another dumb question...

[Anonymous]

i was watching one of those pentrex videos the other day and on it showed a light engine move, 8-10 engines. anyway, one of the 'dead' ones had a flat spot on a wheel. how annoying would that be as an engineer to ride in a locomotive with a flat spot on a wheel...or is it not that noticable..?

[Anonymous]

As a conductor I have ridden on engines with flat spots. Some were not that bad and we were just told to use them and eventually the engine would find its way to a home shop for repair. The thudding of the flat spot is less noticeable at high speed due to the engine noise and other elements. When the train is moving slower and especially when it is in idle just rolling along those flat spots are very noticeable and can get quite annoying.

[Randy Stahl]

Not a dumb question... Anything over one and a half inches is a federal defect, you can start talking speed restrictions. At 2 inches you'll be breaking rail.
Randy

[Train Guy 3]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Randy Stahl

Not a dumb question... Anything over one and a half inches is a federal defect, you can start talking speed restrictions. At 2 inches you'll be breaking rail.
Randy

So if at 2 inches your breaking rail..... does that mean ya have a good chance at derailing?

[Anonymous]

I would expect at 1.5 inches you would loosen the fillings in your teeth. That must be awful fatiguing. If a flat spot is caused be brakes locking up wouldn't more than 1 wheel be affected?

[Randy Stahl]

Yea , Good chance.
Randy

[Anonymous]

We used to see flat spots in Roseville on our GP-15 switchers and had one unit that had a 12" spot on the #1 axle. It was so deep that it wouldn't even roll down a slight grade.

[Howardr]

I'm no expert and I cetainly don't know much about flat wheels but I have ridden the NYC subways enough to know that a f lat wheel is a big pain to the riders. Sounds like hell and the ride is offal. Some passengers move to another car when it's bad enough. While ridding in such a car I have ofter wondered when and if the car would derail as sometimes the train is moving at a good clip.

[zardoz]

Once somebody flattened all six axles of an SD40 at Butler. I was called to operate it light to Proviso for major repair.

Speed restriction: 10mph (for 90 miles). [zzz][zzz][zzz]

[Anonymous]

We have a flat spot on a wheel of our MILW 760 [F-M H-10-44) at the Illinois Railway Museum. I haven't ridden it with the flat spot, but the engineer who operated it on our main line for our "Diesel Days" parade of locomotives said it was pretty bumpy at 20-30mph. The engineers seat has a pretty good cushion, so the flat spot didn't shake his fillings loose.

We used this locomotive for a lot of switching duties last year, but we've used it very little since it was flat-spotted. The spot is close to, but less than 1 1/2".

Rich Witt
IRM Diesel Dept

[Anonymous]

Actually a CP rail freight car left the yard, not that long ago, with a massive Flat spot and broke all the Rail from Montreal to Smith falls, North bound track was closed for days while many crews fixed it up.

[Anonymous]

I hear many rail cars with what I would call BAD flat spots. Who / what is checking the cars for flat spots? How often are they pulled off and fixed? I have heard many that I would have thought should have been taken off the road for repair.
Comments anyone!
I have just joined this Trains forum, so thats why the delay in further comments to this item posted in August.

[Anonymous]

i haul out of a river terminal fairly often in the colder months, fertilizer mostly and they recieve all of their potash by rail. i've watched the guys down there pushing the cars around with their thingamajig, usually with half the wheels on the cars locked up. so it's pretty easy to see how flat spots are caused. i have a hard time imagining how flat spots could be caused on a locomotive though...

[eolafan]

Must do wonders for bladder control!

[Jordan6]

Believe or not we have a detector that detects "thumpers" about 42 miles north of La Crosse. I believe it goes by the sound levels. It's really pretty accuarate (disregard spelling).

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by zardoz

Once somebody flattened all six axles of an SD40 at Butler. I was called to operate it light to Proviso for major repair.

Speed restriction: 10mph (for 90 miles). [zzz][zzz][zzz]

Ya you talk about 10mph....Holy crap. You should have seen some of the ex-CNW Trains on the Cowboy Line back then.....Oh my god! You talk about a bad line back then.

[adrianspeeder]

Do you get in trouble for flatspottin them?

Adrianspeeder

[daveklepper]

rrwitt: Does IRM have a wheel lath? Branford does. And it works and is used. Maybe IRM can work out a deal to drop the axle and wheels and have someone truck the set to East Haven Connecticut and use Branford's wheel lath (actually located in Branford, but the access is at East Haven at the Sprague building, "17 River Street"). Contact:

[e-mail]

Ted Eickman is the Shop Forman

[zardoz]

QUOTE: Originally posted by adrianspeeder

Do you get in trouble for flatspottin them?

Adrianspeeder

If the cause of the flat spots is due to negligence, such as not releasing the handbrake [as MWH pointed out], or not MU'ing the power correctly, then yes; both of those situations would be prevented if the engineer did a proper brake test before leaving the diesel ramp.

If the cause is mechanical (such as a gear tooth breaking and locking the wheels enroute), then no.

[zardoz]

QUOTE: Originally posted by BNSF railfan.

QUOTE: Originally posted by zardoz

Once somebody flattened all six axles of an SD40 at Butler. I was called to operate it light to Proviso for major repair.

Speed restriction: 10mph (for 90 miles). [zzz][zzz][zzz]

Ya you talk about 10mph....Holy crap. You should have seen some of the ex-CNW Trains on the Cowboy Line back then.....Oh my god! You talk about a bad line back then.

Yes; if memory serves, didn't trains operate with a maximum speed of 5mph in some locations?

[Randy Stahl]

QUOTE: Originally posted by daveklepper

rrwitt: Does IRM have a wheel lath? Branford does. And it works and is used. Maybe IRM can work out a deal to drop the axle and wheels and have someone truck the set to East Haven Connecticut and use Branford's wheel lath (actually located in Branford, but the access is at East Haven at the Sprague building, "17 River Street"). Contact:

[e-mail]

Ted Eickman is the Shop Forman

If the flatspots are less than 1 1/2 " I wouldn't worry about it, however there are companys that will come to your site and true the wheels.
Randy