It is some time now I have noticed that feight cars in the US (and Canada ?) bear vertical orange stripes along their bottom sides, I guess every 7 feet approx. I noticed they can be found on different kind of cars (gondola’s, tank cars, …) and I guess I even saw a hopper from BNSF with the same stripes, but then horizontal (??).
Since when are those stripes been applied and what are they for ?
Many years ago, I noticed that some cars (especially boxcars) had on their sides a small black painted area with multiple colour stripes. I guess that was some kind of recognition system for automated yards (a little like the EAN codes on consumer products). Was that the purpose and is that system still being used ? If else, until when was it used, approx ?
The new reflective tape was just mandated to prevent people running into the side of a train. They started last fall.
The old system you refer to did not work because the dirt made it impossible for the readers to work. Cars now have a small plastic? box that is readable from trackside
They will run into the train from time to time, stripes or not.
The only way to prevent run-in into the train in the future is to raise or lower the railroad or the road high or low enough for traffic to safely cross the ROW.
I saw a recent pic of a newly painted BNSF loco that had large patches of reflective paint all over it. It was a night shot and it looked pretty cool with lights shining on it.
A pic or link would be helpful but you are almost certainly talking in the first case about retro-reflective strips applied to the cars to make them stand out in car headlights as stated.
In the second case you are right, they were a form of bar code for lineside automatic readers to scan to keep track of the car/load. Again as stated, they didn’t work because “weathering” messed up the image - like a wrinkled packet not swiping through the check-out.
In the UK something like 99% or better of RR/Road Grade crossings are gated and probably 99.% of those are supervised. It therefore came as a huge surprise to me that in the US people drive slap into the sides of freight cars. But then my Texan friend who converted me to US RR interest pointed out that on an 89’ car, especially one like an empty TOFC flat there’s something like 70’ between trucks with very little at driver’s eye level for a car driver to see… put this on a Grade Crossing in the dark on a cold wet night with the steroe blaring in the car… He lived right by a Grade Crossing and was more surprised that more cars didn’t slam straight into the sides of trains… especially late at night on the way home from bars/parties.
It’s interesting to hear that the reflective stripes have just been mandated. They’ve been around for ages. Does anyone know when they first appeared? (Other than in the dark[(-D])
I’ve heard that Homeland Security want every single container and car micro-chipped for identification. Now how are we going to comply with that in H0, N and Z [%-)]
I think DOT mandated stripes about 1990 or so, I used to think they were unnecessary on big 18 wheelers and had an attitude that they are unnecessary on my flatbed.
One filthy day on Rte 15 with 15 yard visibility in sideways rain an
The DMIR was able to get the system to work by coating the labels with Teflon so dirt didn’t stick, but by the time they figured that out the rest of the US had abandoned the system.
The UP is the largest RR in N America. If every one of the 30,000 employees was converted to a crossing guard, they wouldn’t be able to cover every grade crossing 24x7.
Oh by the way, numerous people drive through or around gates in the side of trains. You can beat the 50th car in the train across the tracks, but the 49th car will get you every time.
They have been used for decades. Scotchlite (one of the first brands) was invented back in the late 60’s or early 70’s. Note also that the changes in the law required UP to change its sill stripe color on its locomotive. It had been a reflective RED stripe, now its a reflective yellow stripe.
Those stripes you mentioned are what’s called Conspicuity stripes. They are reflective and meant to help keep drivers from running into railroad equipment at night. They have had a couple different styles over the past decade mostly either bright reflective orange or red and white horizontal stripes along the bottom of the car.
As for the black patch with multi colored stripes that was called an AEI strip. They came about during the 1970s it was supposed to be similar to the bar code you see on the bottoms of most stuff you buy. Alas dirt, grime, graffiti, and other kinds of filth doomed the optically read tags to failure. Nowadays rail equipment uses a small metal box with a decoder in it to give out that kind of info along with various GPS systems in some types of reefers.
If memory serves me correctly the colored striped thing was called an ACI, which was an acronym for Automatic Car Identifier. The newer little grey boxes are called AEI which is an acronym for Automatic Equipment Idendtifier. (Bold added by me for emphasis)
The ACI color stripes were not on all equipment, and from what I understand the AEI is on all equipment used in interchange and I think this includes locomotives Yes there are still cabooses out there.
Dirt was a problem on the ACI passive system, but the AEI is an active system similar to the RFID tag that has been in the news recently. http://aeitag.stores.yahoo.net/aeirailhis.html will give you a brief history of both ACI and AEI.
I believe Scotchlite was first used in significant quantity on US military vehicles during World War 2. The GN was quite “into” it in the post-war years. 3M has, on their website, a bit of history regarding the product.
