Can somebody smart explain something that came through town this morning? It was a solid train of 40 to 50 cars of reddish Herzog cars, They were, I guess, covered hoppers, although they looked like short (in height) boxcars, with two dump doors on the bottom. HZGX #8832, 8374, and 8818 were some numbers. (No stecils about shackles that I could see, at least[:-,])
Aggerate or ballast train…Herzog has several of these trains.
(they also can be programmed to dump automatically by GPS or by radio remote control)
Not covered hoppers, but open-top cars that were, in a previous life, unit coal train gondolas (rendered obsolete in that operation by aluminum cars). Herzog rebuilt them with the discharge outlets and interior slope sheets (so they really are hoppers now).
Initially, Herzog touted trains like this as being capable of precise unloading of ballast at high speeds, using GPS to determine where it should be dumped (after a hi-rail trip by someone to program the region). The idea is sound, because everybody’s doing it now, but I don’t think the speeds are as high as originally envisioned.
Not to doubt, but they looked covered to me, but I couldn’t get enough elevation to really tell for sure. Precise unloading of ballast at high speeds? Like, how fast? What would you really gain, other than saving a few minutes time required to slow down?
I believe it is a ballast train, I have seen it in the Harrisburg area and even got a shot of it going across Rockville Bridge.
Probably wouldn’t make a lot of difference on most lines, but consider something really busy, where a train moving at walking speed to spread ballast would cause a considerable backup of freight behind it (and the opposing trains wouldn’t allow these trains to get around the ballast train without tying up traffic in that direction, too). So, ideally, you’d appreciate having a train that could move at the prevailing speed of the other freights while performing its chore. And at one time Herzog was saying that this is what could happen with their train.
If you ever saw one of these coming at you at district speed, you’d know why they only dump at 5-10 mph anymore. Most of the contents of the cars do’t quite land where they ought to and if you are on foot anywhere near, you’re covering up and heading for the fences.
the best way to discribe why they use this is saftey as no guys mounting and dismounting a moving train and there is nobody on the cars its done by a operator on the last unit of the engine telling the cars thru gps when to dump in other words the men are doing other things on the line while we dump ballast, or as some would say getting or rocks off.
Just out of curiosity, which line was it on? Going from where to where?
On the BNSF running north through Sioux Falls.
After ballast is dumped, doesn’t it need to be spread, or worked by crews on site? Or, can the railroad really do a drive-by ballasting?
They are dumping only enough for a skin lift (1"-2" raise). The ballast never gets higher than the rail, stops before switches and road crossings, and doesn’t cover up the spikes and tie plates. The ballast regulator will manipulate the new rock when the surfacing gangs show up to better distribute the rock and fill voids. In the meantime, it will just sit in small ridges not as tall as the rail.
And we continue to see a steady parade of D&I rock trains coming into Denver almost daily on UP via Cheyenne.
D&I send 100+ cars a day south through town. Don’t they have rocks in Colorado? Or is it just the pretty pink quartzite color they like?[;)]
The east half of Colorado is rock-less (all sand) and there is only one quarry in CO loading out rock, most ballast in CO comes from WY (Granite Canyon-Sherman Hill./UP) & NM (Pedernel/BNSF).