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This won't be as popular as the I&O thread. Midland Sub and others, you have more overall action than the CFE. Wish we had more. Maybe in time. I believe last Thurday we had WB Ft. Wayne/ Lima local with 4024 and IORY 4034 with 48 cars. Including Cargill 2 bay hoppers. Trains are usually heavy with grain cars and tankers for Bunge in Decatur, IN and Delphos, OH. Later the same day there was EB local with same engines and guess what? 48 cars.Little better mix of cars. We get a lot of grain, tankers, coil steel, gons of scrap, bulkhead flats of steel, and box cars. Also, at time blocks of welded rail cars from SDI west of Ft. Wayne. I've only saw them empty WB going back. Earlier in the week WB had CFE 3883 and 8 or 9 grain hoppers. Most of those were AGP and BNSF reporting marks. Yesterday WB had 4024 and CFE 3886 and 13 cars. Mostly grain hoppers. A couple of Tuesday"s ago had WB with IORY4034 and HLCX unit {blue/maroon} and 100 cars. Also, that week WB and 88 cars. The train sizes can vary greatly. I here horns at night . I believe they may run 2 pair of locals at times. Plus, they come in from the east to Van Wert and work the grain elevator and Continental Structural Plastics {CSP{ and leave EB light at times. Still have occasional CSX grainers at any time. I have not been out to the Van Wert Terninal east of VW in awhile. I don't know if their still bringing in flats of turbine tower sections and other components or not. Have been in the 12-14 flats range normally. Can't get any more than that at a time. They also bring in tankers of bean oil to the Van Wert Terminal and load into the BIG tank there. They transload into semis and drive it to the destination. Also, bring covered hoppers of soda ash and transload into semis and deliver to Winchester IN from the terminal. They should be starting the next phase of the wind turbines sometime this summer. This should keep turbines parts coming. PW

I will follow your CF&E thread

And i am also all over this thread like white on rice. Also welcome to the board BNSF 8000, i see you over on the Fort Wayne board all the time and was hoping you would post here.

At present, the Van Wert drop yard is pretty full of turbine parts as I was out there on Wednesday of last week. There have not been any recent delivery's of these components lately via CSX, which is how they arrive into Lima. CF&E normally stages these trains over at Cole Street yard in Lima and then delivers them out to the drop yard as needed. I'll keep an eye open for more and post as they happen.

In addition, have noticed the W&LE is now back to making about a once every other week trip to Lima.

CG Tower

CG Tower wrote:In addition, have noticed the W&LE is now back to making about a once every other week trip to Lima.

What traffic is exchanged and how many cars per train?

A little bit of everything really...usually only 6 to 12 cars.

CG Tower

AARR wrote:

CG Tower wrote:In addition, have noticed the W&LE is now back to making about a once every other week trip to Lima.

What traffic is exchanged and how many cars per train?

I did see WLE 308 two Friday's ago in the evening. It was sitting at the I&O office in Lima. First time I've saw WLE in Lima. PW

Do any of know if CFE is running daily out of Chicago or not? Have heard they may start daily again. How often does CFE run east of Lima besides to the P&G plant? I don't really know much about that part of the CFE. My posts will be what I see or hear to be correct. Plus, my railfan buds will probably see things I don't. So, I'll use their info when I can. If the Ft. Wayne/ Lima local would go nocturnal again that may affect thread. Let's hope not. PW

They do run east to Crestline quite a bit, maybe not daily but they do make it out that way on a pretty regular basis. In addition, you'll have grain train movements from the elevator in Lima that go to Crestline for CSX interchange. These normally have CSX power as well.

CG Tower

bnsf8000 wrote:Do any of know if CFE is running daily out of Chicago or not? Have heard they may start daily again. How often does CFE run east of Lima besides to the P&G plant? I don't really know much about that part of the CFE. My posts will be what I see or hear to be correct. Plus, my railfan buds will probably see things I don't. So, I'll use their info when I can. If the Ft. Wayne/ Lima local would go nocturnal again that may affect thread. Let's hope not. PW

I believe they run to the IHB in Chicago about 5 days a week. The run to Chicago is based out of Fort Wayne and I think it's a night run there and back to stay out of the way of the one NS train that uses the CFE west of Fort Wayne.

There's a decent amount of soybeans that come up from the Midland on the I&O to Decatur. Bunge has a joint operation with Sabina Farmer's large grain operation @ Melvin. Cargill @ Lima supplies corn for the Valero ethanol plant on the Midland.

bnsf8000 wrote:Do any of know if CFE is running daily out of Chicago or not? Have heard they may start daily again. How often does CFE run east of Lima besides to the P&G plant? I don't really know much about that part of the CFE. My posts will be what I see or hear to be correct. Plus, my railfan buds will probably see things I don't. So, I'll use their info when I can. If the Ft. Wayne/ Lima local would go nocturnal again that may affect thread. Let's hope not. PW

I'm wondering if a few of those yellow DM&E hoppers that i caught on the I&0 at South Chuck last week came off the CFE at Lima

We do see DME grain hoppers and CP on the CFE from time to time. Some NOKL hoppers and coil steel cars at times. IHB coil steel cars. Did see a hodgepodge of grain hoppers on one of the CFE locals this week including some with INTX reporting marks. In the past two weeks I saw at least 10-12 long flats together on one train with rail on them heading WB through Van Wert. A few had GNWR reporting marks I believe. I don't know if this is what some of you call stick rail or not. I wondered if it could be going to SDI west of Fort Wayne or elsewhere. We have also saw a restenciled Spencerville & Elgin grain hopper through VW and also saw most likely the same one on the west side of Bucyrus at the last part of March after the Bucyrus train show. A while ago an ex-Erie Western grain hopper sat at the grain elevator in VW. PW

The rail trains would be carrying continuous rail, aka welded rail. These 1/4 mile or so lengths of rail are cast as one solid piece of steel. "Stick" rail would be the jointed rail sections that you see on parts of the CF&E that did not received welded rail back in the Conrail days.

Speaking of Van Wert, how often do they go down the industrial track to the south end of town?

CG Tower

bnsf8000 wrote:We do see DME grain hoppers and CP on the CFE from time to time. Some NOKL hoppers and coil steel cars at times. IHB coil steel cars. Did see a hodgepodge of grain hoppers on one of the CFE locals this week including some with INTX reporting marks. In the past two weeks I saw at least 10-12 long flats together on one train with rail on them heading WB through Van Wert. A few had GNWR reporting marks I believe. I don't know if this is what some of you call stick rail or not. I wondered if it could be going to SDI west of Fort Wayne or elsewhere. We have also saw a restenciled Spencerville & Elgin grain hopper through VW and also saw most likely the same one on the west side of Bucyrus at the last part of March after the Bucyrus train show. A while ago an ex-Erie Western grain hopper sat at the grain elevator in VW. PW

CG Tower wrote:A little bit of everything really...usually only 6 to 12 cars.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't most of the traffic the Wheeling used to bring into Lima on a more frequent basis go via Bellevue, to Fostoria on NS, then to Findlay and Lima on those turn jobs?

Could be...never have really heard either way. If that were the case then the W&LE would have no reason to come this way period. Let me do some digging around. I am sure a colleague of mine knows the answer.

CG Tower

Y@ wrote:

CG Tower wrote:A little bit of everything really...usually only 6 to 12 cars.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't most of the traffic the Wheeling used to bring into Lima on a more frequent basis go via Bellevue, to Fostoria on NS, then to Findlay and Lima on those turn jobs?

Windmill parts came into Willard over the last few days, dont know if they are headed to Lima or not, but there was some there. On a side note, but also about wind mills, anyone know where semi truck loads of the towers are going eastbound on US 6, through Walkerton. Have seen three or four of them being escorted by the Indiana Highway Patrol over the past few months.

Yes they were. Though it's usually BNSF cars you see- which don't seem to be more hand a hanful a month if that.

redside20 wrote:I'm wondering if a few of those yellow DM&E hoppers that i caught on the I&0 at South Chuck last week came off the CFE at Lima

Heay Z I think I put this in the wrong thread, can you move it to the other CF&E thread, below it, about the NS high rail.

Most of the windmill parts for Van Wert have been coming via CSX Chicago to Lima, around the connection at Deshler.

CG Tower

sd70accsxt700 wrote:Windmill parts came into Willard over the last few days, dont know if they are headed to Lima or not, but there was some there. On a side note, but also about wind mills, anyone know where semi truck loads of the towers are going eastbound on US 6, through Walkerton. Have seen three or four of them being escorted by the Indiana Highway Patrol over the past few months.

CG Tower, the CFE goes south on the old Cincinnati Northern in Van Wert on an as needed basis to Continental Structural Plastics. CFE has been leaving the cars for CSP a block north of the junction off of Center St. by Eisenhauer Manufacturing. There could be anywhere from 1-8 cars at times unless they take them straight out there. The rail I was talking about on the 12-14 flats was not welded rail. Each car had the rail seperately on it. That's what caught me off guard. They weren't welded rail flats. That's why I wondered where it was going. Also, the windmill parts on trucks in Indiana maybe coming to Van Wert County's windfarm projects. They said in the press they were going start trucking them in from Indiana. It may or may not be where their going. Today saw WB CFE train heavy with Bunge grainers. Missed the locos and rest of the train. PW