While driving south of town I saw a UP track truck off the tracks and stopped to ask some questions. One guy was quite open as they were on lunch break. He had transferred from the PRB joint line a couple of months ago. He said that operations managers were considering an experiment to lower wear of the railheads on a portion of the line shared with the BNSF. A third rail down the middle of the track and two sprung rollers under each truck of each loco and coal car. I said “you got to be kidding”, he said no I’m not kidding. He further said one operations manager had gotten a Lionel train for his kid last Christmas. The engine had stopped working on the 2nd day so he had a look at it. Looking at the pickup rollers and 3rd rail in the track gave him the idea. He came up with a plan including costs and estimated reduction in wear and tracks being out of service and has forewarded his idea to UP headquarters where the top brass are considering it as we speak.
And after you walked out of earshot, he and his buddies probably fell down in hysterics!
I could just see the UP substituting a bunch of new moving parts that would wear a lot faster than rail and be a lot bigger PITA to maintain. I can also see bovine pilots flying F22s out of my friendly neighborhood Air Force Base.
Were you wearing a Lionel logo on your jacket? Or was it just a (notice the date) a few hours early?
Chuck
Sure - UP’s guy is jealous of the Dynamic Weight Distribution axle load adjustment feature on BNSF’s new EC44C4 locomotives ! They just want to use the same principle - but only with the spring on the center rollers instead of a hydraulic cylinder to the middle axle - to reduce the weight on the running rails. It’s such a good idea, I’m sure the UP management will approve it today !
Glad you asked, and thought to post it here for the education of the rest of us - thanks ! [;)]
- Paul North.
That sounds like the contraption New Haven used on their coal lines in thirf rail territory. The difference, is that NH attatched the extra wheels onto the couplers. That made them easier to put on and take off. It also had the effect of preventing the cars from see-sawing so badly on the worn out NH tracks. I’ve seen pictures in old Trains Magazines of the ingenious way that NH had for taking the uni-wheels off, at the end of the 3rd rail district- the 3rd rail would gradually get lower and lower, until the uniwheel fell into a special built trough. I never did figure out if there was a way to put them on the coupler, without a lot of extra manpower. Maybe Paul has some concept of how that worked?
The UP does not go about adopting new ideas in this way. I think they were pulling your leg.
Isn’t that the April First Cog Experiment…failed everywhere excepet Pikes Peak and Mt. Washington.
April Fools!
What should have tipped you off that he was pulling your leg was when he said “each loco and coal car.” There are a host of objections to doing this to coal cars, some mentioned above, but to do it to a locomotive is plum rediculous. Tractive effort demands weight on drivers. Sure high speed trains can use idler axles and only two motors on a three-axle truck, both E-units and modern intermodal power. But coal trains? Weight on drivers is essential.
Yes, for Advanced Processing of Rail Induced Loads From Oscillating Overloaded Lading System
You’re a dangerous man with that kind of thing !
Be careful, though, or someone will draft you into indentured servitude in Washington, D.C. to dream up such things “24 x 7” . . . [swg]
Boyd,
What’s today’s date again?
TLA = A three letter acronym for “Three Letter Acronym”
Really? Remember we’re speaking of the railroad which thought up, and implemented ideas like the U50, the DDA40X (and other twin diesels), the Big Boy, the G.E. Turbines, etc., etc.
While I am not saying the “idea” noted above is for real, but I would put NOTHING past the U.P. when it comes to ingenious (some would say crazy) ideas. History has proven they will…at the very least…think about almost anything.
All the motive power experiments you mention are from 40-60 years ago when Union Pacific (which a really is only a “heritage railroad” in the modern company’s corporate structure) was under considerably different management and was a very different railroad.
The most recent example of UP “pushing the envelope” was the investment in 6,000 HP diesels (SD90MAC-H,AC6000CW) which they did not consider a success (which is why they are almost all off the roster). Since then they have been as conservative in motive power practices as anyone in the industry…
These were things were done BMW (ie Before Mike Walsh). I notice the locomotives you mention were technological dead ins. Giving the UP credit the Omaha GP-20s were an important step forward.
Hopefully, Maury Klein’s newest book on the UP from 1996-2004 will have a lot to say about Mike Walsh’s tenure as the UP’s CEO for five years. I believe Walsh transformed the UP more than anyone since E H Harriman bought the railroad at Omaha’s biggest bankruptcy auction.
OOPS, I appear to have accidently started a serious discussion on an April Fool’s thread…I guess I’m gonna have to put on the DUNCE CAP…
I can’t wait to see how those new UP steam engines handle the third rail!!
There… returned to non-serious and I even managed to combine two April Fool’s jokes!
CC