Edit post

Edit your reply below.

Post Body
Enter your post below.
I am not advocating dedicated train-sets; only pointing them out, along with automatic air couplers and bleed train lines, as having exceptional potential.  But there are a lot of drawbacks as well.  The more an industry grows and the more it becomes standardized, the harder it is to make big changes.  Yet, I think the possible big changes need to be dreamed up and kept in mind.  For a long time, it will appear that too much is stacked against them, but the big picture keeps changing, and one day all the pieces may line up to make a big change doable.  For example, there are processes in the energy business that previously were economically infeasible, yet as oil prices rise, they suddenly become economically feasible.      In regard to dedicated train-sets, that idea actually was advocated strongly by John Kneiling.  It is true that the cars need to be the same structurally throughout the train-set in terms of their weight carrying ability.  But they don't need to be the same structurally in terms of their couplers, draft gear, and the structural portion of their center sills that exceed the load carrying requirements.  I am referring to the portion of the center sill structure that is needed in order for a loose-car to withstand the pull transmitted through it if it were the first car in a long train.  I don't have exact numbers, but I suspect you could take several tons out of that car's structure if it were always the last car of the train. So in a dedicated train-set, theoretically, every car would be structurally different, with the structure and its weight diminishing from the first car to the last car.  Moreover, because dedicated train-sets would likely be shorter than average loose-car trains, all the cars in the train-set would be structurally lighter than a loose-car.  So this dedicated train-set concept does have the potential to eliminate a very significant amount of tare weight in a train.  And as fuel prices rise, this idea becomes more and more attractive.
Tags (Optional)
Tags are keywords that get attached to your post. They are used to categorize your submission and make it easier to search for. To add tags to your post type a tag into the box below and click the "Add Tag" button.
Add Tag