The Mook is here to report than one member of her office staff has reportedly “watched a train”!
Mari was watching a grain train - altho she didn’t know that is what it was! But she saw a sign on one of the cars that said not to use a vibrator on the car.
Ok - I will wait for you all to settle down!
Her question was obvious - I told her - I hope rightly so - that it would be to shake the grain out of the car.
Now her question is - why can’t you use a “vibrator” on some cars - keep it clean - this is a family forum!
Still getting over the Do Not Hump - now you guys throw this in the mix! Who said railroading isn’t exciting?
If memory serves (and it usually does not), the vibrator restriction was due to the type of lining inside the product areas. I believe certain liners were more fragile, but whether this was concern for the liner breaking apart, or rather concern that the liner would seperate from the car body.
Zardoz has most of it…Also granular material that is not uniform (not all the same granular size) has a chance of being vibrated into a more well consolidated form - it becomes like concrete and you have to jackhammer it out. Especially where you have piping and gates for stuff like plastic pellets and powdered sugar.
Also, if it’s wet stuff and it freezes, you will see admonitions to not heat up the car or beat on the undersides of the car (weakens the structural integrity of the steel plate)…
Because if you dont hump it, but you use a vibrator on it, all it wants to do afterward is lay around smoking and watching TV?
Wait, this is about railroad cars, not wives…
You dont use a vibrator on the side s of some cars because the liner is a sprayed on, teflon style liner, and you can cause the bond between the car body and the liner to fail.
It means the liner has to be replaced, becuase the product will begin to stick to the sides of the car.
Look closely, and some cars will have a warning, “Do not hammer side of car”, or “Apply vibrator in vibrator brackets only”.
On a lot of bottom discharge hoppers, there is a bracket on the chutes for a pad vibrator to clip into, to help keep the produce fluid and from sticking together in the chute.
Some products, like PVC plastic, or flour, things that compact easy, are shipped in cars with the above warnings.
You know how easy flour will compact, imagine having to try to dig it out of a covered hopper.
Mookie, Aimee said to tell you she dosnt smoke.
Stay Frosty,
Ed