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Broken Rail

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Posted by Boyd on Thursday, August 18, 2016 10:32 PM
I have a 5 foot section of rail from the now gone Minnesota Zephyr. One end looks factory normal. The other end is broken like a young and green soft tree branch as the break is more horizontal than vertical.

Modeling the "Fargo Area Rapid Transit" in O scale 3 rail.

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Posted by erikem on Thursday, August 18, 2016 9:47 PM

ChuckCobleigh

 

 
mudchicken
Lever Brothers, not P&G. (I was raised on a P&G paycheck)...Not far from Ski Bandini...

 

Yeah, now you mention it, I remember that it was LB.  I remember the "Bandini Mountain" radio campaigns in the early 70's, pretty funny stuff, made for an interesting mental picture.

 

There were some TV ads - showing the skier looking like he was passing out from the fumes...

Bandini mountain - not to be confused with Casa di Bandini in Carlsbad, formerly Old Town State Park (San Diego).

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Posted by ChuckCobleigh on Thursday, August 18, 2016 1:27 AM

mudchicken
Lever Brothers, not P&G. (I was raised on a P&G paycheck)...Not far from Ski Bandini...

Yeah, now you mention it, I remember that it was LB.  I remember the "Bandini Mountain" radio campaigns in the early 70's, pretty funny stuff, made for an interesting mental picture.

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Posted by mudchicken on Wednesday, August 17, 2016 10:16 PM

ChuckCobleigh
 
mudchicken
The pit didn't last very long. Fortunately the mechanical facilities got moved on top of the old soap factoy site in less than 10 years during a yard/ TOFC expansion.

 

Find memories of driving by the P&G plant there in Commerce.  You could always tell what they were making by the aroma wafting towards the freeway. As I recall, there was a Nabisco plant on the east side of the freeway a bit, a little to the south.  Cookies. Good.  Yum.

 

Lever Brothers, not P&G. (I was raised on a P&G paycheck)...Not far from Ski Bandini...

Mudchicken Nothing is worth taking the risk of losing a life over. Come home tonight in the same condition that you left home this morning in. Safety begins with ME.... cinscocom-west
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Posted by tree68 on Wednesday, August 17, 2016 9:13 PM

I did notice that.  And have seen it, for that matter...  

LarryWhistling
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Posted by Paul_D_North_Jr on Wednesday, August 17, 2016 9:10 PM

The OP's linked video is about the completely opposite situation.  Aside from the rail being broken vs. connected at both ends, note that the adjacent tie on each side of the break appear to be good (sound), and there's 1 spike in each on the outer (field) side to keep the rail from spreading outward.

- Paul North.    

"This Fascinating Railroad Business" (title of 1943 book by Robert Selph Henry of the AAR)
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Posted by tree68 on Wednesday, August 17, 2016 8:49 PM

I thin I've mentioned this before - there was a video around showing a complete stick of rail unattached to the ties.  The joint bars held the guage,though, and as cars rolled over the stick, it flailedflailed around, but nothing derailed.

LarryWhistling
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Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you
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Come ride the rails with me!
There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...

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Posted by ChuckCobleigh on Wednesday, August 17, 2016 7:01 PM

mudchicken
The pit didn't last very long. Fortunately the mechanical facilities got moved on top of the old soap factoy site in less than 10 years during a yard/ TOFC expansion.

Find memories of driving by the P&G plant there in Commerce.  You could always tell what they were making by the aroma wafting towards the freeway. As I recall, there was a Nabisco plant on the east side of the freeway a bit, a little to the south.  Cookies. Good.  Yum.

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Posted by mudchicken on Wednesday, August 17, 2016 2:53 PM

(1) The mechanical guys were grateful and we knew we had erased the potential for something really bad happening. I had serious reservations about this industrial architect designed pit support structure as did the system bridge engineer once we both saw it (basically an "H" pile every 6 feet with a pandrol plate on top, NOTHING supporting the rail mid-span. (any railroad engineer worth his salt would flinch at the sight of that. Running rail isn't supposed to be its own structural span ) Voiced my concern and was told it was OK (?) - Ran Sperry over the rail when it was in town for it's regularly scheduled trip (arranged a "slight detour" while they cleared the main tracks) and you now already know what they found. (a six foot + piece of piped rail)

(2) New 136#CWR rail to the west coast from Pueblo takes a while. Rail trains  and loading/unloading are scheduled far in advance and there was only one mini-rail train running on the system. (Up to 800 ft strings)

The pit didn't last very long. Fortunately the mechanical facilities got moved on top of the old soap factoy site in less than 10 years during a yard/ TOFC expansion.

Mudchicken Nothing is worth taking the risk of losing a life over. Come home tonight in the same condition that you left home this morning in. Safety begins with ME.... cinscocom-west
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Posted by Deggesty on Wednesday, August 17, 2016 1:36 PM

mudchicken

Classic piped-rail/ head-web separation (probably was open hearth, except new rail will occasionally do that. Found one of those in new rail /CWR in a brand new undertrack inspection pit with nothing supporting the rail)...did not go into service for another 45 days.

The CMO, ChE and system architect got mad at me (and the Chief Bridge Engineer) for bad ordering  their new toy just before they were gonna show it off.

 

And, what would have been their reaction if the first car across that had dropped down on a corner? They should have thanked you for stopping the use of the pit until it was safe to do so.

Why so long before the pit could be used?

Johnny

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Posted by mudchicken on Wednesday, August 17, 2016 12:36 PM

Classic piped-rail/ head-web separation (probably was open hearth, except new rail will occasionally do that. Found one of those in new rail /CWR in a brand new undertrack inspection pit with nothing supporting the rail)...did not go into service for another 45 days.

The CMO, ChE and system architect got mad at me (and the Chief Bridge Engineer) for bad ordering  their new toy just before they were gonna show it off.

Mudchicken Nothing is worth taking the risk of losing a life over. Come home tonight in the same condition that you left home this morning in. Safety begins with ME.... cinscocom-west
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Posted by CShaveRR on Wednesday, August 17, 2016 11:36 AM

CNW had a policy in place for a few years before the merger hat there would be no more just slapping joiner-bars over the breaks--the rail wold come out and be replaced.  I think that was effective in areas that were still jointed rail--probably even saved down-time in the long run.

The most spectacular broken rail I ever saw was in our classification yard...a load of soybean oil had run through my retarders (greasy wheels, I guess), and I had warned the lower tower about the car, expecting the group retarder to be unable to hold the car as well.  It never got the chance--the rail below the divide switch broke horizontally, leaving the base in place and sending the head above the truck--a classic "snake-head"!  The speed of the car was enough to split pretty much the entire rail this way.  The next rail (intact) exerted its force in a strange way, causing the car to ride up on the retarder beams.  I didn't see all of this transpiring--looked that way just in time to see that loaded tank make a slow roll over and stop on its side, landing on the retarder next to the one it was to have gone through.  Incredibly, no lading was spilled and the tank was not breached.

Carl

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Posted by Firelock76 on Tuesday, August 16, 2016 6:55 PM

I guess what a mechanic friend of mine once told me is true...

"It's metal.  It can last for 1,000 years, or it can break tomorrow.  You never know."

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Posted by mudchicken on Tuesday, August 16, 2016 6:22 PM

Bulldog bar probably won't work on that pull apart.

 

Rail breaks are not that predictable, especially with older Open Hearth rail. Can't predict path of least resistance in the metallurgy. Some latent defects may hide for years or decades before something finally evolves.

Mudchicken Nothing is worth taking the risk of losing a life over. Come home tonight in the same condition that you left home this morning in. Safety begins with ME.... cinscocom-west
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Posted by BaltACD on Tuesday, August 16, 2016 1:45 PM

Paul of Covington
   This reminds me:  Several years ago I was shown a photograph by an employee of the NOPB RR of a broken rail.   The rail had broken in two places about a foot apart, and the the piece was lying on its side.   I never would have expected rail to break that way.   Is this unusual?

Stresses can get applied to rail from almost any angle and those stresses get applied in a recurring pattern every time an axle moves over the track.  The stresses can be modified by flat wheels, loose spiking, deteriorating ties and a host of other conditions too numerous to mention - in the real world anything can happen.

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Posted by Paul of Covington on Tuesday, August 16, 2016 1:29 PM

   This reminds me:  Several years ago I was shown a photograph by an employee of the NOPB RR of a broken rail.   The rail had broken in two places about a foot apart, and the the piece was lying on its side.   I never would have expected rail to break that way.   Is this unusual?

_____________ 

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Posted by CAZEPHYR on Tuesday, August 16, 2016 12:12 PM

Back in the days of the Southern Pacific at Newhall CA, there was a train in the cksiding one evening heading to Los Angeles.  When it started up in the siding, the air dropped a few times and the head conductor had to reconnect the air hose in each air drop.    Finally, the train got out of the siding.  We examined the track that evening and found a 24" section of rail had broken off and the train had moved back on the main with various hose reconnections made but no derailment.  The head units first experienced an air hose disconnect and that problem happened several times until the train finally got off the siding.  It was amazing this could happen but the speed was starting up to about 5 mph.

 

CZ

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Posted by BaltACD on Tuesday, August 16, 2016 12:02 PM

Most broken rails are such that equipment & trains can be 'walked over' the break until MofW can get their manpower, equipment and supplies to repair the brake (either applying joint bars or cutting out, replacing and welding in a replacement segment of rail).  Were the break on a curve, the decision to walk the trains over would be more problematical - the decisions to walk trains over broken rails are made by employees that have been trained in track inspection and are fully competent to make such decisions.

This video shows it isn't the easiest thing in the world to derail at train on tangent track.

Never too old to have a happy childhood!

              

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Posted by Buslist on Tuesday, August 16, 2016 11:41 AM

Nothing unusual there. Appears To be in the heat affected zone of the weld (looks like a field weld).

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Broken Rail
Posted by CMStPnP on Tuesday, August 16, 2016 11:22 AM

Interesting....I always expected rail breaks to be in a straight maybe jagged line vs a curve.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMJhIydN1ZA

 

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