Retrieving Bad Ordered Cars

[Anonymous]

I had a unique situation on my model RR the other day that brought to mind a
question about how real railroads function. I was doing a pick-up of a Soo
box car which I noticed was off-balance and leaning too much to one side for
me to feel comfortable trying to get it to the yard (don't ask WHY it was on the
layout like that in the first place). Soooo, doing what I figured a real RR would
do, I assessed the situation, decided it wasn't safe to move to the yard, and not
wanting to block the customer's siding, I set it out on a nearby MOW equipment
spur and continued with the local's remaining work elsewhere.

In the real world, if a crew discovers a piece of rolling stock has, for whatever
reason, become unsafe to move, how would they address the problem?
Would they send-out car men to attempt to repair the car sufficiently to at least
get it to a car shop or the next yard? I'd assume a crane would be dispatched
if the car needed to be lifted. Would that even be the job of car men?

[dehusman]

They set the car out and send out a 'wheel truck' that has jacks on it and a small lifting arm that can pick up a pair of wheels or on bigger rigs, a whole truck . They might use a crane, but mostly they can use hydraulic jacks.

Dave H.

[dharmon]

QUOTE: Originally posted by ghighland

I had a unique situation on my model RR the other day that brought to mind a
question about how real railroads function. I was doing a pick-up of a Soo
box car which I noticed was off-balance and leaning too much to one side for
me to feel comfortable trying to get it to the yard (don't ask WHY it was on the
layout like that in the first place). Soooo, doing what I figured a real RR would
do, I assessed the situation, decided it wasn't safe to move to the yard, and not
wanting to block the customer's siding, I set it out on a nearby MOW equipment
spur and continued with the local's remaining work elsewhere.

In the real world, if a crew discovers a piece of rolling stock has, for whatever
reason, become unsafe to move, how would they address the problem?
Would they send-out car men to attempt to repair the car sufficiently to at least
get it to a car shop or the next yard? I'd assume a crane would be dispatched
if the car needed to be lifted. Would that even be the job of car men?

A great big (40' - 60') hydraulically powered lifting device with four gripping appendages on one side and a fifth on the other is lowered over the top of the car. The car is then raised off of the rails and placed on the RRs maintenance work bench.

sorry couldn't help it[:D]

[Anonymous]

dharmon:

Yep - a replacement set of trucks did the trick. The car then returned to the yard
with the next day's way freight.

[PNWRMNM]

In the real world the car is promably out of balance and should not have been pulled from the customer's siding. If RR takes it is their liability. Could turn over before it got out of the track, even worse on way to yard. Would spoil everybody's day

[kenneo]

PNWRMNM is correct if the car is still on the consignor's rail. The only people who would be happy with such a move would be lawyers.

If, however, such a problem manifests itself later in the trip, the crew sets it out, the RIP comes to fix, and then it continues on.

[wabash1]

if the car is loaded incorrectly it wont get pulled no matter who the shipper or consgnee is. it becomes the problem of the crew and carrier if they couple to it. if happens while in transit we sit it out and have someone come out and inspect it and repair it.

[jeffhergert]

If it's bad enough, they will have the carmen come out and repair it on the main line.
A few years ago the train I was on got hit by a hot box detector. It had been giving false alerts and when the head end went by there were signal maintainers working on it. We got hit about the middle of the train. We stopped, I went back and the indicated axle was ok. Checking 20 axles either side, per the rules, 3 cars back we had burned off the bearing and the truck side frame was dragging. (The burned off bearing is still in the weeds.)
The carmen came out with a new wheelset, we cut the train. The carmen jacked up the car, rolled out the truck and changed out the wheelset. I saw most of this, until the relief crew got us on the hours of service.