Why do freight trains have certain cars that don't carry any cargo?

Question

They are flatbed cars with vertical beams down the middle. Sometimes they are vertical panels with big ovals cutout of them. If you look at one of these cars from the end it would look like an upside down "T". They never carry any load.

Sometimes I think they are just there to make the train longer, making me wait more!

Answer 1

That specific car is called a 'center-beam' flatcar. The structure down the middle acts like a truss so the car can carry a heavier load on its deck, and down to the trucks, wheels and rails. The oval holes in the center beam have been cut to save weight on the empty flatcar and increase the laden capacity.

Center-beam flats are used to carry milled lumber, such as 2x4s, 2x6s, 2x12s, etc. The bundles of "2-by" lumber are banded at the lumber mill and loaded on each side of the flatcar by forklift.

If I am correct, the deck is also slightly sloped down toward center of the car so the bundled lumber rests against the center beam.

The empty center beam flats that you see have been unloaded at their destination, and are being back hauled to a lumber mill for reloads.

Answer 2

It is possible to have a "mixed consist" as Howard pointed out. But anymore, these are privately owned passenger cars where the owner has paid the railroad to have the car moved, and is always on the tail end. (Not sure if it can be next to the engine. Never had to do it.) But there's never a public rail car with fare-paying passengers aboard attached to a freight train. That was a practice (mixed consist) many years ago when trains were shorter and lighter however. The petrol cars you spoke of are classified as hazardous materials. Any car that contains hazardous materials must be placed away from the engines, or the caboose if there was one. There has to be a specific number of "buffer cars" (non hazardous) between the hazardous cars and any equipment where employees are riding. As far as non-employees riding as they might on an ocean-going freighter, that isn't done in railroading - in the US at least. It could easily become a big legal liability, and besides, there isn't the room nor provisions for a passenger.

Answer 3

They do carry things, but sometimes they need to move empty train cars back to where they started. Generally those type of cars will carry something round and long, like telephone poles or big sewage pipes, etc. These things typically don't make a 2 way journey. For example, imagine that telephone poles come from a Missoula Montana, a logging town, and are sent by train to Denver, a growing city in need of telephone poles. Missoula doesn't need anything round and long from Denver, but the cars have to get sent back anyway to get more telephone poles and bring them to Denver again, so they get sent back empty.

Answer 4

This is the bug-a-boo for the railroads.

Unlike in trucking, where there is "back haul" traffic so the truckers can carry paying loads in both directions.

By way of example, in my neck of the woods, lumber and timber products are the primary traffic. Consequently, the trains heading north are carrying predominantly empty cars for timber products producers to load. They generate no revenue.

So, you may be seeing lots of the empty center beam flats. The thing is, often when loaded, you can't see the center beam from your vantage point, so you may be seeing them loaded, only unaware of it.

Tom-SJ above is quite correct. The decks "taper' toward the center beam, so that the center of gravity lies closer to the center line of the car. Moving one of these cars half loaded is not recommended, account they tip quite easily.

Answer 5

BNSF had some cars built by Johnstown America here in Johnstown, PA

They are lower and longer than a regular centerbeam car that carries lumber. And to be honest, everytime I have seen one, they have been empty.

They are somekind of FLEXCAR.

The Rat

Answer 6

I do know what you are talking about, they do carry stuff. But I only seen stuff on that one time! ha and me, I work in a rail yard! I'v been told that, loads on there are very heavy, and never go very far, like they may get dropped off not to far away from where they got picked up, the thing in the middle makes ir stronger, and it really is ment for wood, milled stuff.
Or jsut logs in general, but the other day I saw sheets of glass come in, on one of those, they were stnading up..
But mainly for long things, like wood or long metal.

Answer 7

cars are owned by certain railroads and private companies after there cargo is delivered they have to go back to there owners yard as soon as possible meaning they are attached to the first train going in the return direction

Answer 8

they do carry lumber when loaded now why would it be in a train if it wasnt making freight hauls at some point