Today I ran accross a group of heavy-duty, 8 axle flatcars sitting in a siding. All were like QTTX 131286. Loading info showed a load limit of 468,900 (!). Through the wonder of the internet, I can find photos of that particular car sitting in various rail yards. The photos always seem to show it sitting empty. What would heavy-duty flatcars be hauling out in corn & soybean country? Would they be greatly restricted. as to where they could operate, based on the loaded weight?
Hard to tell what it would be hauling. It was intended for large, heavy loads of stuff like steel plate. An ordinary steel-deck flat car, no tiedowns for heavy equipment or the like, no depressed center for tall loads.
A check of the car’s dimensions and capacity reveal that it has a gross rail load of 630,000 pounds. It makes little difference whether it’s 630,000 pounds on eight axles or 315,000 pounds on four. But the railroad lines in the country that can handle gross rail loads of 315,000 pounds are pretty few and far between. An obvious possibility in “corn and soybean country” would be the UP’s ex-C&NW main line across Iowa–but even that is restricted to the 286K gross rail load (I think UP did that–CNW used to rate it at 315K).
So where did you see it? I don’t know whether BNSF’s main line is good for 315K, but that’s probably the only line that’s likely to be. If these cars brought a load up into some remote location, they obviously couldn’t be loaded to their limit without some sort of special clearance.
Here is a link to a pick of one loaded that used to used by Boeing http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?2,1481727
Transformers and/ or generators for coal-fired power plants.
More likely these days, nacelles/ generators for the giant wind turbines.
Here’s a link to a photo - not mine - of sister QTTX 131276 with the hulk of a wrecked loco on board -
http://www.railcarphotos.com/PhotoDetails.php?PhotoID=12980
469,000 lbs. ‘Load Limit’ over 8 axles = 58,600 lbs. per axle, plus the weight of the car itself - probably on the order of 80,000 lbs. or so, so maybe 70,000 lbs. gross weight on each axle. That’s heavy but not outrageous - a ‘standard’ 263,000 lb. car is 65,800 lbs. per axle, whereas the 286K cars - as in covered grain hoppers and coal gons, etc. - are 71,500 lbs. per axle.
Really, each end of this car with its pair of trucks is not much worse than the adjoining trucks of a coupled pair of such hopper cars. So, as long as the next car isn’t too heavy - probably it’s an idler or spacer empty anyway - it’s no worse than allowing such cars on a particular line.
This illustrates the need to differentiate the load applied at each level in the track structures, bridges, and soils. For track in reasonably good condition - even with 100 lb. rail and a fair number of marginal ties, at low speeds - the individual axle loads here will not likely overload the rails at any one point. But the further down in the track structure you go, the more the higher loads overlap and become additive - though again, not worse than the hopper cars. Or, if the rail was lighter and/ or the ties conditions poor and/ or the ballast wet and muddy and/ or the subgrade weak - then so many loaded axles close together might be more of a concern.
However, a series of these cars as you saw, each fully loaded
Paul, the light weight of the car that Norris mentioned is 161,100 pounds, giving the car a gross rail load of 630,000 pounds, the figure I alluded to. The car in your photograph weighs 100 pounds less, and consequently has a load limit of 100 pounds more, giving it the same gross rail load. That might change a few of the figures in your thoughtful post.
man so why did this post originally not show up until after I made the second post to replace it? (edit)
Just because the car has a max rating of 630,000 lbs, is no guarantee that is the intended loading, is it?
Wouldn’t 286,000 lbs spread over 8 axles be less stressful to the road bed than 286,000 lbs spread over 4? Especially some spongy “mud pumped” spur.
Linked here is a post from the past:
http://cs.trains.com/trccs/forums/t/67417.aspx?PageIndex=2
Pictured here are some of those QTTX Flat cars with the little QJ Chinese Steam engines loaded![wow]
The pictures were made for us( Trains Forum) by Mr. Ed Blysard of Houston ,Tx.[tup][tup]
If you chedck the above link, you’ll find the coments on that thread which Ed made the photos and shared with all of us. Rhought that you might like to see these, again. ‘Murphy S.’ They also wound up in “Corn Country” as well in Iowa. Enjoy!
That’s true enough. The point is that the load has to be watched, and the load limit in many cases is not dependent on the GRL rating of the car’s trucks.
Carl,
Is it possible to have a flat car capable of hauling the same load but with a depressed center for tall loads, with roughly the same car weight, or are depressed center cars usually heavier?
Of course, they don’t have to load the car to it’s fullest weight capacity. If the cars show up somewhere like here, Sioux Falls, S.D., off the beaten path, I’d have to think they were special ordered to carry something that took advantage of their heavier loading capacity.
Dale, I haven’t really checked, but I suspect that depressed-center cars have to be heavier because of the extra support needed on account of losing a solid center sill. Given that, if you needed to haul a load of the same weight, you’d probably accomplish it with added axles, and the added length needed to accommodate them.
Or, they could just be stored there, either because it’s an available siding or in anticipation of some large load that’s not quite ready for shipment yet.
I would expect a depressed center flat to be heavier due to the extra steel needed to strengthen the depressed area.
Two heavy transformers are enroute to Excel Energy’s Monticello nuclear plant, north of Minneapolis, right now, they should make the final move to the plant today. One is on a heavy depressed center flat
The other is heavier and required a small Schnabel car.
These pictures were taken by Dennis Weber near LaCrosse, WI on the BNSF on Saturday May 8th.
John Beaulieu
Like DDA40X 6925 in Chamberlain? [:P]
Chances are, they’d move that future museum piece using the wheels that are already under it.[;)]
The cars are gone this morning. Where they were sitting was an often used siding parallel to the BNSF main downtown. Cars staged there are never around very long.
Looking around, I saw a pile of brand new sewer pipe, close enough to the railyard that they could have conceivably been shipped by rail. Normally, it seems like plastic sewer pipe would be a reletively light load. This pipe seems to be joined together in long lengths. It sort of looks like the sewer pipe equivilent of CWR. It will be interesting to see how it gets to the construction site.
Is it possible, that this pipe was hauled on thses cars, spread out over many carlengths, similar to CWR? It would seem like any old flatcar would do for that sort of thing.
Carl and Dale;
Here is a link to the kind of depressed center flat being discussed. Maybe it’ll help?
I guess I just fat fingered the keyboard–Where’s Eleanor Roosevelt when you need her?[X-)][banghead]
Sometimes to save shipping costs PVC pipe will be sleeved one in another I’ve seen up to 6 that way but usually only 4. Must be the required diameter (inside) goes upstream first and then the larger maybe(?) saving the extra PVC costs vs shipping costs? Sewer and storm water pipe usually white. There may be an adapter involved. Water pipe (usually green in color) often is shipped that way also.
CL9000 water pipe is very heavy. If the pipe was white a long length of the bell allows for some movement of the pipe without it separating. Some locations in CA have bell lengths of 2 ft.