IORY South End thread

[midland sub]

K438-07 has been picked up by CSX. It was sitting at Mt Sterling waiting to head north to Columbus. I believe track work around Grove City was holding it up. 3 CSX locos for power. This is either the second or third ethanol train out of Valero.

[midland sub]

Don,

Like Redside said Melvin is located on the Midland between Wash CH and Wilmington. It's a rather large operation to say the least. The quarry is located on both sides of the Midland main. A tunnel underneath the tracks links the 2 sides. They own almost all of the land in the area along with 2 other large quarries within 10 miles of Melvin. There's also a large grain elevator at Melvin: Sabina-Bungee and Premier Feed that ship unit grain trains. JRJ owns the Melvin quarry.

You might as well write off the chances of ever seeing anything come out of the Blue Rock quarry north of Greenfield. Depending on who you talk to, either the quarry is mined out or it's been sold. Even if they did want to us rail again, you're looking at a couple million dollars or more to get the tracks open to the quarry. There's not more than 5 or 6 car lengths of head room left on the DT&I at the Thrifton interchange track so it would be a rather complicated move.

[redside20]

midland sub if you could help me out a bit, what is the name of the grain elevator in Sabina proper? I've been out that way past WCH only once and saw the elevator and quarry at Melvin. How many sidings are there at Melvin?

[AARR]

midland sub if you could help me out a bit, what is the name of the grain elevator in Sabina proper? I've been out that way past WCH only once and saw the elevator and quarry at Melvin. How many sidings are there at Melvin?

IIRC it's Sabina Farmers Elevator(?) but they recently merged with Bunge(?) and it's now Bunge-Sabina somethingorother.

[redside20]

midland sub if you could help me out a bit, what is the name of the grain elevator in Sabina proper? I've been out that way past WCH only once and saw the elevator and quarry at Melvin. How many sidings are there at Melvin?

IIRC it's Sabina Farmers Elevator(?) but they recently merged with Bunge(?) and it's now Bunge-Sabina somethingorother.

oops I just looked on bing maps Jasper Mills is between Sabina and WCH, Melvin is west of it..I'm getting a little carried away here. LOL So both elevators at Sabina and Melvin are named Sabina Bunge? is this correct? I know all about Bungee, The Central Soya Elevator at Bellevue was bought out by Bunge like 10 years ago

[midland sub]

It's sort of complicated to explain the Sabina and Melvin grain operations. Sabina Farmers Exchange and Bunge created a joint venture back in 2003. At the time Bunge owned the old Landmark (now Keynes Bros) grain elevator in Jeffersonville on the DT&I. The new Sabina-Bunge venture would use use the 4 (at that time Sabina-Melvin-Bowersville-Winchester) Sabina Farmers Ex. (SFE for short) locations along with Jeffersonville to expand the grain markets for local farmers. SFE ended up buying Jeffersonville and then selling it and the Winchester (NS Peavine line) operation in early 2006. Sabina-Bunge is basically Bunge North America marketing the grain and SFE the storage, purchasing and shipping and handling of the grain- the unit trains of corn and soybeans.

Sabina Farmer Ex. still ships grain by rail in one to 15 car cuts out of Sabina and Melvin. Corn and wheat tend to go to Cincy and the Ohio River in 10 to 15 car shipments- mostly from the Sabina location. Melvin seems to do more soybean loads in smaller one to 5 cars at a time. Sabina are billed as SFE and Melvin as Premier. Premier is a separate operation of SFE located at Melvin. Premier offers multi agronomy services: seed, fert, GPS planning etc. They get some potash and a lot of liquid fert and anhydrous loads. Back when DHL had their US hub in Wilmington, Premier would unload tank cars of de-icer for them.

[redside20]

as always midland sub appreciate your input and info

Midland Sub..after looking at Bing maps, what is the place just northwest of the elevator at Wilmington that gets the plastic pellet hoppers.

[redside20]

21:51 hearing horns blowing outside the apartment for the Clime Road grade crossing. could it be the second ethanol train?

[midland sub]

Redside you were looking at Timber Tech in Wilmington. They make different styles of laminated patio, decking and fence products. They get inbound loaded plastic pellet hoppers and centerbeams of lumber. You can always tell a Timber Tech load of lumber by the black tarp that covers it. Some of the finished product leaves by rail. Either the centerbeams that brought the lumber in will be used or empties from Lowe's will be spotted. It's easy to spot these loads as the centerbeams are only loaded half way and the product is in white and red paper. Pellet cars waiting to go to Timber Tech are stored at the Sabina storage track.

[midland sub]

Must be it. CSX 7341-33 and 2 other CSX GE wide cabs for power. 80 loads with a cov. hopper for the buffer.

Did they just replace the Clime Rd crossing equipment? The RA signal contractor was in Wash CH tonight with a trailer that had an old elect. cabinet that said Clime Rd.

21:51 hearing horns blowing outside the apartment for the Clime Road grade crossing. could it be the second ethanol train?

[midland sub]

CWR heads up for Lima. An Atlas crew was busy digging up the last of a mile or so of CWR that CSX had left and never installed in Wash CH. The rail came from an unknown former C&O line back in early 2001. CSX planned on laying the rail on some of the New Transfer, Potter and Wash CH One storage tracks. They did the New Transfer but never got around to putting the rest in. The IORY has already taken most of the rail to Cincy and used on the McCullough track work last year. This will go to Lima in the next couple of days. 6 or so TTX storage TOFC cars are being used to transport the rail.

[That Guy]

Where are they using the CWR at in Lima?

Heard an interesting bit at work tonight from the CMO. He stated that the CFE GM wants all the GP38's back on the property. Apparently we are getting one of the 38's back now to replace the 1400. This CFE GP38 has been at the Wheeling and Lake Erie for the last 2 weeks getting repairs done and believe it or not, it got WASHED!!

There is something going on behind the scenes with the CFE, IORY, and Norwood. Apparently the CFE is fed up with Norwood and is looking to have the WLE start doing repairs until the the shop gets built in Ft. Wayne. Again getting this last part all 3rd hand.

[redside20]

Must be it. CSX 7341-33 and 2 other CSX GE wide cabs for power. 80 loads with a cov. hopper for the buffer.

Did they just replace the Clime Rd crossing equipment? The RA signal contractor was in Wash CH tonight with a trailer that had an old elect. cabinet that said Clime Rd.

21:51 hearing horns blowing outside the apartment for the Clime Road grade crossing. could it be the second ethanol train?

Midland Sub that was indeed the old electrical cabinet for Clime Road and they replaced the crossbucks too. But boy..they sure took there sweet old time getting all that equipment replaced

[midland sub]

No one seems to know or is saying where it's going in Lima. Probably for yard or interchange trackage. It's not that heavy of rail. Maybe CG Tower can find out for us. I guess we'll also wait and see where the rail comes for the Fayne project down here.

The Norwood backlog problem is RA's fault. You can't under maintain a loco fleet for 3 operations and then suddenly do an about face on the subject. There's too much to do and not enough space or people to do it quickly. The old rumor that all of the CFE GP38s were going back probably won't happen with the way RA sets up the power assignments. The CIND wants all 3 of red-white-blue GP50s, but still can't get them. Maybe some of the CORP junk will head east after the CEFX GP20Ds arrive.

[AARR]

I enjoy all the updates. thanks guys.

[That Guy]

Well it's offical, CFE has signed a contract with the WLE for all repairs and 92-day inspections. They told us today. The 3883 just came back this past weekend from the WLE. The 4032 and 4034 are currently in Brewster getting new traction motors, combo's, and wheels turned.

Our CMO told us today that they went over the list of repairs that the WLE preformed and compared it againist repairs from Norwood and found we were being billed for repairs that were never FULLY preformed. Apparently the WLE told our CMO that they couldn't believe some of the wiring stuff they found.

The FEC 506 is back on property and will working in FTW.

[AARR]

Our CMO told us today that they went over the list of repairs that the WLE preformed and compared it againist repairs from Norwood and found we were being billed for repairs that were never FULLY preformed. Apparently the WLE told our CMO that they couldn't believe some of the wiring stuff they found.

Is Norwood shops a RA entity or are they separate?

[midland sub]

The IORY built the shop at McCullough in Norwood sometime in the 1990s or earlier. I believe they did a good deal of the heavy work and painting at the Logan shop before Norwood came along. I think most of the GP7/9s and all of the GP30s (except 86-87) and GP35s were painted in Logan.

[AARR]

The IORY built the shop at McCullough in Norwood sometime in the 1990s or earlier. I believe they did a good deal of the heavy work and painting at the Logan shop before Norwood came along. I think most of the GP7/9s and all of the GP30s (except 86-87) and GP35s were painted in Logan.

I'd think someone at RA would be unhappy if one of their franchises sent their locomotives to a competitor for work because they get poor quality from their own

[midland sub]

It's not the first time they've sent stuff to the WE. At least 2 of the NYSW SD70Ms were shipped over for work.