Firelock76 Buslist dakotafred Bring back EMD's E-series body! Nothing since has looked as streamlined and "American." Could they still meet FRA's new crash worthyness standards?
Buslist dakotafred Bring back EMD's E-series body! Nothing since has looked as streamlined and "American." Could they still meet FRA's new crash worthyness standards?
dakotafred Bring back EMD's E-series body! Nothing since has looked as streamlined and "American."
Bring back EMD's E-series body! Nothing since has looked as streamlined and "American."
Could they still meet FRA's new crash worthyness standards?
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If you want to see what kind of crashworthiness can be built into a loco nose, find a copy of the specs for the front end of the original Shinkansen end-of-train cars. The curved pilot plate under that bullet nose concealed a multi-layer stack of steel plates - armor better than that on most battleships. Since the whole thing was only a few centimeters above the rails, NOTHING was going to get in there to damage or derail a train. OTOH, whatever it hit would probably be punted into low Earth orbit.
Aerodynamic considerations have caused the bullets to evolve into inverted grain scoops. I suspect the armor is still in there.
Chuck
daveklepper Hand-crafter compound-curved nose expensive to build. Otherwise, you are right. The Alco FA and PA nose is less complex. Would that be OK?
Hand-crafter compound-curved nose expensive to build.
Otherwise, you are right.
The Alco FA and PA nose is less complex. Would that be OK?
Oh, yes!
dakotafred daveklepper Hand-crafter compound-curved nose expensive to build. Otherwise, you are right. The Alco FA and PA nose is less complex. Would that be OK? Oh, yes!
3D printing?
If GM "killed the electric car", what am I doing standing next to an EV-1, a half a block from the WSOR tracks?
Paul Milenkovic3D printing?
I don't think "3D printing of locomotive noses" and "cost-effective" can be used in the same paragraph.
You might use 3D printing, probably of the type used for architectural spaces (I will find the explicit technical reference; it uses a large gantry and high-speed additive plastic to produce a 'wireframe' that is then filled with less expensive material) to create molds for panels that will be produced with more conventional (and le$$ expen$ive) methods. But that's just a one-time exercise. You wouldn't make production noses that way, and I'd be tempted to add that any nose design that actually needed to be produced via 3D printing ... with FRA strength and collision provisions inside ... might be a triumph of "design" over practicality in precisely the wrong Cesar Vergara style.
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