IIRC, the MOT in St. Louis has an even larger "whale" tank car in it's collection. It was the largest tank car every built; but something in the rules changed while it was being constructed, and it was never used in service.

I used to see these cars all the time on trains passing through the "chemical belt" at Beaumont, Texas. I guess they will disappear now; another car that is also all but extinct are the tiny, really short tank cars. We used to recieve one of these cars at a time loaded with chlorine at one of the power plants the company I worked for owned; but the railroad no longer wanted to handle these short cars, and the chlorine comes in by truck instead.

It always seemed that the shorter the tank car, the nastier the contents!! Another commodity handled in the little short ones was acid.

At RMNE, we have these tank cars: a 1911 GATC car (K-brake and arch-bar trucks), two 1923 UTLX insulated cars (last used for parrafin wax service in 1970) and a 1923-vintage GATX uninsulated car (was upgraded in WW2 w/AB brake, etc).

Howard P.
Placard, CT

That would be a very interesting piece to have in a collection somewhere.

While the "whale" cars that are all preserved all seem to be prototypes, this was an actual revenue generating car that earned its keep for 40 years. I feel like that makes it even more important than the ones currently preserved.

Good luck to whoever goes after it!

The Association of American Railroad's 40 Year Interchange Rule has in most cases been changed to 50 years, to match the Federal Railroad Administration's 50 year rule.

While some of the large tank cars were prototypes, most did run in revenue service. UTLX-83699, a 50,000 tank car, the second largest tank car ever built, now at the Galveston Museum, ran in Amoco Oil Company's service as well as other companys. I worked at UTLX in the early 1970's and was around the car when it came into the shop for repairs. I later managed the Amoco Oil Company fleet for 25 years and had pressure cars that held 43,000, 41,000 and 39,000 gallons in the fleet in the late 1970's. They left the fleet when HM-144 was instituted. If they had been retrofited, they would have been too heavy to move product economically as they would have had to be light loaded. Light loading of tank cas creates poor train handling characteristics.

As information, not all tank cars automatically can have their life extended to 50 years. The AAR's Equipment Engineering Committee has to approve any extension and this is only done witht he concurrence of the AAR Tank Car Committee, of which I am currently a member. Very few tank cars have had extensions granted, and fewer still have had the required work completed to take advantage of the extension approval.

Just recieved this posting on Railspot concerning the "whale" that was at the Galveston Railroad Museum:



I can provide Don's e-mail address off-line if anyone is interested.

That car in Galveston has been scrapped due to damage from Hurrican Ike. I'll check with them to see if they would like a replacement....

Another product that used to travel in short tank cars was Tetraethyl Lead, the long-abandoned gasoline additive. Remember the Blues Brothers' 1974 Bluesmobile?--it could burn regular (leaded) gas.

From a museum standpoint one of the nice things about tank cars as exhibits is that they shed rain and snow quite well. Only the running boards would retain them, especially if they are made of wood. The whale in St. Louis has top steel running boards of open mesh steel. Painting it is hard just due to its sheer size, but smaller ones are easier to deal with.

Ron Goldfeder
St. Louis

I was told this past weekend that the 5 cars in this group built for DuPont have been scrapped in Alabama.