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This is a list of car type codes issued by the General Superintendent of Transportation in conjunction with the implementation of the COMPASS computer system circa 1967-68. Both the GN and the NP purchased rights to the system from Southern Pacific, which developed it with IBM at a cost of several million dollars and called it TOPS, Total Operations Processing System. I believe that the Burlington and SP&S adopted it about the same time. By having all components of the proposed Burlington Northern adopt the same software before the merger, the training and learning curve issues associated with the new...

I had a question from a customer today about how many of a just introduced rail car the store had in stock. He was thinking that he may want more than than the one he bought to support a model industry. I explained how this supplier works, which seems to be typical. They take reservations for various cars. After many months, they decide that they either have enough reservations or not. If they decide to proceed, then they do design work, then order, then wait for the boat from China. Finally they fill the orders based on the reservations they...

We have two cement car models in the store. One is 70 ton ACF designed and built cement cars. These models by Intermountain are a very accurate rendering of a lot of 25 cars the Great Northern bought in 1946. They were painted mineral red when delivered, as is the model, which is available with six car numbers. The railway would go on to acquire 405 cars of this design. We also offer models of the 100 ton ACF center flow cars the Great Northern bought for cement service in 1966 and 1967. The railway acquired 200 of these cars...

Ken asked a question about finding Reference Sheets. Given that he had trouble, odds are others have the same question, so I will answer in public. Since the ones Ken asked about are low numbers, the easy way to see all three is to go to the catalog and choose Reference Sheets. Then sort low to high and you will see them in numerical order; 1, 2, 3, etc. The other way is to go to the catalog and search by number in the search box in top right corner of the page. Here you need to know the format...

Last week I had three comments that lead me to think that some of you may not know how the store works, or may be intimidated by it. Fear not, you can not break the store. Feel free to poke around in it! The best way to find an item is to go to the catalog tab, and then select the collection that the item is in. Art is in 'Art and Specialties' and depots are in 'HO Structures' for example. The collections are intended to be simple and logical, so wrong guesses should be rare and they are not fatal....