Locomotive brake shoes

[Anonymous]

I under stand that steam locomotive would have "cutting or grinding shoes" put on to fix flat spots or profile the tire/flange where thay any color or mostly yellow?

[Randy Stahl]

The cutting shoes we have are anything but yellow , I don't think paint would last long in that application . If they were painted I think any high visability paint would do the trick , after all you don't want to send an engine back to work with cutting shoes on !!!

[WSOR 3801]

We use low-friction composition shoes on our engines with clasp-type brakes.  They are yellow in color, to tell them apart from regular black shoes.  The cutting shoes seem to be concrete in color.

[efftenxrfe]

In the early sixties it seemed o be SOP for S-2s (Alcos) to be equipped in service with an axle"s worth of red-shoes grinding away at the results of a neglected hand brake and often the results of the actions of a not skilful hoghead that knew jacking the br cyl psi from 35 to 50 or 60 would make a cow pony out of a Clydesdale, referring to quickly kickig cuts on a classifier job,....ya' had to bail-off back to about 35 psi near stopping or....flat-spot city.

[coborn35]

Our grinding shoes are red.