Paul of CovingtonI think they wanted the left and right wheels to reach the guard rails at the same time. Why?
Think of them as GUIDE rails to guide the flanges into the gap between the rail being crossed.
Paul of Covington Semper Vaporo Technical question: Why is the guard rail (or flange trap or anti-derail, whatever you want to call it) longer on one side than the other? If you draw a line across from the tip of the guard rail on the UP rail to the tip of the other guard rail and then extend it to the BNSF track it seems it would be a straight line across the tips of all 4 guard rails. Why are they not the same length from the frog to the tip of the guard rails on both side of each track? Just guessing, but I think they wanted the left and right wheels to reach the guard rails at the same time. Why? I don't know.
Semper Vaporo Technical question: Why is the guard rail (or flange trap or anti-derail, whatever you want to call it) longer on one side than the other? If you draw a line across from the tip of the guard rail on the UP rail to the tip of the other guard rail and then extend it to the BNSF track it seems it would be a straight line across the tips of all 4 guard rails. Why are they not the same length from the frog to the tip of the guard rails on both side of each track?
Technical question: Why is the guard rail (or flange trap or anti-derail, whatever you want to call it) longer on one side than the other? If you draw a line across from the tip of the guard rail on the UP rail to the tip of the other guard rail and then extend it to the BNSF track it seems it would be a straight line across the tips of all 4 guard rails. Why are they not the same length from the frog to the tip of the guard rails on both side of each track?
Just guessing, but I think they wanted the left and right wheels to reach the guard rails at the same time. Why? I don't know.
That is just it... they WON'T reach them at the same time. Maybe that is the reason.
Semper Vaporo
Pkgs.
Semper Vaporo Paul of Covington Semper Vaporo Technical question: Why is the guard rail (or flange trap or anti-derail, whatever you want to call it) longer on one side than the other? If you draw a line across from the tip of the guard rail on the UP rail to the tip of the other guard rail and then extend it to the BNSF track it seems it would be a straight line across the tips of all 4 guard rails. Why are they not the same length from the frog to the tip of the guard rails on both side of each track? Just guessing, but I think they wanted the left and right wheels to reach the guard rails at the same time. Why? I don't know. That is just it... they WON'T reach them at the same time. Maybe that is the reason.
Maybe I don't understand your question. Since the crossings are not 90º, if the guard rails (guide rails) were the same length from the frogs, the wheels would not hit them at the same time. If you draw a line across the tips of the nearest rails (blue), it would be parallel to the ties under the left (white) ones. The ties under the nearest ones are not 90º to the rails.
(Edit) I re-read your question and realized you are comparing UP track to the BNSF one, and in the nearest ends they are different from one road to the other, so we may not be talking the same language. I was comparing BNSF to BNSF.
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"A stranger's just a friend you ain't met yet." --- Dave Gardner
It looks like the new crossovers will have wooden ties. Would concrete ties be unsuitable for a heavy-use situation such as this or is there another reason for staying with the older method?
The angles of the photos and the angles of the ties under the tracks is quite confusing to me. I am not so sure of my own question now!
I still think that a line drawn across the track from the tip of one guard rail to the other (on the same track, either BNSF or UP) would not be perpendicular to the track rails. But due to the odd angles it is hard to tell. Maybe I am all wet! (It IS raining here.)
Looks like on one side they have a straight piece of rail and on the other it is bent. My guess is that both pieces are similar, since this is "built to fit" it is shorter due to the angle.
The cam is not working for me
No joy in the Great White North either.
Bruce
So shovel the coal, let this rattler roll.
"A Train is a Place Going Somewhere" CP Rail Public Timetable
"O. S. Irricana"
. . . __ . ______
camera not working today on firefox,crome or explororer
Nor on Safari...getting a "trouble slide" indicating camera probably down. The Wrigley Field webcam is working, so it doesn't appear to be an Earthlink problem.
Using the "trouble slide" reference brings back memories of working for a UHF station in town here nearly 50 years ago. Once in a while, we would trip off the air for a little bit and, as expected, we'd get calls from some of our viewers. Always, when we would explain that our transmitter was down, someone would ask why we didin't put up a slide to explain that. I never tried to explain why not, as it would have been an exercise in futility.
These days, futility seems to be about the only exercise I get, along with jogging my memory.
AgentKid No joy in the Great White North either. Bruce
No joy in the Too Sunny South either. But, putting an optimistic face on it, maybe the webcam system is down for some maintenance (that's a free translation of "fixing our mistakes") and, when it comes back, we'll have the same full screen capability we had before. One can hope.
ChuckAllen, TX
Yup, My display states "Your connection may be insufficient or the camera may be temporarily unavailable.
Earthcam.
OldtrainwatcherIt looks like the new crossovers will have wooden ties. Would concrete ties be unsuitable for a heavy-use situation such as this or is there another reason for staying with the older method?
Concrete ties for a set of diamonds such as this would be a custom-molding job, and each tie along the tracks would be different as the routs were getting further apart. Better to have wooden ties where one tie length could be adzed and drilled (for plates and spikes or bolts) as needed along its length. Less cusom work to do.
Carl
Railroader Emeritus (practiced railroading for 46 years--and in 2010 I finally got it right!)
CAACSCOCOM--I don't want to behave improperly, so I just won't behave at all. (SM)
Webcam still dead this morning... just the blue and white daisy pettles rotating to infinity.
The cam just came back for me
Working for me.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
Working here, too. Still no full screen though.
cefinkjr Working here, too. Still no full screen though.
What he said.
On a rest break from prepping my house for the window installers tomorrow.
Bingo... EarthCam works here, now, too.
STOMP THE PRESSES! Errr... I mean STOP the presses...
I just ACCIDENTALLY got a FULL SCREEN display using IE-11!!!!!
Forget the icon in the corner... DOUBLE-CLICK the video itself! Double-click it again to return to the original view.
hee hee hee happy accidents!
CShaveRRConcrete ties for a set of diamonds such as this would be a custom-molding job, and each tie along the tracks would be different as the routs were getting further apart. Better to have wooden ties where one tie length could be adzed and drilled (for plates and spikes or bolts) as needed along its length. Less cusom work to do.
I don't get out a lot to see for myself, but I'm not sure I ever recall seeing even a switch having anything but wood ties. Concrete just doesn't make sense for a switch because not only are the anchors custom, the profile of the tie is custom and any advantage of quantity production would be completely wiped out.
Semper VaporoI just ACCIDENTALLY got a FULL SCREEN display using IE-11!!!!! Forget the icon in the corner... DOUBLE-CLICK the video itself! Double-click it again to return to the original view. hee hee hee happy accidents!
What he said. Everything good to go here.
There are a lot of kids at the park today. It is interesting watching some of the younger ones cover their ears when the engines sound their horns. It reminds me of AgentKid's little brother. Despite spending the first eight years of his life in a station, he never did get used to the loco horns. He also had a problem with fingernails scratching a blackboard. Remember blackboards?
KP has several photos of concrete turnouts that UP used in his epic Sunset Route thread.
Semper Vaporo STOMP THE PRESSES! Errr... I mean STOP the presses... I just ACCIDENTALLY got a FULL SCREEN display using IE-11!!!!! Forget the icon in the corner... DOUBLE-CLICK the video itself! Double-click it again to return to the original view. hee hee hee happy accidents!
You get a great big Gold Star!
BTW, Escape will still get you back to normal viewing.
I believe that's called serendipity (had to look it up to confirm the spelling) but don't you just hate such Easter Eggs in software. I 'grew up' with IBM documentation where every comma was significant. It may have insulted my intelligence sometimes but it never left me in doubt. I don't have time for learning how to use a piece of software by trial-and-error.
It is only serendipity if I was looking for something and found something else...
All I was doing was having a twitchy index finger!
The "FULL SCREEN" mode works when using the Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox web browsers, but not when using the Microsoft Edge or Google Chrome web browsers.
Boy, oh boy, oh boy, I'm sure glad we finally got it back, and SEMPER VAPORO figured out the solution!
But, what's up with the cobwebs stretched across the lens?
Is that one of Charlotte's kids?
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