FRRYKidOn a railroad what dictates whether a railroad would use a rotary plow?
Really deep snow.
Layout Design GalleryLayout Design Special Interest Group
cuyama FRRYKidOn a railroad what dictates whether a railroad would use a rotary plow? Really deep snow.
FRRYKidOn a railroad what dictates whether a railroad would use a rotary plow? On a wild hare, I thought about getting an Athearn rotary. While the railroads I follow didn't use them (to the best of my knowledge, I think it would be an interesting item to add. I just wanted to know if it would be accurate for my operations not. I searched the forums and didn't find anything on that subject. Any assistance you can provide would be welcomed.
Rotaries are maintenance intensive. Sucking up something hard, like rocks, fenceposts, fallen tree limbs, what ever, breaks blades off the impeller. As long as you can ram a conventional wing plow thru the drifts, and a couple of locomotives can do a lot of ramming, you clear the line with a wing plow. The rotary comes out when the wing plows can no longer hack it. In New England we get a lot of snow but nobody needed a rotary. Out in the Rockies they get more snow, and they needed rotary plows to get thru it.
David Starr www.newsnorthwoods.blogspot.com
To use a rotary you need a lot of open space to throw the snow. So any place with narrow (50 ft or less) right of ways or built up areas would not be good candidates.
To justify the cost of a rotary, you need to have consistent really deep snow over a fairly large area (6-20 ft deep for miles). Having a few 10 ft drifts isn't enough.
Dave H. Painted side goes up. My website : wnbranch.com
Another plan might be that someone in your area does contract repair on old steam rotaries. The Athearn model being steam powered.
And would need a tender during operation. But not for repairs.
Ed
I think the prototype for the Athearn rotary was a diesel-powered rotary, but they now offer some versions with a steam engine tender, which I assume is meant to represent a steam rotary. I believe the Walthers rotary is a steam rotary.
Walthers offers a decent and reasonably-priced winged plow. I replaced some of the moulded-on detail with free-standing parts, but it's easy to build and may even be available as a r-t-r.
Here's a similar one, photographed a couple of years ago in Goderich, Ontario, right in southwestern Ontario's "snow belt":
Another option is a Jordan spreader, which in some ways is more versatile than a wedge-type plow. Walthers made a nice one, although I'm not sure if it's currently available. Since my free-lance railroad is set in southern Ontario's "snow belt", it was a good-enough excuse to buy one. Mine has been customised somewhat, and I made the wings positionable.
Wayne
dstarr Rotaries are maintenance intensive. Sucking up something hard, like rocks, fenceposts, fallen tree limbs, what ever, breaks blades off the impeller. As long as you can ram a conventional wing plow thru the drifts, and a couple of locomotives can do a lot of ramming, you clear the line with a wing plow. The rotary comes out when the wing plows can no longer hack it. In New England we get a lot of snow but nobody needed a rotary. Out in the Rockies they get more snow, and they needed rotary plows to get thru it.
They are indeed maintenance intensive, and also very slow. A full sized wing plow charging a drift is usually able to do it almost instantly. That is unless it gets completely stuck and the crew has to spend the next 3-4 hours digging out three units one by one, plus the plow, before making another run! Fortunately most of the time it is easier. But generally even the railroads that still have a rotary only use it as a final desperate resort, and that will mean they sit idle for several years in a row.
Perhaps Buffalo is not true New England, but I recall one winter, back in the late 1970s, the lake effect weather dumped so much snow that one or two rotary plows were borrowed from western roads. A year or two back they were also used to open some branches on the plains, in North or South Dakota.
John
This isn't American but it might be fun to watch how it was done in the 1950's:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ugIoMD495E
I'd think the steam locos to be preferrable, as snow and electrical equipment aren't especially compatible.
Canadian National applied shielding to some plow-service geeps...
....but seemed to prefer F-units, when they were still common, for such service.
They have some really great Plow action videos on You tube, I think the answer to your question is that the railroads use the plows to keep the tracks open when the snow or drifts get to deep.
Thayne
Here is a video of some spectacular snow plowing action in Switzerland, shot in the 1930´s on the Bernina narrow gauge line:
watch?feature=playerembedded&v=iy HIUljPos
LION has been told that once you use a rotary on the line, you must continue to use it all winter, so my understanding it that even where they are used, they are a last resort. NYCT does have modern Jet operated snow blowers that are good for blowing ballast into standing equipment or into the neighbor's windows. Sound a sleep, and all of a sudden a rock flies through your window, it wakes you up and your house gets very cold. The NYCT snow-blower just went past!
The Route of the Broadway Lion The Largest Subway Layout in North Dakota.
Here there be cats. LIONS with CAMERAS
Well, I always considered Buffalo to be Mid Atlantic rather than New England, and those lake effect storms have a very bad rep. I can believe they might need a rotary or two to clean up after a serious lake effect storm.
FRRYKidI obtained a Walthers wing plow and am working on an F7B unit. I have come up with yet another question for operating a wing plow: When using an F7B unit to run a wing plow, are there any modifications that would need to be made to the unit in order to run it properly? Thank you as always for your assistance with my inquiry.
A F7B ia a booster unit meant to be controlled from a unit that has a cab. The "hostler" controls they are equipped with are meant only for limited use in a yard to move them where needed.
I doubt an F7B would be used alone to push a snowplow. If used with a snowplow, it would be used in conjunction with a cab unit. Most likely a F7A, although any unit with a cab that it could be MU'ed with would work. For instance a GP.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The blades on Southern Pacific Rotary Snowplows (still kept at Roseville CA for potential use by the Union Pacific on Donner) are electrically powered. Each plow is accompiaed by a modified B unit called a "snail". The B unit does not have traction motors. It's purpose is to generate electricty to run the rotary blade. The combination is moved by locomotives that have cabs.
Some of the SP rotaries have movable wings so they can plow a wider path.
I tried to sell my two cents worth, but no one would give me a plug nickel for it.
I don't have a leg to stand on.
On the Sierra Nevada Mountains in California, SP (now UP) has one stationed atr Roseville, just east of Sacramento nd one in Sparks just east of Reno, Nevada. They are called out only when the "Storm King" rors over the mountains and the flangers and Jordon Spreaders can not handle the snow. In January 1952 one got stuck when hit by an avalance when trying to free the City Of San Fancisco which was stuck near Donner Lake.
FRRYKidDSchmitt, I have seen pictures of wing plows with B units running them. Is it possible that via MU connections that the B unit can be controlled from the cab of the wing plow therefore eliminating the need for anyone in the B unit?
I didn't think of that. Possible, but the only photos I found with B units were rotaries. The B's were probably all "snails" although I can't confirm that.
I believe it's called a "wedge plow" not a "wing plow"?? There are two types, one for single track that clears snow to either side, and one for double track that only sends the snow to one side.
A plow operator didn't just sit up there in the cupola and enjoy the view. Depending on where the plow is being used, the wing blades might need to be retracted for lineside obstacles and the flanger blades lifted for road crossings, bridge guardrails, and turnouts.
There's a very interesting discussion on snow plows HERE with photos and diagrams showing insights into the operation of rotary plows. Evidently, in steam days, the plow operators did, indirectly, control the locomotive via whistle signals and operation of the locomotive's brakes, so it's entirely possible that a crew member in the plow could control a diesel using suitable mu connections.
wjstix I think the prototype for the Athearn rotary was a diesel-powered rotary, but they now offer some versions with a steam engine tender, which I assume is meant to represent a steam rotary. I believe the Walthers rotary is a steam rotary.
It's steam.
Note in the photos on the Athearn site that there's safety valves in the roof and a steam exhaust stack at the rear of the roof. There's also a smokebox face on the rear of the model--not something usually applied to a diesel. UP, Rock Island, and Soo bought these. Here's a shot of a UP version:
Note that there's still pop valves showing on the roof. And there's the tender, of course.
And in this picture of a sister plow (same model) you'll note the smokebox projecting from the rear of the plow and the water hose between it and its tender:
The following is from the STMFC Yahoo Group (in reference to the Athearn model):
Locations that didn't normally see rotary plow use did (do) see such use when the weather requires. I grew up near Freeport, Illinois and somewhere in the mid to late 1960's we had a serious blizzard. The Milwaukee tracks running NE from Freeport (through Dakota, Davis, and toward Beloit) were filled with snow at every cut. The Milwaukee brought in a rotary. Dad worked for the IC and knew it was coming, and we went over and watched from the parallel Route 75. Definately a show!
The IC main, running more east-west to Chicago, wasn't troubled quite as bad by that snow. Usually, when Dad got called out for a plow extra it was using a Jordan Spreader. There was a Jordan Spreader based there in Freeport on the IC. I'm not sure where the Milwaukee had that rotary based, but possibly in Savannah.
Bill