Watching some bad order coal cars being “set out” before the loaded train leaves town.
Can someone take me through the process - not the actual setting out - the time a bad order is found (how it is found) to how it is isolated in a 125 car train in the middle of a rather large yard, to how long it may sit before it is repaired and how it eventually gets to its destination.
You can also throw in why the entire train has to sit for so long before it moves between each manuever of setting the cars out. (it sometimes takes an hour or more of an automobile sitting at a blocked crossing before the whole procedure is completed and the train can leave town.) Beside the fact that several cars take awhile to set out, but what if there is only one on the entire train. This process never seems to go very fast.
And how many departments does this involve in the whole process?
Let me make sure I’ve got this right, Mookie – there are people who are willing to sit in their cars for up to an hour because a non-moving or nonassembled train is blocking a public road? The price of non-participation is non-representation: complain.
Even if a detour were available, I would sure raise hell–cars can back up waiting at the crossing. What do emergency vehicles do? There should be a toll-free number to reach the RR co. on the back of each crossbuck. Surely most people with cell phones have them with them in the car? A toll-free no. usually is listed by company name in the White Pages of the phone book, too. Either the people giving directions in the RR yard don’t care or don’t know how much the level of inconvenience is. (I hope it’s “don’t know.”)
To explain this would probably take pages, but briefly - it is at our watch site, so we gladly watch people coming racing up to the crossing and slam on their brakes. They can see this parked train for 3 blocks and yet it never seems to dawn on them that they can’t get through that train.
There are other routes around the blockage and most people will back up and go a different route. Emergency vehicles are placed so that if they see a train, they call dispatch and have one from the other side of the train dispatched. We have a great emergency department in our city and they are very good at dodging these “stoppages”.
Police are informed and they duly go out and see what the problem is, but by the time they track down the headend and call dispatch and try to figure out who to ticket, the train has gone on. And…there is no city law that the trains can only block a crossing for 10 min. I just read that in the paper not too long ago.
Plus this is in a section of town that is used to years and years of this problem and they just treat it like business as usual.
What is going to be funny is when the viaduct into the heart of the city and over the railroad tracks (in and out of yard) is completely torn down for at least a year in '08 and the western part of the city has to detour over this very area - and (remember - we have 6 tracks in this area) and two to three of these sets of tracks are blocked with trains for one reason or t’other. The outrage will be heard clear back to Chicago!
I, personally, don’t care how long they block the crossing - it just kind of screws up some good train watching. And, I am sure that the yardmaster has to have all that time just to get those bad orders set out. It is just that the front or middle of the train “happens” to be blocking this crossing while all this goes on. Sat it was the 32nd car that b
The following applies to a train at the initial terminal:
Usually it is the car department forces that spot the b/o cars. Otherwise, it is usually the train crew that notices something amiss during the brake inspection/roll-by.
The duration of the move would be determined by:
1)clear track ahead,
2)number of switches the engineer must throw,
3)conflicting movements,
4)authorization from the various departments to move the train,
5)location to put b/o car(s),
6)ambition level of the crew,
7)is the crew on overtime?
8)how many cars the engineer must hang on to during setout: the more cars, the more careful he must be to not cause further ‘complications’. If the car to be set out is 100 deep in a train, careful slack control, as well as gentleness in shoving or pulling through yard switches, are good ideas.
Enroute problems are discovered by either an observation by a crew member, or a trackside detector; occassionally the dispatcher will call the train to relay a report provided by the public.
Mookie: In our town, the folks like me who work downtown refer to it as a train rodeo. When the rodeo comes to town, you know to take a different route.
Assuming you’re correct in stating that bad-order cars are being set out (and I have no reason to doubt that), most of them will have been found by Car Department forces after your train arrived from the west. They’re looking for everything from bent, unusable safety appliances through flat spots on the wheels to brake cylinders with the incorrect length of piston travel, any of which may cause the car involved to be set out. The most common defect is worn brake shoes, which can usually be replaced on the spot with relatively little effort.
Keep in mind that many defects found by en route detectors (dragging equipment, overheated bearings) have to be dealt with more quickly than dragging them to the next yard, and those cars have likely already been set out somewhere along the line. Some of the newer detectors, such as those for wheel roundness and vibration, may not give a report to the crew, but will relay it to the yard ahead–the inspectors may not discover these cars, but they may have to be set out.
At North Platte, UP has recently put into use a system that can change out defective wheelsets underneath loaded or empty coal trains without breaking the consist. From what I can figure, your yard in Lincoln is the BNSF equivalent of North Platte, when it comes to movement of coal out of PRB. I wouldn’t be surprised if they were looking into similar tractors and jacks.
OK–so all of the bad-order cars in the train have been detected. If there’s no yard crew available to switch them out, it will be the responsibility of the new road crew to do it before they get out of town. Any way that works is fine–but keep in mind that the train has the air pumped up, and any separation made will require the loss of the air in the portion not constantly connected to the power. So when you go to tie your train back together, you have to cut the air back in before you can move the train in one direction or the other.&n
Car department inspection at originating terminal.
Line of road defect detectors - dragging equipement, hotbox, wheel impact, etc.
Visual roll-by inspection. Everyone - T&E, Signals, MoW, Supervisors - is suppose to conduct a visual inspection of a passing train.
Walking inspection after an UDE - Undesired Emergency Application.
Length of time required to set the BOs out depends on:
How many there are.
Where they are.
Where you have to put them after cutting them out.
If the conductor has help.
Train handling practices - setting and releasing hand brakes, charging the air brake system, etc.
The attention of Dispatcher - if signals are needed.
How motivated the crew is.
How long it takes to get them repaired varies:
Loads get repaired faster then empties (usually).
How far the car has to be moved - if it’s movable at all. If a car can’t be moved and the Flying Squad has to go to the car, the car will probably take longer to get repaired then if it could be taken to the shop. Also, if a crew has to make a special move to retrive the car, it may sit longer.
How backed up the shop is. Cars are usually repaired first in - first out. Except for hot loads, which get priority.
A big factor on time will be recharging the standing portion of the train, as has been mentioned. When the train is broken, the air is dumped on the standing portion (ie, it goes into emergency).
From Conrail EC-99 Air Brake Rules:
Charging time to 90 PSI
Single Car - 7 minutes 50 Cars - 8-11 minutes 100 Cars - 18-25 minutes 150 Cars - 35-50 minutes
Times based on 50 foot uncharged cars. Shorter times shown are for minimum brake pipe leakage, longer times are for maximum allowable brake pipe leakage.
some B.O. cars will sit in a siding for awhile.I have also seen csx hire a crew to scrap cars on the spot.makes more headaches for our local trainmaster.
The charging times tree68 quotes are for a “Dry” or completely uncharged train. Once you have enough air to start throwing bad orders out, the release time from each emergency application (standing portion) will be considerably less, except for really cold weather, a lot of brake pipe leak age or an unmotivated crew.
Other factors are: will the yardmaster in charge let you make the next move, will the control operator answer the radio if you need a signal, is the blue flag off the only track in the yard upon which the yardmaster will let you set the B.O.‘s to, do you have to wait 30" for the next Metra train to get by? Then my favorite delay: the B.O. car won’t clear your end of the track (remember, it is the only track in the whole yard for these cars), but no one is available to watch the shove on the other end of the 7000’ track. How long will it take the condr to walk back there to watch it?
Wow - a lot of information to digest! Will need some time to go through all this carefully.
2 points: No Jessie, I don’t need a bad order sign. My office and my home are both just large walk-in closets as people who have visited can attest. I am trying to minimize at this point in my life. Thanx anyway.
Picked up the paper this morning and read that they will be making about 4 crossings on north end of town “quiet zones” - but what I found interesting buried in the article is that the railroad wants to close the very crossing we are discussing. I am not sure that there is a conclusion to draw from this, but…
It would really isolate a small housing section that is in that area - only one way in and out if they did. I think a bridge would be a better solution.
They didn’t ask me.
Thanx for all the information. I have some extra time, so will ponder all of it very carefully!
Not anymore, unless the locomotives are old (pre-SD40-2).
The air compressors in the new locomotives can move huge volumes of air compared to the old units. Even a second unit does not really help pump the air quicker than a single unit, as there is only so much air that can move through the finite space of an air line. Even the “owner’s manual” on the new locomotives tell you that it does not increase airflow if you rev the engine; the compressors are already working at full quadrant at idle.
Back in the days of the GP’s, when charging a trainline, we would rev all the units to about the 4th notch to try to keep up the air pressure; nowadays you just sit there in idle, which seems strange to us old timers.
Z - That’s addressed in EC99 - EMDs use(d) a crankshaft driven air compressor - notch up the engine and it pumps air faster. GEs and some newer EMDs use an electrically driven air compressor (Mookie’s “whoop”), so engine speed doesn’t make any difference.
Right; but there is still the issue of maximum airflow capacity through a fixed system.
The easiest way to tell is by watching the main reservoir pressure. If the MR pressure is higher the BP pressure, then the compressor is feeding the air line all the air it can.