembly shop is the 18,750-sq-ft fabricating shop. This shop is equipped with metal working tools for fabricating car parts. At its west end is an outside steel storage area of 15,000 sq.ft. Both the outside storage and the fabricating shop are served by the same 10-ton bridge crane. There is sufficient area in this shop to set up under frame and side jigs for use in conjunction with new-car and complete rebuilding programs.
Along the west wall of the main shop is a series of smaller work areas. The blacksmith shop opens directly into the fabricating shop and the main shop. The adjacent machine shop is a completely enclosed area. It contains the toolroom, pipe shop, and space for storing the materials handling trucks used in repair operations. The next area, opening into the main shop, is used for truck repairs. It has elevated rails and a gantry crane for truck work. Wheel storage is immediately outside this shop.
Next to the truck repair shop is the lumber storage and wood mill. All lumber can be stored under cover in this area and is placed there directly from cars spotted at the adjacent unloading dock. This area has a complete sprinkler fire protection system. A 125- 75-ft storeroom is next to the wood min.
All these areas flanking the west side of the main shop are in a continuous structure with 20-ft ceilings. On the east side of the main shop is a 250- by 25-ft lean-to structure with locker and washing facilities for 350 men, a lunch room for 250, and the shop office.
Cars move from the main repair shop into an open-sided structure where they are sandblasted. From here they are moved over pits for undercoating. The open-side shelter connects the main repair shop and the paint shop. Cars are not exposed to the weather from the time they enter the main repair shop until they emerge from the paint shop.
The paint shop is a 325- by 51-ft building. On one track is a fully automatic Binks traveling paint-spray booth. On the other track is a handtype booth. Since these booths went into operation, the Erie has been applying a single-coat, direct-to-metal paint.
A crossover between the two repair shops makes it possible to move repaired cars under either the automatic or the hand-spray booth, or to perform part of the finishing under one booth and transfer the car to the other for completion. Cars are moved from the shop and lightweighted in Meadville yard where stenciling is completed.
References:
- Railway Age. February 16, 1959