RailBox consists question

[Topo]

Hello friends.

It's prototypical to run a consist with RailBox 50' Boxcars mixed with other «normal» (non-RailBox) cars?

I have seen pics of consists «RailBox-only», but not remember to have seen then mixed.

 

[railohio]

It is more prototypical to mix the RailBox cars with other cars than to run them alone. RailBox is just a leasing company that supplies equipment to railroads. They all run like any other boxcars in the North American fleet.

 

[60103]

Railbox came out when there was a major shortage of boxcars in the U.S. IIRC, it was a joint company of most of the railroads. Their feature was that they had no "home road" to return to. About the same time, the interchange rulers introduced "Incentive per diem" charges (extra daily charges) to induce roads/shippers to get cars moving again in a hurry. This caused a number of otherwise insignificant roads to suddenly acquire large fleets of boxcars.
The make up of a train would depend on whether it was coming or going, and which boxcars were on hand.
Some roads ran special trains to collect foreign cars and get them "off the property" and onto some other road so that the charges would stop accumulating.

 

[Topo]

Thanks for the clarifications, gentlemen.

These cars are very colourful, but I think that having more than three or four in my layout at one time would be too much yellow joined!

 

[railohio]

RailBox was actually a subsidiary of Trailer Train which was jointly held by a number of Class 1 railroads. Today both operations are consolidated under the TTX brand.

 

[60103]

and just today I saw a Railbox car with a big TTX patch in the upper right corner.
My wife commented on the pastel colours on the other cars in the train.

 

[rockislandmike]

I've seen some of the newest ones recently here in Edmonton. They often travel in duos or trios, but they're always mixed in with a bunch of other freight cars, very frequently a mish-mash of other boxcars.

 

[Chessie6459]

i haven't seen any of the railbox cars come through portage, pa yet, but i am sure i will see some one of these days.