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12/1/11. WB CFE train LIFW at 10:42PM with CFE 3880/CORP 4024 and 53 cars. It had 36 grain cars: CSYX, BNGX, AEX, FURX, FMLX, ATSF, 6 empty steel flats, 6 plastics hoppers for CSP eventually: ACFX and NAHX, 3 box cars and 2 gons. First train I have seen or heard in awhile. Definitely doesn't help that the house is closed up now. Train ran through at track speed with a non-working EOT.

The CFE open house was today in Fort Wayne for the new shops/office. Was anybody able to go?

Great pictures of the CFE open house over on the fwarailfan.net board There are 3 parts on the Local Railroad News. Nice amount of engines over there now.

PW

I didn't know a thing about it, I guess I missed the memo! Though I can almost see my office window in the last picture

Chris

12/4/11. EB LIFW at 6:45PM or so. The CFE train had CORP 4024/CFE 3880 and 41-42 cars. Train had several FMLX hoppers, some box cars, loaded gons and some other grain cars like BNSF and AGP. Only goes about 15mph by the Mendon Rd. crossing. Has for quite awhile now. Trains roll through Van Wert at close to track speed and then slow once they start to leave VW eastbound.

12/5/11. There a 9 soda ash hoppers at the VW Terminal on the unloading track. Still no grain cars at the Scott Equity elevator. See what the future holds on that.

PW

12/5/11. WB FWLI at 2:53PM at the Richey Rd. crossing west of Van Wert. Leading were CFE 3880/ CORP 4024 and 85 cars. Upfront were 5 box cars, 3 empty steel flats, 2 gons followed by75 or so grain cars. All the grain cars were for Bunge: AEX, BNGX, CSYX and FURX. Rolling along at close to track speed.

EB FWLI at 8:45PM at the Fisher Ave. crossing with CORP 4024/CFE3880 and 23 cars. In the consist were 11 loaded steel flats, 5 grain cars, 4 gons and 3 Canadian National box cars. Cold and snowy at the time. Brrrr.

PW

12/6/11. WB LIFW at 12:25PM. Running solo and long hood forward was CFE 3882 and 21 cars. The CFE train had 8 empty steel flats for SDI, 9 loaded gons and 4 box cars.

EB FWLI at 4:35PM at the Gilliland Rd. crossing. Still solo CFE 3882 and 31 cars. Train had 26 covered hoppers including AEX, CSYX, BNGX, FURX, BNSF, BN, MWCX, FMLX and 1 HMBX, 2 BNSF coil cars, 1 Procor plastics hopper, 1 box car and 1 tank car. Train was going around 10mph out there in the country.

PW

12/14/11. WB LIFW at 12:28PM. Running solo was IORY 4034 and 51 cars. The CFE train had 26 grain cars, 11 loaded gons, 6 box cars, 4 empty steel flats 2 tank cars and 2 plastics hoppers.

12/13/11. IORY 4032 and another IORY unit with orange stripes 4034 or 4036 were working the CFE Cole St. yard in Lima. Even had a 1 autorack they were switching. Quite a few cars in the CFE yard.

In the yard CFE yard were CSX 2678/6141/8122, GP38-2/GP40-2/SD40-2 with a train to pull to the CSX yard. Ended up being a 55-65 car transfer run. Got to see where some of the loaded steel flats go to from CFE and alot of the box cars and Bunge cars. Also, saw some of the plastics hoppers for CSP on that train.

The one track in the CFE yard had an 80 car cut: 46 grain cars: Bunge cars plus 14 NOKL cars, 17 box cars: NOKL YKR TTX, 13 gons 2 tank cars and 2 plastics hoppers. The next track over had nearly as many cars on it. And there were plenty of cars on some of other tracks.


12/14/11. EB CFE train with a CFE unit leading with a loaded welded rail train at 5PM. All cars were TOYX except for the last 2 were CWRX cars: Continuous Welded Rail reporting marks?

PW

12/15/11. WB CFE train LIFW at 12:28PM. Rolling through Van Wert with a CFE unit upfront and most likely CORP 4024 and 99 cars. The train was very heavy with Bunge grain cars 86 all told, 7 box cars and 6 coil cars. Had 70 various Bunge hoppers bringing up the rear.

EB FWLI through VW at around 4:55PM. Leading were CFE 3882/3880 and 20 cars. It had 17 grain cars all Bunge hoppers and 3 box cars.

At last check the Van Wert Terminal had around 13-16 soda ash hoppers there.

PW

12/19/11. WB LIFW through Van Wert at 11:55AM. Leading were IORY 4032/CFE 3882 and 27 cars. In the train were 15 grain cars, 5 loaded gons, 4 box cars and 3 empty steel flats. Cruising along around track speed.

EB FWLI at the Richey Rd. crossing at 5:18PM. Leading again were CFE 3882/IORY 4032 and 78 cars. Rolling along at track speed. The train had 39 grain cars: heavy on Bunge cars: BNGX, FURX, CSYX some FMLX and MWCXexAGP and an AGPX, 13 loaded steel flats, 12 loaded gons, 11 tank cars all for Bunge and 3 box cars.

PW

12/21/11. LIVW the Van Wert Turn rolled into VW at 11:19Am with 12 cars. It has 9 soda ash hoppers from the Van Wert Terminal transload and 3 plastics hoppers for Continental Structural Plastics {CSP} on VW's southside on the old Cincinnati Northern. Probably will pickup 3 or so empties while out there. All of the soda ash hoppers were FMLX and 1 TSBX or TBYX didn't catch the reporting mark.

There are now 14 soda ash hoppers at the VW Terminal and they are unloading now on the 2nd track in with the conveyor over on the southside of the track.

There is MOW work going on at the VW Terminal today. Too far back to see what's going on for sure. One of the pieces of track equipment is a brighter yellow color than the Atlas equipment . Have to see if I can find out anymore about this.

No grain cars at the Scott Equity Exchange for quite sometime. CF&E is missing out on quite a few loads if this continues.

PW

VW Terminal more than likely has another contractor other than Atlas going their track work.

Not much the CFE can do if Scott Equity isn't shipping their grain by rail. With several ethanol plants in the area I'm surprised if they would ship anything but wheat or soybeans by rail anymore. At the minimum Valero pays 20 cents a bushel more than anyone else over on the I&O.

midland sub wrote:Not much the CFE can do if Scott Equity isn't shipping their grain by rail. With several ethanol plants in the area I'm surprised if they would ship anything but wheat or soybeans by rail anymore. At the minimum Valero pays 20 cents a bushel more than anyone else over on the I&O.

Quite a few elevators in MI who provide corn to ethanol plants have gone fully or in part to truck.

However, I recently learned that HESR is running 13 or so car shuttles between MI Thumb elevators and the ethanol plant in Caro. Some of the shuttles travel less than 20 miles by rail if my mile post memory is correct.

Indeed there's a one 20 mile shuttle based on the I&O for Valero for both inbound corn and outbound ddg.

12/22/11. WB LIFW at 11:22AM through Van Wert with CFE 3880/IORY 4032 and 56 cars. Was only going 10-15 mph. Train had 32 covered hoppers: CSYX, AEX, BNGX, FURX, FMLX, AGPX, TGSX and ECUX, 14 box cars: TTX, CSXT, NS,YKR, 3 CN and 1 GTW, 3 gons: MWCX, OMWX, 4 coil cars: 3 ATSF and ! BNSG, 2 Bunge tank cars and 1 empty steel flat. Train even slowed down further to around 5 mph as it went out of town.

PW

12/29/11. LIVW into Van Wert this afternoon at 1:45PM or so. Leading is CFE 3886 and 15 cars. The Scott Equity Exchange is getting 9 grain cars of HMBX, FURX and MWCX reporting marks. Train has 6 plastics hoppers for CSP in VW of 4 ACFX [OMYA] and 2 EPTX . They took out 4 plastics hoppers to CSP and brought back 3 empties. The other 2 loaded cars are sitting north of the diamond on the old Cincinnati Northern until there is room at CSP: CSP can only use 3 or 4 cars at a time.

Heard WB LIFW go through town last night around 10:30 PM or so. The EB FWLI went throuugh this morning around 4AM or so.

There are 14 soda ash hoppers at VW Terninal as of this morning. Most likely 10 loads and 4 empties.

PW

bnsf8000 wrote:12/29/11. The Scott Equity Exchange is getting 9 grain cars of HMBX, FURX and MWCX reporting marks.

Is this the place that has not shipped by rail in a while because they were trucking to nearby ethanol plant?

AARR, yes it is the same elevator. Probably a good rate by rail for them.

PW

Regarding Crestline, I spoke with a gentleman yesterday who is helping expand the grain/soybean facility there. He said right now there are two 300,000 bushel bins, a 500,000 bushel bin, a 700,000 one, and two one million bushel bins. That's pretty substantial. I'd say as lucrative as grain is to railroads, the CF&E is pretty safe west of Crestline. Most of the elevators are shifting business to Crestline, as ADM in Shelby no longer can ship by rail and with Crestline handling soybeans now, it's pretty much a locked deal. Mansfield is the other big one, out of which NS originates a grain train for Conway.

bdconrail29 wrote:Regarding Crestline, I spoke with a gentleman yesterday who is helping expand the grain/soybean facility there. He said right now there are two 300,000 bushel bins, a 500,000 bushel bin, a 700,000 one, and two one million bushel bins. That's pretty substantial. I'd say as lucrative as grain is to railroads, the CF&E is pretty safe west of Crestline. Most of the elevators are shifting business to Crestline, as ADM in Shelby no longer can ship by rail and with Crestline handling soybeans now, it's pretty much a locked deal. Mansfield is the other big one, out of which NS originates a grain train for Conway.

My information is CSX serves the Crestline elevator? Interesting..

I haven't heard or seen a CF&E for days now-the last train went through Bucyrus around 2:30am 10-12 days ago and I not sure if that was the CF&E local,the Cargill grainer or the CSX grainer..There's very little CF&E action in this neck of the woods.

bdconrail29 wrote:Regarding Crestline, I spoke with a gentleman yesterday who is helping expand the grain/soybean facility there. He said right now there are two 300,000 bushel bins, a 500,000 bushel bin, a 700,000 one, and two one million bushel bins.

I developed a formual that seems to get me in the ballpark of how much rail business an elevator does. It is not scientific and there are always exceptions to the rule.

I take the total bushel capacity, subtract 25%, divide by 3500 (average bushels per railcar) and that gets me close quite often to the annual number of railcars and elevator ships.

So in the above example they may ship around 814 cars per year.

I would be very interested knowing if that is in the ballpark of rail business they do

Brakie wrote:

bdconrail29 wrote:Regarding Crestline, I spoke with a gentleman yesterday who is helping expand the grain/soybean facility there. He said right now there are two 300,000 bushel bins, a 500,000 bushel bin, a 700,000 one, and two one million bushel bins. That's pretty substantial. I'd say as lucrative as grain is to railroads, the CF&E is pretty safe west of Crestline. Most of the elevators are shifting business to Crestline, as ADM in Shelby no longer can ship by rail and with Crestline handling soybeans now, it's pretty much a locked deal. Mansfield is the other big one, out of which NS originates a grain train for Conway.

My information is CSX serves the Crestline elevator? Interesting..

I haven't heard or seen a CF&E for days now-the last train went through Bucyrus around 2:30am 10-12 days ago and I not sure if that was the CF&E local,the Cargill grainer or the CSX grainer..There's very little CF&E action in this neck of the woods.

I believe the grainers you see on the CF&E are in fact CF&E crews. They have CF&E symbols too.