Remote Control Locos, Like or Dislike? Show of hands please.....

Trains Magazine General Discussion
1

OK, yet again the use of a remote has lead to another minor incident with no injuries. I have worked with remotes in the yard and I just don’t like them. The remote packs loose contact, and there is a good five second delay in stopping. Now, as a conductor, being remote qualified would give me the ability to hold more jobs, but I just don’t like them. I’d rather work with an engineer any day. I know these remotes are being introduced to save money in terms of labor cost by cutting out the engineer.

Remote technology is likely here to stay, I just wi***he RR’s would have done more fine tuning. I have a feeling one day not too far off a crew will consist of one man sitting at the controls of locomotive watching it while it is being controlled remotely from some centralized control station in India because all the jobs were outsourced.

Sorry about the negativity today, must be the overcast skies outside. I could use a happy pill or two right about now.

Fellow forum members spill your beans and share your opinions of remote technology.

2

Been here, done this - results were railroaders hated them - Mookie watches them and a few interesting souls out there even thought they might be ok.

We have a couple of them that I see quite a bit - they always have two people running them - and haven’t even seen the remote packs on the gentlemen running the engine!

Maybe someone got smart…?

3

I am not a RR employee or union member or connected to the RR business in any way and even I can see RC engines look to be a very bad idea. To many safety concerns and control issues.

How do you emergency stop?

How do you control in bad weather, use a big umbrella?

Who does the uncoupling? Climb onto cars? Does the controller have to do this while carrying the control pack? That sound like a serious safety concern.

What about outside radio interferrence causing problems?

I would like to know exactly how does a “controller” operate the engine, do they ride exposed on the engine? stand on the ground alond side the train? Isnt that a HUGE security and personal safety issue in bad areas?

I just dont see how having a RC controller is an improvement over having someone in the cab who has a far better feel for what the train is doing than someone standing on the ground next to it would have.

I just keep thinking whats next, remote controlling from a cubilce?

Someone please explain this system to me?

4

Like them or not they will be here to stay.

It’s just like when diesel took over from steam (not that I was around to witness this)>

The diesels took over in the yard slowly getting better and more efficient and the next thing we know they have all taken over for steam.

Same thing with these stupid remote control pieces of crap, they’re working in the yard, the technology in improving, the next thing we know these things will be going a little further a little further and then there won’t be anything but remote loco’s!

Perhaps within the next few decades we will see the demise of the running trade employee.

Hope not, but you can’t say it isn’t possible.

5

Man, tried to stay away from this, but…
RC is dangerous.
Period.
Yes, it allows the carrier to force the yard engineer back to the ground as a switchman/conductor.
Which forces him to excerise his senority, and bump someone, who excersises his senority, which…in the end, the young guys get furloughed,(laid off)
But real savings in payroll?

Hasnt happened, note UPs desperate need for employees.

In fact, here in Houston, the remotes have added to the congestion, and added a lot, they just cant get the job done, and UP’s yards are pluged.

Now, if you railroad for a living, you already know what a pluged yard does to the rest of the division, it pretty much stops the entire thing, dead in its tracks.
If you cant get trains in the yard, you cant get them out either, so…

Vic, you wanted the basic how it works?

Trains did a nice three pager on remote control last year, Kathi Kube has a excellent techno explanation on the belt backs, but just to give you a idea,
you have a model railroad, right?

Take your throttle pack trackside next chance you get.

Now imagine running the next train that you find that is doing some switch work, spotting a industry.

Try to get the idea of where the locomotive is, and what you could do if something went wrong,(not much) and how you would have to work the plant.

Have a buddy who works in a real large yard here in town, with remotes.
He is scared to death, to the point he is looking for another job outside the railroading industry.

He was telling me how he felt when he has to ride a 50 car cut out of one track, and then shove himself back in on the leading car.

The “throw” control on his beltpack wouldnt function, and he couldnt pass control to his helper on the other end of the yard, so he was stuck riding the thing in.

Imagine it like this.

You have your remote control

6

I must say that I think remotes are ok on certain jobs. Like working a hump and pulldown yard, I can run the slack in and out as hard as I want, I dont have to talk as much, it’s like a big toy train. Also I would think being an engineer on these jobs just going back and forth on the lead would be too boring. If I was an engineer I would rather be out on the mainlines/ branchlines on roadswitchers.
But I must also say that the remote controls should be closer to how the controls are in the cab. Remotes have limitations. As for safety, if used correctly it is as safe as convetional.

7

Not an active railroader, never worked in a yard. Only contact I have with RC is the coal dump at the steam plant. Switcher (with engineer) positions cut of cars for dumping, cars are advanced using RC, probably from a fixed location. When all the cars are dumped, manned loco pulls 'em and gets another cut.

As has been discussed here and in previous threads, RC has it’s purpose. The Canadians are supposedly using them quite successfully, but it was pointed out that they use them differently than we do in the US.

I won’t outright condemn them, but like any tool, it’s gotta be used appropriately.

8

Like I said , I think these are a fundamentally BAD idea, a huge accident waiting to happen just so the bean-counter bottom line looks good.

So I guess we have to wait for a remote operator trying to move some LPG cars to fall off, get knocked out and have this remote controlled wonder keep on going right into an open switch or something, derail, catch fire, explode and take out a few square blocks or have a Chemical tanker get cornered and release a toxic cloud over a few city blocks. Maybe then the powers that be will figure out these are a bad idea? Yeah Right.

Of course we’ll have to listen to their terrorist theories then find out it was because an overworked controller who didnt have the five arms he now needed to do all the things he was required to do, fell off while trying to operate his control pack, talk on the radio and pull a cut lever all while hanging on to the side of a moving car.

Something like that? BAD idea…

9

From what I’ve read and heard, yard work needs two crewmen at least. I’ve operated a form of remote control locomotive, on my model railroad. Switching back and fourth going the 4 feet from coupler to power pack gets tiring real quick.

I could see a remote control operation doing well on a local, where you only have to pick up, and set off a few cars per location.

My question, though, becomes this: How do you make sure you don’t hit the remote accidently in the “dead zone”?

10

Puckdropper has a good point, there is no way to prevent the human error from creeping in, and someone in the dead or red zone screwing up and hurting themselves.

Vic, as for the locomotive running away, the belt packs have a sensor, which, if it leans past a certain degree of tilt for over 45 seconds, is supposed to shut off the locomotive, or apply the brakes, depends on whos remote system you are using.
But, like all mechanical devices, at some point, it will fail, thats just a given.
And, in railroad, especially in a yard, 45 seconds is a long, long time for a locomotive to be moving un-controlled.

Ed

11

The minor accidents I’ve seen with remotes are caused by inatention probably due to boredom or inexperiance comunly associated with remotes, people hire on and now they run an engine with 40 cars. I have also seen accidents with engineers for the similar reason, at least from boredom. I like working with remotes and all but,… this is what remotes cannot do; switching a yard on a grade. You need accurate control and somene should always be near or on the engine to sens wheel slip/ spin and other rough slack action plus accurate control of air brakes. Another thing is high volume, well you could do with remotes if they got a little more refined but you can’t save labour because you need at least a 3 man crew to work fast and safe. And of course industrial switching where the general public has access to the track, people expect some one is watching from the cab and you need point protection.

I think remotes should be refined with real engineers operating the remotes, with compensated wage increases when it saves crew costs and the fact that you’re outside some of the time again. It’s a fact remote has been invented so lets imbrace it and make money on it to boot, it can be fun, safe and profitable. Right now it’s all new guys operating them and that is asking for trouble.

12

I agree with larry.remotes can work in some areas.but in a yard or on the main no way.they are just not safe.
stay safe
joe

13

Wait wait- one important factor that was overlooked

How does the locomotive know that it has hit someone?

And-

Lety’s say the signal can’t reach the locomotive and the locomotive shuts down and comes to a complete stop and it takes an hour to get going again… what ahppens if it blocks crossings for an hour?

People can hardly wait for a freight train to pass at 35 MPH, how are they going to wait while it passes at a grand total of 0 MPH?

they are going to get impatiant, and then it’s like an Automic bomb, a chain reaction will ensue.

14

The plight of short lines trying to remain profitable by their use produces a certain amount of empathy in this writer in that I realize there are some instances where you do what you have to do in order not to cross that thin line between profitability and becoming a bicycle trail. But at best, my empathy is more akin to ambivalence at best. There is no substitute for having the enormous advantage of having a human being directly on board with eyes, ears, motor reflexes versus adding an additional factor or step in the mix via a tenuous radio frequency.
I follow science news and the deterioration of our magnetosphere that shields us from the solar radiation makes you think twice about the long term viability of the technology unless you are talking shielded cable as our military utilizes to prevent sun spot activity from frying their radio links.
Can you imagine mainline road power with onboard software using GPS and an upgraded function of centralized dispatching with microwave relay towers allowing a second tier of control?
Pretty scary thought when you consider the amount of hackers who disrupt major corporations and the federal data banks with apparent ease.
Unfortunately and realistically I think that’s where the industry is headed long term. I think the trend of the illusionary concept of what I call “workless work” is pervasive and I think the move away from real people doing actual physical tasks outside of the low pay service industry is going to kill the goose that laid the golden egg.
Productivity is up as well as unemployment. Nobody has seen this before. It has nothing to do with politics…are you reading this Bergie? I am being a good boy.

15

Remotes should be used as wheel chauks, plain and simple! I have seen numerous times when the operator could not see the loco and run through a switch, or sideswipe another train. I went through 8 weeks of classroom training and 6 months of OTJ training to get my FRA card and I think a week with a belt pack is just plain wrong. I saw a post on here where the writer said its a big train set. HELLO,my train set dont carry haz mats that can take out a city block. I personaly saw another railroader say that he was not worried about derailing or messing up equipment because the company will cover it up ( which they do ) his excat statement " I am fireproof because i am a remote operator ". I am currently sitting at home on suspension for at least 30 days because my conductor and I kicked a autorack and it slamed into a loaded covered hopper. Now if a remote had done it not a word would have been said, I’ll put money on that one. Do I like remotes? Naaaa.

16

Another question keeps crossing my mind…

Do they operate remotes in bad weather? snow, rain, lightning, etc.?

Doesnt this affect Safety? seams a very bad idea to be standing out there switching cars in a lightning storm with something that has an antenna?
Rain? I dont know anyone operating RC in rain, very bad for the control box…

I just have a real hard time picturing a single guy trying to do all the things it normally takes a crew of two to three to do safely.

17

US railroads have the mistaken concept that just because something can be done once under optimum conditions, that on time occurence then becomes the norm for everything.

Not all tools should be used in every case. Remote Control is a tool. It does not have an application on EVERY yard job that exists in a terminal or on any rail road.

Even in tools as simple as the hammer…one size does not fit all uses. Why the rail industry views tools as one size fits all I can’t comprehend.

18

Hi Vic,
Its acctually a three man crew being reduced to a two man crew.

How its set up now, there is a engineer, a foreman/conductor, and a fieldman or helper.
Engineer and I go drag a cut of cars out of a receiving yard, come around, and start kicking cars into tracks, which the helper has already lined up.
The helper, if hes good, stays one or two steps ahead of me, and we can steadily kick cars.
When a track starts to fill up, the helper couples it up, and we shove it down to the limit on the other end, he is eyes of the job right then, and in control or the job.
When a track fills sooner than we expect, the helper rides the far end, I catch on at the cut, we often have to couple and shove a track holding onto a bunch of cars still needing to be switched, and the engineer is is on the other end.
Eyes all the way round…
We fill up the track, put it on the limit, I cut away and drag out, the helper catches a ride with the cab(Noras new job) back up to the lead, and get going again.
When we are done, we have to swing, or move these full tracks over to a depature yard, where the car men can inspect them, look for defects, lace up the air hoses, air up and check the brakes, hang the rear end device, and make it ready to leave.
This requires one of us to be on either end on the yard, me to drag them out, him to watch the shove, and often, we are swinging to a track that already has cars in it from the top end crews switching, or the second half of a train.
Which means one of us has to be at the joint, or coupling point in this track, when we shove back in, then we get it together, and spot it for ground air.

Now, with a remote, I have to not only read a switch list, check it against the cars I am holding on to, line the lead switches, talk on the radio to keep my helper clued in, and pull pins, all while trying to run a locomotive via a box straped to my chest.
When we couple a track, the remotes have a feature, call throw

19

put a movie camera on loco and small screen on remote box so you can see. too many bugs still. really dont like the jobs lost. are enough lost to comm. china. put a blimp up above yard(stationary) with camera to watch movements in yard. ha.

20

put a movie camera on loco and small screen on remote box so you can see. too many bugs still. really dont like the jobs lost. are enough lost to comm. china. put a blimp up above yard(stationary) with camera to watch movements in yard. ha.