Hot Weather on the Rails

[Anonymous]

Ed, mentioned working in very hot out door climate in one of his responces. When it gets real hot out do railroads implimant heat schedule's and rotate workers in and out of air conditioning? Do they shift the work hours so that most of the work is done at night? It has to be dangerous working in that climate. I have alway's worked in air conditioning, I can not imagine working in such heat.
TIM A

[wabash1]

railroads dont change nothing they tell you to drink more water they supply gatoraide, or anything like that to replenish your body you pace yourself but if you are outside you get air flow and shade on the engine you get hotter and hotter. after 8hrs or so nobody smells fresh. you just do whatyou haft to do to get your work done with out heat stroke.

[edblysard]

Hi Tim,
You know why the crews love the newer locomotives?
Because they have A/C. A lot of the older SD40-2, and just about anything older than that had none.
I dont work on a road crew, I am whats called a yardman. I flat switch cars all day long, outside on a lead, into a 48 track yard.
We bring our own coolers, mine is a bucket style that doubles as a seat, about 1/2 time larger than a 5 gallon soap bucket. Our railroad provides canned water, but it taste like the can, so most of us buy our own, or gateraid, or some type of "power" drink. You don't drink sodas, the sugar in them will make you ill.
We have a ice machine behind the roundhouse, so we can fill the coolers up. You pace yourself, and when you feel the heat is getting to you, you take a break. Our carrier dosnt mind, remember, the humidity in Houston runs around 80 to 90 percent most of the time, and combined with 95 degree days, the heat index is about 107 to 110 often.
My schedule is wed thru sunday, on duty time 1500 to 2300, and if needed, the carrier can keep me till 0300. (thats 3:00pm to 3:00 am), but most of the time we get done around 21:30,(9:30pm) and get to leave. Anything over 8 hours in a day is overtime. Right now, sunset is around 8:30 pm, with the hottest part of the day around 5:00 to 6:00. So I get a little break, in that it is cooling down half of the time I am at work. We have a lunch room thats air conditioned, and yard crews can eat and take their breaks there. The top end job, who work and switch the other end of the yard have a 16 X 16 foot "shanty" with a toilet and a wall mounted A/C. They take breaks there, but come through the yard to eat in the lunch room. Our road crews eat on the locomotives, which all have A/C.
We work three shifts in a 24 hour period. Start time are 7:00 am, 3:00 pm. and 11:00 pm.
The concept that the carrier would change anything is non exsistent. They allow you to take a cool down break as needed not out of sheer compassion, but because they dont want you to pass out while riding a car or making a move, and get hurt and file a claim against them, or tear something up.
Once you get acclimatized to the heat, you can work longer than most would imagine, as long as you keep yourself hydrated. Long sleeved light weight shirts and a good hat are a must. You pace yourself, and when you feel the heat getting to you, you stop, take a jug of water, get on the motor in the A/C and cool down.
I am lucky, in that the yardmasters and crews here kinda have a deal, we get all of our work orders at the beginning of our shift, and when your done, your done, and you can go home. (the railroad term for that is "getting a quit") So if we get finished by 8:30, we go home, if its too hot to work fast, we go a little slower, and go home at 11:00 instead. Either way, we get 8 hours pay, so, again, its a matter of paceing yourself.
Regardless of the weather, you work, in thunder storms, rain, heat, snow and cold, shoot, we even switched through tropical storm Allison, although not much got done, we were out there.
Thats one of the first things they tell you when you apply, they expect you to work no matter what the weather is.
Stay Frosty, (hey, thats a pun)
Ed

[JoeKoh]

ed
have the same thing at work.Winter real cold summer hotter than-.How often do you run into buckled rail due to the summer heat?
stay safe
joe

[Mookie]

and which is worse for rails - summer or winter (probably summer, but want to hear it as fact.)

Jen

[Anonymous]

Good question, seems when ever I hear about a derailment caused by a broken rail its either very hot or very cold. Which is worse?

Thanks Jen
TIM A

[edblysard]

Often, in the older parts of the yard and on our "main" line, but mostly its the welded rail that seems to get sun kinks. Havent had any big buckles, but have had the kink go to the inside so bad I kicked a car into a track, and the binding made the front truck ride up and over the rail. And it seems to happen most on the welded rail on the steel ties, even though our MOW swear the pandrol clips and the nylon spaces under them are suppost to allow the rail to expand up and down, instead of lengthways.
At least thats their story, and their sticking to it...
Stay Frosty, if you can.
Ed

[edblysard]

Summer is the worst, sun kinks and the grease in the turnouts melts away quickly, dust and grit in the switch points and switch plates, your nose and ears and hair too, and the switch mechanisim itself needs to be greased or lubed more often. We have mild winters compared to the rest of the country, under freezing is not common, so ice and snow is not a factor.
Ed

[Anonymous]

Well up here the most problem is neither SUMMER nor WINTER. it's when the temperature is about 30, 31, or 32 degrees.. and freezing rain comes down. Last tiem there was freezing rain... All the signals jammed.. and soemwhere the circuit cut.. causing a mass "Tumble-down" in the block. which took six and a half hours to repair..

i tohught i was going to go insane.

Ed (or anyone), if you know, why does freezing rain effect the signals worse then snow or anyhting.. almsot everytime we have freezing rain.. somehting screws up..99% of the time with the signals. Do you know why... i find it awkward

Cheers,
DETOUR kev

[Anonymous]

My thought would be, and this is only a thought. The ice sticking on the ties forms a conductor across the rail bed. This shorts out the two rails causeing signaling circuits to activate. My guess is, there is some kind of Zeaner Diode or current switch in the signal boxes that stops this from happening in normal rainy weather. But with ice (With lease resistance then running water) forming a direct short across the rails, the signals see it as a short caused by a train.
Just Guessing
TIM A

[Mookie]

Tim- and others: Since I live in ice country - we are right between snow and warm - we should see a lot of that around here. I am not sure that we do. Anyone know if we do or why we don't?

[wabash1]

Even though heat takes its toll on the rails with kinks the cold also couses problems resulting in broken rails the tempature can get cold enough that you can brake a rail with one car with a flat spot. But it is not just the cold that does this it is the big swing in tempatures. in other words if it is 40 degres at 5pm and drops to 10 by morning this is to radical a change and in the north it happens regularly and broken rails occur.

[Mookie]

Wabash - so I have a broken rail - how is this discovered and what's to keep me from running my engine over it?

Jen

[edblysard]

Hi Kev,
Not a signal engineer, but one does post here often, you may want to make your question a seperate posting to get his attention.
No real knowledge, but I agree with Tim somewhat, add that to the fact that freezing rain will drop tree branches real quick on the the power lines, or snap the lines proper.
Post it and lets see if he can explain.
Stay Frosty, (ha ha)
Ed

[Anonymous]

does he have a name that he likes to go by?


Kev.

[Anonymous]

oh and ed you got to tell me how you got your name and location up beside your posts.. i can't stand the dash anymore.

cheers,
kev.

[Mookie]

he got the name from his mumzy and daddy and he lives in Houston..

(It's a joke Kev, since I haven't rattled your chain in awhile). Go to the update profile up above and go from there. Read the directions carefully and I bet you can get your profile changed.

Jen

[wabash1]

several ways in signal territory the signal will not be a clear. that is the first clue. the second is you be riding along and everything is smooth then its like hitting a pothole. these are just some of the ways. broken rails are funny. some are easy to see from the engine and others you wont see or feel on the engine. that is where maintance of way comes in. The fact that there is a broken rail doesnt mean you cant go over it. when we have a broken rails we are doing restricted speed anyways when the track men show up they usually have us run 5-10mph. when you hear of train derailments do to broken rails its speed that was involved. there are other situations but just a rail snaped into isnt much problem at slow speeds.

[Mookie]

As always, you cleared that up.

Thanx

Jen

[Anonymous]

LOL.. yeah i should check that out! LOL

thanks Jev.

Detour Kev..

[Anonymous]

JEN! thats what i meant to put... the V is close to the N


Detour Kev.

[Anonymous]

nope Jen i'm really gonna nedd your help.. when i click update profile it doesn't tell me anyhwhere to put my namew it asks for e-mail, password changes, country, postal code...

it's your turn to help ME!

cheers,
Detour Kev

[Mookie]

Kev - I looked it all over - when I signed in a long time ago, they asked my name - which is where the Jenny comes from - (I hate that name) I would have like to have had just Mookie, but no had to put down both. Looks like the form has changed, so write to them at [e-mail] and ask if you can get signed on like some of the rest of us. If you figure it out, I may change the name to Mookie and throw the Jenny away!

Wish I could be of more help

Jen