bfskinner wrote: By the way, didn't you pose a question to another forum about the operating principles behind the postwar Lionel 362 barrel-loader? Why not give the big hitters on this Forum a whack at it -- in a new thread, of course? I might even have a go at it myself.
By the way, didn't you pose a question to another forum about the operating principles behind the postwar Lionel 362 barrel-loader? Why not give the big hitters on this Forum a whack at it -- in a new thread, of course? I might even have a go at it myself.
I give up. How does the barrel car move the barrels up the ramp? I know that it has an electro-magnet that vibrates the ramp, but why don't the barrels go down rather then up. My grandson and I have tried vibrating a homemade ramp but everything always travels down rather than up. What is Lionel's secret to make the barrels defy gravity?Earl and Grandson, Adam
So let the contest begin. The answers do not have to be acccurate. They just have to fool my grandson.
Earl
Earl,
The direction of travel is controlled by the coil and the spring steel strips that mount the ramp to the frame of the car. The coil pulls the ramp downward, then in between successive pulls, the springs push the ramp back to its original position, which is towards the unloading end of the car. For the barrel loader and car to work correctly, the barrels must have a bit of tooth. This causes them to move only when the springs push the ramp, which in turn causes the barrels to move toward the unloading end of the car. Sorry if this sounds confusing, but I couldn't think of a better way to explain it.
EIS2
OK, I will give it a try. I will talk about the barrel loader rather than the car, which works similarly, because the component parts of the loader are easier to see.
The key, or so it seems to me, lies in breaking down a complex system and dealing with the component parts. Someone on the other forum said that he had tried to build a vibrating platform but the barrels (or whatever he used) just bounced around more-or-less in place, rather like the University of Wisconsin football fans in their traditional "jump around" that you may have seen on TV. I submit that if each of the Badger fans were to lean leftward to the point that he/she was overbalanced, once the jump-around started the entire study body would actually flow 'round and 'round the stadium in an apparent continuous stream. That is, each fan would jump up and come down again a little farther to the left of his starting position. The relevance of this will soon be apparent -- I hope!
What needs to be recognized is that putting relatively uniform objects on a LEVEL and UNIFORM vibrating platform will only produce a certain amount of random agitation, with the objects remaining very close to where they started. The "trick" is to devise a way of having them all go in one direction. The side rails on the barrel loader constrain the barrels so that they can only move right or left along the ramp. But why do they always go the same way -- say right-to-left? It is necessary for the vibrating mechanism to produce a net force in the proper direction.
The way this is done on the horse/cow cars and corral, as well as the old Tudor Electric Football game that some of you may remember, is that the cows, horses and the tiny football players all had little feet with slightly springy "legs" that were bent in one direction. (Had they been pointed straight down, the devices wouldn't have worked.) These springy thingys reacted to the vibration such that it was relatively easy for them to move forward a bit, difficult to move backward, and side-to-side hardly at all. This means that the springy things create a "forward bias" that caused the little cow or football player to move a little bit forward (only) when bounced around by the vibrating base. Rather like the energetic Badgers which, if properly leaning, would only move leftward.*
Now the barrels don't have any such springy projections; but, as jimtrumpie has accurately pointed out above, there is some friction between the barrels and the ramp. That this friction is critical is made clear by the fact that the barrels stay on the ramp and do not slide down when the loader is not vibrating. (If you raised the ramp up to a steeper angle, at some point this friction would be overcome and the barrels would indeed slide down. This implys that the slope of the ramp must remain relatively shallow.)
Consider what would happen if the ramp were perfectly horizontal rather than slopping upward. (Anyone with a barrel loader can easily try this at home merely by raising the lower end of the ramp.) In this condition, the barrels will still move right-to-left. Why? The above-mentioned "bias" in the leftward direction is supplied by the springy supports that connect the ramp to its base. Notice that they are angled similarly to the feet of the cattle or the football players. So in this case, it is not the barrels that have a tendency to move right-to-left direction, it is the ramp that moves more readily left-to-right.
One way of looking at this is that the ramp drops out from under the barrel, thus breaking the friction between the ramp and the barrel. While the barrel is "floating" above it, the ramp moves to the right. When the barrel "comes down" it lands on the ramp slightly to the left of where it used to be, and the now-restored friction keeps it there. (This may not be the exact sequence of up-down, left-right movements of the barrel loader, but it works as an illustration.)
Now, a slight digression. Magicians have long demonstrated that one can pull a table cloth out from under table set with china simply by yanking the cloth quickly enough. If they tried to do it slowly, the china would simply be dragged along with the table cloth and everything would be pulled off the table onto the floor and everyone would laugh. (The friction between the cloth and the china would keep the two moving along together.) So, the magicians found a way to diminish this friction virtually to zero. The quick yank does this, The inertia of the china (in this case, its tendency to stay right where it is relative to the table) is greater than the friction between the china and the tablecloth. So while the cloth is rapidly moved relative to the table, the china stays put. More or less.
In the case of the barrel loader, the motion of the vibrating coil, in conjunction with the slanted springy supports, imparts both a slight up and down force on the ramp, along with the more obvious left right motion, This force in the vertical direction lifts the barrels a little, or drops the ramp out from under them, or both. This temporarily (very temporarily) breaks the contact of the barrel with the ramp, thereby momentarily overcoming the friction that has been keeping the barrel where it is on the ramp. At the same instant, the ramp is actually being pulled to the right, so that when the barrel "comes down" it lands slightly to the left of where it started. With contact between the barrel and the ramp re-established, friction holds the barrel in its new location until the next back-forth, up-down cycle begins. This cycle, repeated again and again in very rapid succession, causes the barrel to move to the left. (Or, if you prefer, causes the ramp to be repeatedly moved to the right, out from under the barrels, much like the tablecloth that was yanked out from under the china.)
Now if this cycle is clear for a horizontal ramp, it is easy to imagine tilting the ramp slightly so that the left end is higher than the right. The barrel will still move right-to-left, only now it will actually climb up the ramp.
Clearly the amount of vibration, controlled by the amount of voltage one applies to the coil that causes the vibration, the proximity of the armature to the coil, the design and tension of the spring supports, the angle of the ramp, the surface finish on the barrels (the "tooth" that jimtrumpie mentioned) all must be engineered so that they work together. Obviously if the angle is too steep, or the barrels too friction-free the device wouldn't work.
Clearly, this discussion would benefit greatly from a step-by-step diagram of the cycle of the relative motions of all the moving parts; or, better yet, one of those marvelous computer-generated slow-motion videos such as they produce at Call Tech, among other places. Not having access to any of that, words must suffice. I hope they do.
What little beauty there is here is that you can try some of this at home, but be careful not to use your wife's good china. You can easily try tilting the ramp to determine at what angle it stops working properly. There is no doubt an angle so steep that, although the barrels have enough friction to not slide down when the device is at rest, if you turn it on the barrels will indeed slide down rather than up. This is due to gravity, of course, which is not only a remarkably reliable force, It's Our Law!
The principle of operation of the barrel loader is based on the wisdom of Sir Isaac Newton who postulated that items at rest will remain at rest unless acted upon by some force. If you follow the forces (including the force of gravity, of course) you can understand what's happening. The only problem is that it's hard to see when every thing is vibrating so quickly that step-by-step motion blurs into what appears to be continuous stream.
*I am going to avoid saying anything further about the "left-leaning Badgers" as this is not a political forum.
Mr. Skinner,
Thank you for a very thorough reply. You must be a teacher or professor by trade.
I am quite amazed at the inginuity of the Lionel engineers. I think the barrel car is the most technologically advanced of all the postwar items.
The real test of your explanation is whether my grandson accepts it. I'll give it my best shot in convincing him.
Thank you for the kind words. I wish my post was shorter, but I tried to include concepts and examples that could be understood by people with varied understandings of physics and engineering. At least it didn't run to 793 pages!
I have a granddaughter who is almost eight. She loves my trains, but seems to love my workshop equally. I try to explain things to her and to let her "learn by doing" wherever possible.
You can easily demonstrate the process to Adam with a couple of lo-tech props. Take an item that is relatively heavy for its size, such as a fishing weight with a flat bottom, so it won't roll. Then take a piece of thin but stiff card-stock. Bend one end up a bit to give you a sort of handle that you can pull and push on like a grocery cart. Find a smooth level surface such as a table or Formica counter top.
Place the weight on the card near the "handle" and pull it slowly. The card and the weight will move together toward you smoothly, as expected. Then start again. This time yank the card a little -- half an inch or so. It will be clear that while the card moves toward you the weight remains more-or-less in place. Then push the card and the weight slowly away from you. The weight will now advance in the direction away from you, relative to the table top. Repeat this pull/push cycle and the weight will move along. Practice this a little until you can do it smoothly and reliably.
Once Adam understands what is happening (he can and should try it himself) get a splitting wedge or similar item and try again, substituting the wedge for the smooth table. (Make sure the wedge is fastened in place, and maybe put a few marks on it so that the progress of the weight can easily be observed.) Start with the weight near the pointed end of the wedge and do the fast-pull, slow push cycle a few times. The weight will climb up the wedge. I think Adam will accept it, because he has already shown his interest and curiosity.
FYI, this principle has been used in industry for years in devices known variously as "linear vibration conveyors" and similar names. Lionel engineers made wide use of it. Perhaps the easiest example to understand is the 397 coal loader, where the little bits of coal manage to climb up a stepped ramp. (The action of the rubber conveyor belt is obvious.) The 397 can be slowed down and speeded up over a fairly wide range so that the operation becomes clear.
Other accessories, such as some of the culvert handlers, use a string-and-spring arrangement to transmit pulses that convert the linear motion of the armature into rotational motion. The string grabs a wheel and turns it a fraction of an inch, and then lets go when the tension is released, so that the wheel does not return to its original position. The spring provides just enough tension to keep the string from falling out of its groove. This cycle of pull-and-relax/reposition, repeated many times per second, results in a remarkably smooth rotational motion driven by a back-and-forth action. Someone recently posed the problem (on one of the forums) that his string kept falling out of its groove -- a clear case of improper tension due to the wrong spring, no spring at all, or malajustment of the tension. As with the barrel loader and car, when in proper adjustment, the device works well.
On a personal note: I am not a professor, although I once taught briefly at the college level. Mostly I was an administrator in local government. When I retired, one of my brighter employees commented that the reason that so many of our staff meetings were unproductive was that nobody ever understood a word that I had said. This was a sobering revelation indeed, and I hope it is not the case here. Tedious perhaps, but incomprehensible? I hope not.
Good luck to you and Adam.
Thank you once again for your very thorough post. I will show my grandson your demonstration when he comes over.
I thought the #3562 barrel car and #362 barrel loader were identical, except the car had wheels. They are also designed quite differently. The platform electomagnet is oriented parallel to the ramp and so the horizontal vibration of the ramp is directly due to the electromagnet. The electromagnet of the barrel car is oriented perpendicular to the ramp so the vertical pull of the magnet must be transformed into horizontal movement of the ramp. This is accomplished by the ramp mounting system. Pulling down on the ramp causes the ramp to have a horizontal component which, as Mr. Skinner pointed out so well, causes the barrels to move up the ramp.
The barrel car does not have the rectifier that is used on the platform. I don't know whether Lionel determined that the rectifier was not needed or the design differences negated the need for the rectifier.
After sleeping on this issue, I realized that the barrel car and barrel platform, although seemingly very similar, operate on completely different principals.
The barrel platform operates very similar to the magician that pulls the tablecloth out from under the dishes as Mr. Skinner described. The inertia of the barrels causes the barrels to remain nearly stationary while the ramp is pulled under the barrels. The slower motion of returning the ramp to the rest position coupled with the friction between the barrel and the ramp causes the barrels to travel up hill. The motion is a result of the electromagnet being oriented parallel to the ramp.
The electromagnet on the barrel car is oriented perpendicular to the ramp. The initial motion of the ramp is vertical, which causes the ramp to drop out from under the barrels, leaving them momentarily suspended in the air. The mounts on the ramp cause the verticle motion to be transformed into lateral motion which translates the ramp under the suspended barrels. When the barrels drop back onto the ramp, they are at a different position on the ramp. The ramp then returns to the rest position and the barrels are now at a higher point on the ramp. Repeated cycles move the barrels up the ramp.
EIS2,
I suppose one could say, as Bill Clinton might, that it depends on what you mean my "principle." The basic principle of operation of the barrel loader, barrel car, 397 coal loader, baggage handler station, horse/cow corral, and all the "Vibrotor" accessories, etc., is all the same at the level of physics; namely, Newton's First Law of Motion. This is significant only insofar as some folks seem to believe that the devices defy gravity -- a notion that would dismay Newton who was quite a fan of gravity -- not to mention apples.
The actual design engineering does vary somewhat from accessory to accessory, but the basic principle remains the same. I stand by my posts. Any effort to try to "pull the rug out from under" my explanation will be resisted with vigor. In any event, it is clear that you now understand "how it works," and can explain same to your grandson.
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