Train Portraits: The Intermodal

Intermodal traffic is pretty big in Australia, and has a long history. While rail freight is dominated by bulk goods such as ore, coal and grain, container traffic is a not insignificant part of Australia's rail transport. Rail corridors between major cities are frequented by container trains, adding up to hundreds of thousands of tons each month.

I'd had the idea of building a small container train for some time. As with any other freight train in Australia, container trains are long, and prototypical lengths are just not feasible for me, neither in terms of space nor budget. So instead of 2-4 locos and dozens of carriages, this train will have to make do with one loco and six carriages.

Motive Power

The locomotive for this train is none other than my NR52 "Kungara Mankurpa' in indigenous livery. I have introduced this locomotive at length in a dedicated post. Despite the described flaws, this model has become one of my absolute favourites. The driving characteristics are rock solid, and it's a feast for the eyes to watch the loco go around the track.

NR locos are very versatile in real life. They pull world-famous experience trains like The Ghan and Indian Pacific, and perform freight duties across the entire spectrum. With nearly 120 of the prototype in service, they can be seen in almost every state and territory in Australia. So in more ways than one, the NR is the perfect loco for a container train.

Rolling Stock and Loads

The rolling stock for this train consists of two sets of 63 foot container wagons, coded RQTY. Historically, these wagons go back to the FQX design which was jointly created by Victorian Railways and South Australian Railways in the late 1960s. Later, the South Australian FQX stock went to National Rail, where it was rebuilt with the objective to reduce weight, and recoded RQTY. Part of the RQTY stock was used by the SeaTrain division running trains between New South Wales and Queensland.

These models also come from SDS models, and they've done a great job on them. Thanks to a die-cast spine they have sufficient weight to provide wobble-free driving characteristics even on non-perfect track.

When National Rail was privatised and renamed Pacific National in the early 2000s, the RQTY stock as well as the NR fleet became part of Pacific National as well. Half of my RQTY models are in National Rail SeaTrain colours (blue and orange), while the others are Pacific National grey and yellow.

RQTY wagons can carry three 20ft containers, or one 40ft and 20ft container each. When looking at real life container trains, they are not always fully loaded. At times, there's only one or two containers on a wagon. I contemplated doing that with my train as well, but decided that with only six wagons, I might as well get a full load. Also, real trains are not always made up of the same type of container wagon. Again, for the sake of simplicity I did not go down that particular rabbit hole. But the option is there, should the mood strike me.

With the rolling stock sorted, it was time to think about the loads. Some time ago, On Track Models started producing models of curtain-sided containers, a container type which, according to their website, has been in use since the late 1980s and is still in use today. These 40ft containers carry all kinds of different liveries, from corporate paint jobs to advertising motifs. The latter struck my fancy, with advertising for Australian staples like Vegemite. The gaps are filled by a bunch of 20ft container models in a few variations. 

To avoid having to glue containers to the wagons, the wagons have a nifty feature. There are small holes on the deck, in which tiny pins can be inserted. The containers have corresponding holes and sit on top of those pins, which hold them in place. This also makes it possible to change the loads as desired, if one has more containers than space on the train.

Plausibility

This train fits into the fairly narrow time window between the dissolution of National Rail into Pacific National in 2002, and the repaint of NR 52 circa 2007. It is absolutely not uncommon for Australian railway companies to continue running locomotives and rolling stock in liveries and signage of their predecessors. Aurizon still run locomotives in Queensland Rail livery from over 30 years ago. They're not usually in a hurry to repaint all their rolling stock. 

So it's very plausible that a container train may at some time have partially consisted of RQTY wagons in different liveries, hauled by an NR locomotive still carrying National Rail signage. While I am not sure whether the curtain side container motifs fit into that time window, I was at least able to ascertain that, according to photographic evidence available on the net, the lone Maersk container is not completely out of place.