http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=66643
On the right, you can see a post type thing. Is this a hot box detector? I’ve been to this location myself, but haven’t been able to determine if it is.
Thanks,
Matthew
Listen on a scanner as a train goes by, if you hear the sounds of a defect detector it must be. I think it is, but I am not sure.
Sorry, I don’t have a scanner. Hold on, I’ll check the timetable an engineer gave me a couple years ago
The timetable says that there is a hotbox detector at mile 19, but that’s a least 8 miles west of there.
Matthew.
Is that maybe an AEI reader/scanner? Heres something that looks similar. http://railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=8834
That is an AEI reader.
What does an AEI Scanner scan?
That’s an AEI scanner…
Each piece of equipment has an AEI tag. Automatic Equipment Identification, the little gray looking tags attached about 4 feet high…often on the sill.
The scanner emits a very low range (10 to 20 feet distance) microwave radio signal, and this signal activates or excites the circuit inside the tag, which is encoded with the reporting marks for that car, locomotive or piece of equipment.
Because they require no power source of their own, but are energized by the scanner, AEI tags are cheap, and long lasting, you have to crush it to make it quit working!
The AEI tag, when it gets within the range of this low distance signal, it will in essence talk back to the scanner and tell it which car it is looking at, so you can build an accurate list of a train, in sequence from the head end back.
Every piece of equipment has an AEI tag, that’s how we keep track of all the cars and equipment in North America…and any car from Mexico that is in interchange service has to carry a tag also.
This eliminates the needs for clerks to walk trains and handwrite a list, is faster and cheaper than the old optical scanners that used a color coded bar code on the side of the car.
If you look closely at the next passing train, you can see the tags, they are light gray, mounted around 4 feet above the rail height, often on the sill of the cars, and measure about two inches tall, six to eight inches long, and are about 3/4 of an inch thick.
There will be one on each side of every car and locomotive.
There are thousands of AEI sites nationwide, in Houston alone, we have over one hundred, and on the PTRA, we have 24 of them.
Ed
I thought those went out of fashion in the 80s? We are talking about the tall coloured bar things, right? I haven’t seen them on anywhere near all the cars.
Matthew
No, we’re talking about a completely different creature here. These are electronic devices. Heres a link for more info. http://shop.store.yahoo.com/aeitag/atstantemaei.html
ah, now I know. Where do they put em?
Matthew
as answered before the AEI tags are mounted on side sil of locomotives and cars.