Industry ideas

Cornreaper

Cornreaper

New Member
Apr 26, 2006
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Barrie, ON
Hi all. I've got my track down and running on my N-Scale door layout and I'm beginning to creep into scenery. I've already settled on having a brewery as my major industry, and I've put in a team track. That leaves me with 2 other sidings that I'm drawing blanks on. I'm looking for ideas for 2 industries that are fairly small, yet big enough to justify having a siding. I'd also like to be able to run a decent variety of rolling stock, but nothing much bigger than 50', I've got some tight radii. Any ideas????
 
If one of the other sidings is far enough away from the brewery you could have a small beverage distributor building (like a freight house sort of structure) that could receive cars from the brewery. I've seen such an industry locally.

Ralph
 
If the brewery is the central focus of the layout, then industries that would either provide products for the brewery or receive its finished product would certainly be appropriate--some local beer trucks parked at the team track, and put a hop farm or aluminum (or tin, depending on your era) sheet factory/distributor as other possible industries--or a glass company to provide bottles! Another common industry that can ship to any distributor is a box factory--before sturdy cardboard boxes became fairly universal, factories turned out wooden crates to hold shipped products. And that can be supplied from a lumberyard, and so on...Consider the flow of a product, from starting components to finished product, and the things that make those components, and then consider the industries where those products are made, and you'll have a long list of potential industries to model.

And don't forget an interchange, where you can pick up carloads from the industries you don't want to model!
 
jetrock said:
And don't forget an interchange, where you can pick up carloads from the industries you don't want to model!
Click to expand...

The interchange is an excellent idea, as it will also give you a place to which you can ship products from any of your industries. Another thing to consider is what type of rolling stock appeals to you. If you like refrigerator cars, how about a produce distributor? Or an oil dealer (tankcars), or in an earlier era, a coal dealer (hoppers). If the real estate available for an industry is an odd shape, you could probably squeeze in a small scrap yard, and ship out scrap in gondolas.

Wayne
 
Well, I already have a both a team track and interchange designated, so that'll give me some variety there. I had thought about making the other industries related to the brewery, but they would be just too close for my liking, even with selective compression.

My time frame is roughly present-day, and the theme is a fictional shortline that interchanges with the CPR in the North Bay (Ontario) area. So I guess I'm looking for industries appropriate to the region other than timber or mining, cuz I just don't have enough space to pull those off!

Now I'm just being picky!
 
Roughly present day in the North Bay area does not leave you much...! :( Not much timber goes by rail these days, and if mining involves the railway, it's in unit trains.

But your own backyard has huge potential. Have you seen Ian Wilson's Steam... books? Steam at Allendale is about the last days of steam in Barrie. If you go back a few (or more than a few now...) decades, you will get shorter cars, and a wider variety of industries served by rail.

Of course, if you are not worried about prototype, then the sky is the limit... A short line from North Bay with a tourist train (to run older equipment), a steel mill (some of which can be very compact), an undefined "manufacturer" that could take in everything from boxcars of parts to plastic pellet hoppers, OMYA limestone slurry in tankers, large machinery on flats, etc. Even though you are present day, this fiction will give you an excuse to run older locos, a mix of rolling stock, and so on. You might want to model just the interchange with CPR, and concentrate on the fictional line.

Good luck!

Andrew
 
I kinda like the "undefined manufacturer" concept.....

Either way, here is what I have to work with. The 2 tracks at the back will be hidden for staging/continuous running, the interchange and team tracks are at the bottom right, and the 3 industrial sidings in the middle. I'm now thinking about making the brewery larger than I planned and move it over to take up the 2 tracks on the left instead of just the one on the right. That would give me 'in' and 'out' tracks. It would also make me only have to settle on one other industry. I think a layout this small can probably keep busy enough with just 2 industries, a team track and an interchange.

I also like the mini-steel mill idea. Perhaps a combination of many of the ideas I've heard, such as a recycling plant?

b32947456c.jpg
 
You can still ship wood. by me there is a business called Atlantic Wood, and it gets 2-4 centerbeam and bulkhead lfats with various lumber.

The team track is an excellent idea.

I'd just pick something random.
 
Of course there are many types of industries..Here is a list of industries found on the C&HV.If you see one you like use it.

1.Pillisbury.IN:Sugar,flour,corn starch,corn sweetener OUT: Empties.

2.Valley Produce.IN: Produce OUT: Empties

3.Midland Foods Dist.IN: Food stuffs,paper products/plastic ware. OUT: Empties.

4.Carters Lumber Co.IN: Lumber,roofing,Paneling,insulation.OUT: Empties.

5.Alloy Steel Blades Corp.IN Coil steel. OUT: Empties.

6.Roberts Distribution. IN:Beer,wine whiskey Tobacco products. OUT Empties.

7.Country Boy Co-op. IN Empties/John Deere Implements OUT Grain/Empties..

8.Riverside Feeds.IN: Feed OUT Empties.

9.Standard American Knitting Corp.IN Cloth,Dyes,tread. Out Military uniforms/Empties.

10.Honey Creek Meats Processors IN: Meats OUT: Empties.

CDBI/C&HV Distribution Center.
1.Creeger Implement Co.IN: Case Farm implements. Out Empties.

2.The Yuleman Corp.IN: Steel Beams OUT Empties.

3.Southern Ohio Rural Electric. Electric poles,wire and transformers.OUT:Empties.

4.Cottons Lumber Co. IN: Lumber,Roofing Insulation Paint.OUT: Empties.

5.J.D.Gilbert Corp.IN: Rolled Paper OUT: Paper products/Empties.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Wellston.
1.General Plastic Corp. IN:Resin/empties OUT: Plastic pellets/Empties.

2.Wellston Scrap Iron. IN: Empties OUT: Scrap.

3.76 Lumber IN:Lumber,Roofing OUT:Empties.

4.Williams & Sons Co.Inc. IN: Scrap rubber empties.OUT: Rubber pellets/Empties.

Coon Creek Branch.

1.Campbells Trans-loading. IN: Empties OUT:Coal

2.Black Hawk Load out #12 IN: Empties OUT: Coal.

3.Cardinal Mines Tipple #28 IN: Empties OUT: Coal.

McArthur

1.American Steel Doors.IN: Coil Steel.OUT: Steel doors/Empties.

2.Cardington Steel Corp.IN:Coke,Scrap steel OUT: Steel Drums/Empties.

3.Landmark. IN:Empties OUT:Grain.

4.Ideal Leather Co.IN:Hides chemicals empties OUT:Process Leather empties.

This is the last town on the J line that has industries..I am still working on the Columbus to Parkersburg Industries..

The CDBI/C&HV distribution center is a modern day short line term for freight house.I got the idea from R.J.Corman that operates such facilities..The idea behind that is to give off rail customers rail service.This seems to be working quiet well for R.J.Corman on his Western Ohio Lines at ST.Mary Ohio..I will add new customers to the distribution center as they come on line..
 
My layout is ho, but i have 2 industries that do not take up alot of space.
A steel drum co, buys and sells steel drums.
siding holds to cars, a box and a gondola.
Box brings in new steel drums, load the car with rebuilt and new steel drums to be sent out the customers.
The gondola, the steel drums that are to be scraped.

Th eother industry i have is an tree bark distributer.
The siding holds 2 wood chip cars of tree bark and off loaded and trucked off outfits that want bulk tree bark.

I hope this may help you in your search for small industries for your layout.
 
Cornreaper said:
My time frame is roughly present-day, and the theme is a fictional shortline that interchanges with the CPR in the North Bay (Ontario) area. So I guess I'm looking for industries appropriate to the region other than timber or mining, cuz I just don't have enough space to pull those off!
Click to expand...

Wow, that's a coincidence. I'm planning ( but haven't started building yet) a 6.5'x10' HO layout which will be a fictional shortline that interchanges with the CPR in the Thunder Bay (Ontario) area. I have five or six sidings to account four, plus the interchange and a team track. I'll be watching this thread closely!

My era is different - late 1930's - so some things will be different and my locos and rolling stock will be generally shorter (mostly 40').

Here are some industries I've considered:
- brewery
- milk bottler
- lumberyard
- paper mill
- coal distributor
- furniture manufacturer
- crate factory
- grain elevator

Since the primary resources of northwest Ontario was lumber or ore, and I don't have room for a lumbermill or mine, I've tried to think of industries that use or are related to wood (lumber, paper, crates). CPR also brings a lot of farm products from the prairies to the Great Lakes, hence the milk bottler, grain elevator and brewery.

I can't wait to see what you come up with!
 
Here's an aerial shot of a steel mini-mill in southern California from GoogleEarth, as well as a link to their site, which has a few more pics: http://www.tamcosteel.com/compinfo.html

It's a fairly small industry (by steel industry standards), and uses an electric arc furnace to recycle scrap and make rebar. It would be easy to compress to fit your space, while staying believable. The aerial photo shows their spur, which curves around the main building 180 degrees, to the scrap unloading area. You could also say outbound cars are loaded on the same track, which would add some more work for the switching crew as they may need to move a car temporarily, then replace it after they're done.

Chris
 

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Wow, so many ideas, brakie. I guess I was thinking too hard, overlooking all the simple type industries.

Skammer, I like how all of your industries tie into each other. If I had more space, I could do the same!

Colton_modeler, I'm really intrigued by that mill...I like the idea of having just the one track to increase switching.....I have much thiniking to do now!
 
Cornreaper said:
Hi all. I've got my track down and running on my N-Scale door layout and I'm beginning to creep into scenery. I've already settled on having a brewery as my major industry, and I've put in a team track. That leaves me with 2 other sidings that I'm drawing blanks on. I'm looking for ideas for 2 industries that are fairly small, yet big enough to justify having a siding. I'd also like to be able to run a decent variety of rolling stock, but nothing much bigger than 50', I've got some tight radii. Any ideas????
Click to expand...

I don't know why I didn't think of this earlier, but a good industry to go with a brewery is a grain elevator complex like the Walthers ADM model. Here in So Cal we have two breweries, Anheiser-Busch in the San Fernando Valley and Miller in Irwindale. The largest building in the City of Commerce is the Great Western Malting plant. It is a huge elevator that supplies malting grains for the breweries.
 
I think you have a pretty good list of possibilities and seeing as its fictioinous it can be just about anything. Are you going to build any portion of a none tracked town or anything like that, it appears you have the room for it. You may even find you'll add a spur or 2 as your layout comes more to life .
 
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