Impressive is probably to slight of a word for that scene
PL
......That sure is an impressive bridge. Have passed that bridge for 45 plus years on our way back home to Pennsylvania. I can't remember when we have seen a train on it....It sure does and has always impressed me as being adequately built.
Enjoyed seeing all those bridge structures photos.
Quentin
videomaker wrote: Define "slab train" looks like an empty gondola train to me...Impressive bridge !
My guess is that the gons contain steel slabs.
How about that Rio Grande unit, just slightly far from home, and looking rather spiffy!
Kaput for the Mill that made the slabs or kaput for the bridge?
I think bridge is good for another 100 years if they would just scrape dat rust off and repaint it proper.
....I really don't know any update info on the future of the bridge, but recent article in Trains on that railroad....it sure would seem to me the bridge is not coming down.
I have to confess that I have never heard of a "slab train." What on earth is this "slab" of which the contributor speaks? Do we mean "slag" train? Slag is the rock-like pile of impurities which steel mills for generations have dumped some distance away from the mills, often into enormous piles. For example, on the B & O between Newton Falls and Warren Ohio is a famous "slag heap" (yep, that's the correct term) probably three to four stories high and perhaps half a mile long or more. This heap is the result of the now-defunct steel mills of Warren, Niles, and elsewhere close by needing some place to dump this final waste product of steel-making.
"Slabs" bring to mind manufactured steel sheets of various thicknesses, not slag. So, I'm going to say the photograph (and it's a fine one I much appreciate studying) is a W & LE slag train, not a slab train.
I'm going to assume this mistake was made by the same kind of people who think "high hills" means high heels and that it's fun to watch the "Stillers" play "dahntahn" after having a "jumbo." Yunz wanna bet?
After looking at the picture again, it is definitely a slab train. Metal slabs, usually still hot, are shipped from the rolling mill to a remote finishing mill in steel-floored gondolas. Slag, on the other hand, is usually carried in thimble cars while it it still liquid from the furnaces to a nearby dumping site. The thimbles are equipped with air-actuated dumping mechanisms which tilt the thimble to pour out the molten slag. It's an impressive sight after the sun goes down.
Steel slabs are by their very nature very heavy, so a single slab in the bottom of a gon will probably max the car out, yet be virtually invisible to the casual viewer.
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
....No question about that. Slabs are heavy {most likely an understatement} at best....I doubt if one is expecting to see a "stack" of slabs on a flat car, it's not going to happen. Extreme weight involved.
I am utterly mortified by my stupidity! I apologize for thinking the thread contributor was wrong, when, in fact, it is I who is wrong!
I was convinced when I read about the thimble cars; not only do I recall seeing them myself pouring hot slag down the embankment (and it really is a special sight at night!), but only a person who really knows steel-making would use the correct term.
And yes, slabs are so heavy that one wouldn't stack them in cars, anymore than one could dump slag from a gondola.
So, like Christine Jorgenson, I stand corrected!
Thanks to Chris / CopCarSS for my avatar.
I will take a shot at the slab question Ive run steel and aluminum at one time.
There are very large cranes that sometimes either have a hook on them, a coil pin (Giant peice of forging about a foot thick and 3 feet long more or less) electroplate on or a little bitty jaw set with 4 corners on it. They come up to the object above the truck or railcar, reach in and pick it right up.
What is fascinating is the precision in these very large overhead cranes. A focused operator on his radio belt can gingerly pick anything anywhere in reach and set it anywhere and just so. He had to be able to do it because sometimes there is a man on the deck within 2 feet of that 24 ton coil shoving on it into the angled rails. (Much good that will do he he.)
The electroplate is not good to be around. It tends to attract anything and everything. I would hate to see the utility billing on just one of those.
Electric furnances are even worse. They sit 10 feet from the payphone humming while they work and leave you shouting into the payphone on the wall asking the barely intelligable voice on the other end to repeat. Cellphones took care of that little annoyance pernamently.
Those are just the little ones you see in the foundry, the really big ones the Mill uses are usually off-limits to non authorized people.
I was told at one time that these large cranes go through replacements of chain and cable every so often. If you go to a mill and eyeball a overheader, you will notice that the chain is worn smooth on those very large links which are at least as big as anything sold at the big box lumber store.
Now, Aluminum slabs are like 6 feet wide 3 feet high and 40 long. Those get picked up by gigantic forklifts with very small people in the cab. If you can get to it from the side, that is usually a good way to work it.
Finally the walthers rolling mill structure kit is pretty typical of a loading, unloading operation. Whenever you enter one of these, eyes and ears OPEN. You need to check for moving overheads, flying objects and sirens as these big beasts move inside carrying stuff that will turn a man into a dried paint splot on the deck.
Im not a Union Man, but Ive always felt that America is Steel and if we stop making the stuff, we will forget how to do Cities and everything in it down to the most common appliances etc.
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Not useless.
Some of that Aluminum coils are 8 feet high "eye to sky" and about 6 feet across. Three will fit onto a Covered Wagon and be consumed by the Brewery in a few hours time making beer cans to fill.
Think of the energy consumed to raise the hell heat necessary to create one of those slabs. NOW that is something.
zardoz wrote: videomaker wrote: Define "slab train" looks like an empty gondola train to me...Impressive bridge !My guess is that the gons contain steel slabs. How about that Rio Grande unit, just slightly far from home, and looking rather spiffy!
That is probably a W&LE unit. It appears someone high up at W&LE is a DRGW fan. I wonder if this has caused a problem with UP.
http://www.wlerwy.com/
http://www.wle.railfan.net/wlecur-rost.html
"No soup for you!" - Yev Kassem (from Seinfeld)
The unit in question is a former DRGW GP40 that the WLE bought- the engine retains it's old DRGW paint but is renumbered into the WLE numbering system. The WLE has a couple GP40s and at least one tunnel motor SD40T-2 in Rio Grande paint.
In regards to the paint scheme- unlike logos, paint schemes on locomotives can not be trademarked or copyrighted. So the Wheeling and Lake Erie can use the black and orange DRGW scheme without consent from the UP- I would assume though that they did get the okay from either the UP (if long enough ago SP) to use the "speed lettering" like DRGW did since that would be considered a logo.
I rather like the fact that Mr. Parsons chose the Rio Grande styled scheme for the WLE- it sure is a heck of a lot better than the old WLE "Kodachrome" scheme.
JohnWPowell wrote:Thats a cool bridge!!
It is cool. Until you realize the WEIGHT that needs to carry across that distance. As the bridge gets older the steel gets thin and peeling to the touch if it is neglected.
Now the combined weight of bridge AND train is cool!
Murphy Siding wrote: How do they unload the slabs?
They load/unload steel slabs with a electromagnet and overhead crane. I was just in Mittal Steel plant in Conshohocken Pa. in the slab storage building. The slabs are at least 8" thick and 20' long, they were only picking 1 up at a time. I've seen them pick 2 thinner slabs at one time and also drop 1, I guess they had power drop and the magnet lost some power. That will get your attention.
Eddystone wrote: Murphy Siding wrote: How do they unload the slabs? They load/unload steel slabs with a electromagnet and overhead crane. I was just in Mittal Steel plant in Conshohocken Pa. in the slab storage building. The slabs are at least 8" thick and 20' long, they were only picking 1 up at a time. I've seen them pick 2 thinner slabs at one time and also drop 1, I guess they had power drop and the magnet lost some power. That will get your attention.
And shake very ground. That is why you eyeball everything above you if you aint ever been inside a mill. You DONT want to be anywhere near where that slab hits. LOL.
One stupid question... how much do those steel slabs at 8 x 20 weight anyway? I understand aluminum weights but not that of slab steel.
Can't answer how much they weigh, didn't get a chance to talk to the crane operator. The railroad just spotted a string of empty gondola cars in the building to be loaded with slabs. The operator was also moving them out of the way at the end of the building some we could store our tools and gear. If I get a chance I'll ask one of the Ironworker foremen on the job what they weigh.
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