Packing House Operations on Model Railroads

with an emphasis on the ATSF

7-27-05

Car Needs Ratios

A typical national brand meat packer would process 2000 head a day. How many cars are needed to handle that operation?
· Stock cars: 40-50
· Hanging meat reefer: 16-20
· Other meat reefer: 0.6
· Blood tank (if unprocessed): 1.4
· Blood box (if processed): 0.2
· Paunch gondola (if by rail): 0.4
· Hide box: 1.4
· Tallow tank: 2.4
· Tankage box: 0.75
· Salt box: 0.4 (for hides)

Additional freight car services might include:
· Gondolas: bedding for the stockyard
· Box: feed for the stockyard
· Box: cardboard boxes for other meat products
· Box: cleaning supplies, consumables
· Box: Salt for ice plant if on premises
· Loads of coal or oil for power plant and boiler house.

Because loaded stock cars and loaded meat reefers are high priority perishable loads, packinghouses received multiple switch jobs a day.

Much of this material was provided by Don Lake of Darling, International. Darling has been rendering animal by products for 100 years. Click here for more info on Darling Cars.

Donboy on the Ops-Ind web group used to work in a packing plant. He reported:

"Coming in you have:

Salt (lots of salt if you are processing pork) – 2 cars a month
Boxes – 4 cars a month
Cans – 4 cars a month
Barrels - 1 car a month
Livestock – 30 to 40 cars a day balance came in on trucks
Feed for the livestock – 2 cars a month
Bedding for the livestock – 4 cars a month
Plant equipment – 1 car a month
Saw dust for smoking meat – 1 car a month
Fuel for plant boilers – 3 cars a month
Chemicals for cleaning – 1 car a month
Chemicals for brine mixing – 3 cars a month
Fresh or frozen meat bought on open market for curing (normally frozen hams for Easter and Christmas the +25 cars below had to come from somewhere)."

"Outbound you have:

Hanging beef – 10 cars a day
Fresh, curred, frozen and canned pork – 40 cars a day
Seasonal rush on bacon for camping seasonal + 2 cars a day in May,
June and July
Big seasonal rush on ham for Easter and Christmas + 25 cars a day the week three weeks before holiday (big event you noticed it!)
Dried blood – 2 cars a month
Pet Food – 1 car a day
Hides – 2 cars a week"

"A lot of activity moving cars in the plant tracks Most inbound and
all outbound cars had to be weighed. Empty cars had to be iced before
loading. Loaded cars needed to be pulled and empty cars spotted so
loading could continue (loading spots for 15 cars loaded a day 50
cars). Livestock needed to be unloaded as soon as possible so they
could be fed and watered. Outbound cars would need to be blocked for
their outbound trains."

"A full time plant switcher plus the local railroad crew switching the
plant at least 3 times day. Just guessing I expect that in HO scale
the plant footprint would be about 10 foot by 10 foot if done in full
scale."

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