In the Megantic coverage I read that Harding set the handbrakes on the five locos and, a spacer car, and a “remote control caboose.”
I had not heard that term before. I assume that this type of caboose is retrofitted with an engine control stand, and functions in a similar fashion to a cab car on a commuter train. Correct?
If so, I don’t see why the RC caboose would be coupled to the engines. One would think that it would be at the rear of the train. But I am pretty sure that Harding did not walk his entire 74-car train just to set that one brake.
Why would that caboose be coupled to the engines?
Also, can someone explain the spacer car? I am familiar with spacer cars next to ungainly flat car loads. But why next to a tank car?
As I understand it, the R/C car is for operating distributed power. It contains the electronics necessary to send the appropriate radio signals to other locomotives. Using this approach means that the locomotives themselves don’t need to have the electronics installed.
With this in mind, it has to be next to a locomotive so the MU cable can be connected to it.
I will gladly stand corrected.
This is not to be confused with a “shove platform,” which is nothing more than a safe place for a crew member to stand on long shove moves. Many of these are repurposed cabeese, usually with all the openings sealed, and often looking the worse for wear.
Some railroads are now using a small box that connects to the MU cable to create remote control locomotives. The box is paired with a belt pack. This approach allows any locomotive to be used for remote control, not just those with the proper equipment installed.
Buffer/spacer cars are required between hazmat and the locomotives. If it is a mixed freight, I believe five cars must separate the hazmat cars and the power. For a unit consist, one car is allowed. These are often older covered hoppers loaded with sand, etc.
Spacer cars are also used to improve weight distribution. The Interlake/Arcelor Mittal bottle train on the IHB has spacer cars between each bottle car to avoid overloading bridges since the bottle cars load VERY heavy.
Thanks all. And especially thanks to Tree for introducing me to the word “cabeese!” [:)]
I’m still kinda dense about this, though. I thought that all road engines could be used to control any contiguously-coupled loco consist. Not true? Just because an engine has MU cables does not mean it has a control stand?
Not all engines have a radio transmitter capable of broadcasting to a receiver in an engine too far from the head end to run MU cables to it. Thus the Remote Control car that has the MU cable sockets to receive the control information and then has a transmitter to send that information to the mid or rear engines to receive.
I thought that all the engines in a (contiguous) loco consist were connected to each other via MU cables, and that was all that was needed. Doesn’t the lead unit hook to 2, 2 to 3, 3 to 4, and so on?
I didn’t think radio was needed at all if the units were contiguous. And I thought that you could MU as many units as you wanted to just by connecting the cables. No?
You are right - contiguous locomotives can be tied together, essentially making them one locomotive. This was the very concept of the F unit and the practice continues to this day. In fact, at first there were several methods of doing this, meaning that certain locomotives wouldn’t MU with certain other locomotives. That’s all been standardized now.
There are power limitations and other considerations involved, but that’s another topic.
The issue comes if you want to control a locomotive that is not contiguous - ie, mid-train and end-of-train distributed power. There is no MU cable running through the train, just the brake line. Thus radio is the only solution.
Railroads that run a lot of distributed power will equip most, if not all, of their locomotives with the appropriate equipment. Another option is connecting a car with the appropriate equipment to the locomotives. This car contains the radio and other control equipment necessary to do the job.
They M-Ued to the locomotive consist and then the consist could be operated by switchmen on the ground with belt packs. These engines either had traction motors removed or disconnected. I got to play with the converted yard slugs years ago. Now engines are equipped with the gear and I haven’t seen one in a few years.
UP converted a large batch of retired GE units (mostly B23-7s) into remote control receivers and numbered them in the UPY 100 series. They were painted solid gray with red lettering. I saw one in El Paso from the “Sunset Limited” this past summer.
Not so much the weight of it, but when hand brakes are applied on the RC caboose the brakes are applied on all 4 axles of the car, not just one truck as happens with locomotives.
The RC Cabs probably have a weight of approximately 40 tons as opposed to a loaded oil car coming in at very close to the 286K maximum weight permitted (143 tons for the mathmatically declined).
The purpose of the remote control caboose is to act as the radio receiver and relay the commands to the locomotives to which it is MU’d. The MM&A did not use distributed power; instead the control unit was a BeltPak worn by the engineer when he was down on the ground switching the train. This method is quite common in yards and private industries, with specially assigned locomotives having the receiver built in. As already pointed out, having the equipment in the former caboose eliminates the need to equip each road locomotive.
I am guessing that the BeltPak is not compatible with the DPU equipment in current main line locomotives since the controls are much simplified.
This is the system the UP uses. Originally developed in Canada by the CN. I was at one time RCO qualified. I Still have the vest the box attaches to. (It, at least ours, isn’t actually worn on a belt.) When running you don’t control the throttle. You select the speed you want, there’s multiple settings, and the on board computer runs the throttle and independent brakes to maintain the speed selected. There’s a coast setting and the operator can control the independent. There is functions for using the automatic brake. It’s been over 12 years since I’ve used it, but I think top speed was 15mph. Our system wasn’t meant for extensive over the road operations.
I don’t know what MM&A used but expect it was also for switching. A single person runs the train in the normal way between work events. When arriving at a yard or industry, switches to RCL mode, straps on the box and does the switching. When done, put the box away and switch back to normal operation and run to the next location.
I dimly remember that these Irving Oil trains had to be assembled from cuts of cars in shorter loading tracks, and then placed as cuts of cars for unloading, which would have been something the remote would facilitate.
I do not much like the idea of a single-man crew doing trial-and-error coupling-up from the head end, or having to walk repeatedly down the train to cut locations getting more tired by the minute, when the cars are full of nondegassed Bakken crude…
