I was on George Elwoods website here recently and there were a couple of photos of Minneapolis & St. Louis wooden boxcars that had been converted to work train equipment. The photos were taken back in 1968 and the cars rode on Fox trucks! My first thought was, "Wow, too bad these cars with these trucks couldn't have been saved!" Then I thought, hey, maybe some Fox trucks DID get saved!

So the question to RyPN readers is, how many Fox trucks did get saved and under what kind of equipment?

Thanks!

midlandblb@cs.com

One of these boxcars (still with its Fox trucks) has been restored and is displayed at the Mid Continent Railway Museum.

Jeff Terry



jterry618@msn.com

Railroad Museum of New England has an ancient 32-foot truss-rod flatcar perched on a pair of Fox trucks. We think it is originally a NYNH&H car. It's been on display at Essex, CT for many years.

> I was on George Elwoods website here
> recently and there were a couple of photos
> of Minneapolis & St. Louis wooden
> boxcars that had been converted to work
> train equipment. The photos were taken back
> in 1968 and the cars rode on Fox trucks! My
> first thought was, "Wow, too bad these
> cars with these trucks couldn't have been
> saved!" Then I thought, hey, maybe some
> Fox trucks DID get saved!

The South Carolina RR Museum has a Pressed Steel Co. flatcar with Fox trucks...and climax 3/4 size couplers. This car is the only surviving piece of equipment from the Guinyard Brick Co. RR. in West Columbia, S.C. We think it may have begun as a gondola, and our curator is currently reserching this car.

Mike Gellner, Member SCRM

The South Carolina RR Museum, Inc.
msgscrm@aol.com

In addition to the cars mentioned above, the Rarus RR, Anaconda, Mont., owns 5 Pressed Steel Car Co. 30T boxcars from 1906.

The organization at Snoqualmie, Wash., had two 40', 40T flatcars from 1900-1905, donated by a paper mill, formerly from Winston Bros. Construction Co. (1920's) at the Seattle electric utility's dam project on the Skagit River. Descriptions of several western roads 1900± flatcars have failed to identify their original purchaser.

"Had" because this peculiar group scrapped the car in better shape last year. The Cal. State RR Museum purchased the trucks. Neither organization made any noticeable effort to find a home for the car.

First generation pressed steel (or Pressed Steel) cars are saved from great rarity only by the 10-12 ex-GN ore cars sold on the west coast as ballast cars near 1920. They have the pressed steel fish-belly side sills of the flatcars and box cars. CSRM's operation at Jamestown has most of them, ex-Sierra. None of these cars and a few other early Pressed Steel flatcars have Fox trucks.

I have been looking for Fox-truck survivors for a number of years, and missed the one in Conn. Does anyone have the contact information for the RR Museum of New England?

The best history of the dawn of steel railroad cars is Jack White's (1986) More than an idea whoÂ’s time has come: the beginnings of steel freight cars. History of Technology. Eleventh Annual Vol.: 181-207.

Pressed Steel Car Co. held the patent for, and made all of, the Fox trucks during their brief period of popularity (1897-1910±). White's (1993) American railroad freight car. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Univ. Press has several drawings of the Fox truck and a few of its copies.

> I have been looking for Fox-truck survivors
> for a number of years, and missed the one in
> Conn. Does anyone have the contact
> information for the RR Museum of New
> England?

Mr. Boykin:

Send me an e-mail, and I will attempt to answer any questions about the car you may have.

Howard Pincus
RMNE

hpincus@mindspring.com

> There is (or was) at least one freight car with Fox trucks in the Steamtown collection, a wooden Boston & Maine box car which we used for parts storage. The car made it from Bellows Falls to Scranton on its own wheels. It had a cracked journal box which had to be filled prior to each leg of the trip. Somehow it ended up with the stuff at Tobyhana Army Depot.
If my memory isn't playing tricks on me, the Rutland Pile Driver Outfit had at least one Fox truck in it. This three piece set also made it down on it's own wheels.
J. David


jdconrad@snet.net

If I am correcct, 4-6-2 113 at the Gold Coast railroad Museum tender rides on Fox trucks. She is also the only FEC 4-6-2 with her orginial short tender.

JEFF@COMPUCOMIS.NET

> So the question to RyPN readers is, how many
> Fox trucks did get saved and under what kind
> of equipment?

> Thanks!

The Victorian Railways of Australia used fox trucks almost exclusively on their 30 inch gauge lines. Some 250 vehicles were so fitted between 1898 and about 1915 and about 50 are still in use by the Puffing Billy Railway every day. They have survived remarkably well with even a few now fitted with roller bearings.

> If I am correcct, 4-6-2 113 at the Gold
> Coast railroad Museum tender rides on Fox
> trucks. She is also the only FEC 4-6-2 with
> her orginial short tender.

Must compare but I believe GN 107 still has the short tender - although given shortline tendencies, the tender might not be the original. There are supposedly archival photos of 107's tender on fox trucks on GN but now the trucks have been exchanged for nothing special.

Do you have drawings of 113 tender?

Dave

irondave@bellsouth.net

Astonishing! Are these genuine Fox patent trucks? There were several copies. I don't discount the possibility since Fox was an Englishman.

There must be a web site for the Puffing Billy RR, but I can't lay my electrons on it. Can you help, EL- ? Thanks, John Boykin

johncb@u.washington.edu

> There must be a web site for the Puffing
> Billy RR, but I can't lay my electrons on
> it.

Follow the below link.

Regards,
Jim Robinson


Puffing Billy website

From their "fan page". Follow the below link for a rolling stock photo showing one of their Fox (??) trucks with what looks like roller bearings no less.

Regards,
Jim Robinson


Puffing Billy truck photo

Take a look at this

This is one of the plain-bearing type fox bogies, the axleboxes are square, whereas the photo Jim refers to clearly shows the round shape of the roller bearing type.

If ever there was a simple bogie design, the fox bogie was it!

> From their "fan page". Follow the
> below link for a rolling stock photo showing
> one of their Fox (??) trucks with what looks
> like roller bearings no less.

> Regards,
> Jim Robinson

Hmmm, rattling the brain a little...

I believe the box car with fox trucks never went to Tobyhanna and was perched atop the bridge over South Washington Ave for years. Only one wooden car has been demolished (a delapidated combine), two boxcars went to strasburg (I believe with bettendorf trucks). I'll have to walk out and take a look.

As for the pile driver, I believe it rode on archbar trucks, but I'll have to get home and take a look at some pictures.

P.S the long gone "Casey Jones" ICRR 382 engine had fox trucks on the tender.

bing@epix.net