Oil Train

[daveklepper]

There is less demand for specialized long-throw "cushioned" draft gear today because normal draft gear has been greatly improved and has much of thle characteristics of the specialized draft gear.  Both improved design and improved materials.

Chains and buffers would not be an improvement and would be less safe in coupling and uncoupling.

[Electroliner 1935]

If you look at "UNIT" Coal trains for utility generating stations, one frequently sees "foreign" cars in their consist. This is as stated above, you cut a Bad Order car out and substitute another car. Train cycle continues with the ordered amount of coal. If you had to tie up a large block of drawbar connected cars for one bad axle, it becomes less efficient. And adds delays. Agreed that it requires more couplers and brake hoses etc. But that choice has been make by intelligent bean counters who made valid studies. There was an oil train that ran in captive service on the SP with intercar hoses that let the train be loaded and unloaded from one end. Remember seeing pictures in Trains back in the fifties I think. I think that train had coupled cars. 

[Euclid]

Solid drawbars might be part of a solution that would require lots of other changes in how things are done.  Solid drawbars would be an example of a radical change.  So would ECP brakes; or an entirely different tank car design; or improved tank car suspension. 

You don’t just drop these radical changes into a business as usual model.  Business as usual would have a hundred reasons why the radical change couldn’t be done.  So a radical change would need to be part of a whole system of changes that all reinforce the possibility of each other and make each other possible.  It would be a whole system of changes that would each reduce the probability of a derailment to some extent.    

If the oil train problem is just a lot made up hype, I don’t know if any solution is needed.  But I get the feeling that a solution will be required even if the problem is just hype.  Whatever solution that ends up being, I would think it will need to be seen as catching up with the problem. 

At ten oil train wrecks per year, I don’t see how strengthening tank cars is going to catch up with the problem.  Increasing the tank wall gets contentious above 9/16”, and that has suddenly been deemed insufficient.  Nobody knows what DOT will require or when they will require it.   Maybe inspection and detection could catch up, but I have no idea if it could.  If not, maybe a radical change might be the only solution.   

[BaltACD]

My understanding was that the SP's Tank Train was 40 cars long?  What was it's unloading time?

The oil terminal on my territory is emptying 3 100 car trains per 24 hour period.  I have not viewed their equipment or procedure.  All I know is that several hundred miles of railroad are being severly congested with oil trains - both loaded and empty.

What, if any, operational improvements my carrier will make to handle this business more efficiently is as yet unknown.

[Paul_D_North_Jr]

The Buckeye Albany Terminal (NY) off of the CSX Kenwood branch routinely empties 96+/- 'normal' tank cars of ethanol by gravity (only) in an 8 - 10 hour daytime shift, and no one seems to be in a big hurry during that operation, either.

- Paul North. 

[Paul_D_North_Jr]

Some of these 'advances' - mainly drawbars, on intermodal cars, and maybe some coal hoppers - have been in use for almost 25 - 30 years now, and the industry has adapted to and even embraced them. 

Others are still in the embryonic stage - e.g., ECP brakes.

I'd be more convinced that some 'improvements' are impractical if a development and test program - such as at the AAR's (former name, I can't remember the current version) test track at Pueblo, Colorado, or an FRA-sponsored program on a Class 1, or even a Class 1's own efforts - after 5 or 10 years of genuine and honest effort was to conclude that it's "not ready for prime time", or uneconomic generally, or only in certain specific conditions, etc.  For example, BNSF's PTC test program on a branch line that ran for 10 years or so, starting in the 1990's.  Another example that has been adopted are the "jump" frogs / OWLS crossing frogs, etc. - I'd have given that concept the proverbial 'snowball's chance', but they seem to have won over a decent portion of the industry.

As an EMD guy once said (I recall that it was Dick Dilworth): "One test is worth a thousand opinions."  Back in the day, EMD was all about being a "disrupter' (to use the current vernacular) and imposing "It can't be done !" change on the industry from the outside. 

- Paul North.   

[tree68]

BaltACD

All I know is that several hundred miles of railroad are being severly congested with oil trains - both loaded and empty.

A loaded oil train sat on the Mohawk, Adirondack & Northern at Utica for almost a week, apparently waiting its turn to be emptied.  Putting it there involved a 2+ mile push move, so they must have been desperate.

[Euclid]

It seems to me that the tide is turning away from solving the oil train problem with stronger tank cars, and toward a solution by the use of ECP brakes.  Both solutions are advocated by the USDOT, but the industry is strongly opposed to ECP brakes to make oil trains safer.

There is also opposition to increasing the tank car wall to over 9/16”.  But since that number has demonstrated to be inadequate, the quest for a solution is moving to ECP brakes.  Unlike increasing the wall thickness, ECP brakes do not reduce the payload of the tank cars, but the direct cost of ECP brakes is objectionable to the industry.

I speculate that part of that objection may lie in worry that an ECP mandate for oil trains may eventually be extended to all railroad equipment to universally replace conventional pneumatically controlled brakes. 

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2015/03/01/oi-train-crashes-loveless/24179333/

Quotes from the link: 

But a former Obama administration official who played a key role in writing the U.S. proposals says that for all the talk about increasing the thickness and durability of tank cars, the more vital consideration may be putting better brakes on those trains.

"The more I think about it, the more I think that the ECP brakes may be more important than the tank car itself, because it would stop the pileup of the cars when there's a derailment or when there's a need to brake in a very quick fashion," Cynthia Quarterman, who stepped down last year as the head of the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA), told me the other day.

 

"When I was in government and today I continue to say that the question is more complicated than just the tank car," said Quarterman, who at PHMSA, which is part of DOT, oversaw development of the pending government policy. "It really needs a multifaceted solution."

The DOT rulemaking took such a broad approach, proposing tanker cars with thicker shells to resist puncture, new fittings to stop valves from leaking, lower speed limits for oil trains and advance notice for local safety officials when the trains are headed for their communities.

But Quarterman says she's increasingly convinced that better braking is the key to the solution.

"These brakes help stop each car individually," she said. "The big cause for these incidents when they happen is you get the pileup, all the cars run into each other, and crash one upon the other upon the other. These new ECP brakes will have control of each tank car so you won't have that kind of pileup."

[Randy Stahl]

She's wrong. all opinion and baseless guessing on her part. There is no evidence to support her claims as to the behavior of a derailing freight train with ECP brakes. The saddest part is that she got to the press with this.

[Dakguy201]

Ms. Quarterman's argument for better brakes is something of a reach.  Say a given accident results in a pile of 12 oil tankers on fire.  If we equip the train with ECP brakes, perhaps the result is only 8 cars in the pile and on fire.  The better brakes did not materially change the result of the accident.  

There may be many reasons to require a brake change, but I don't think the problem with oil trains is solved by better brakes. 

[Norm48327]

"The big cause for these incidents when they happen is you get the pileup, all the cars run into each other, and crash one upon the other upon the other. These new ECP brakes will have control of each tank car so you won't have that kind of pileup."

Her lack of knowledge of the laws of physics is obvious.

[Euclid]

ECP brakes offer the following advantages over PCP brakes:

 

1)    Fewer derailments due to fewer undesired emergency applications.

 

2)    Fewer derailments due to better slack control, which results from brakes applying simultaneously on all cars.

 

3)    Reduction of jackknifing and pileup due to simultaneous brake application ahead of and behind the derailment.

 

4)    Reduction of jackknifing and pileup due to reduction of the stopping time, which is due to the simultaneous application.

 

5)    Reduction of jackknifing and pileup due to a delay in its onset, because of the elimination of severe slack run-in (such run-in depending on where the derailment is located in the train).   

 

 

I agree that these advantages might only reduce the number of derailed cars, and it only takes one to start a fire.  But the fewer cars in the heap, the smaller the fire will be.  This is because fire can spread easily in the heaped cars stacked like cordwood in a fireplace, but not as easily to cars strung out in a line. 

[edblysard]

 Once the train is in emergency braking, no matter what type of

brake system put it there, the remaining actions/reactions will depend totally on the weight, speed and mass of the train.

EPC brakes are great at helping control braking during normal train movement, but so far, most carriers have decided that the small increase in performance do not justify the expense of the system.

In emergency situations, they do little to mitigate the damage....once the train is in emergency, and the brakes are on completely you are at the mercy of Newton's third law.

Once the friction overcomes the forward momentum, the train will begin to stop.

EPC will do little to aid that.

I guess the Westinghouse system, working at the speed of sound, isn't fast enough?

[dehusman]

A 100 car train is roughly 6000 feet long.  The emergency application propogates at about 900 ft/sec.  Since the emergency propogates in both directions from a train separation, it effectively moves at about 1800 ft/sec.  That takes about 3-4 sec to propogate through the entire train.  Since the brakes are setting while that is happening, there is some brake application during that period.  Assuming a linear propogation, that is effectively 1/2 braking force for 3-4 seconds, then full braking after that.

Assuming 40 mph, that's about 1 car per second (59 ft/sec).  Assuming that the braking effort while setting has no effect on the speed of the train, the train will move about 4 car lengths during that 4 sec.

The millions to buy ECP is buying you about 4 sec of increasing the brake force from half to full effort and about 3-4 cars, 200-250 ft of distance before the brakes begin applying. 

Once the brakes are fully applied, the braking rates between the conventional and ECP trains will be nearly identical.

[dehusman]

Euclid

1)    Fewer derailments due to fewer undesired emergency applications.

I don't see that since there is still all the parts of the conventional brake system in place, most of the UDE's are caused by failures in the air hoses and train lines, and theose will remain.  It actually adds one more route of failure, the control system for the ECP system, so the opportunity for failure is greater with the ECP system than without it.

2)    Fewer derailments due to better slack control, which results from brakes applying simultaneously on all cars.

 

I agree for cases when the train air is being used, there will be reduced slack (but not eliminated since gravity trumps ECP), in cases where dynamic braking is being used, the performance and slack would be the same since ECP has no interaction with ECP (unless it is some form of blended braking).

 

3)    Reduction of jackknifing and pileup due to simultaneous brake application ahead of and behind the derailment.

Don't understand this one since if the train derails, the emergency applicationis automaticaly propogated in both directions, front and rear simultaneously, with conventional brakes.  How that prevents jacknifing, I don't understand.  The jackniking is caused by the rear of the train running into the derailed cars, not necessarily the head end cars.  ECP will not prevent the derailed cars from stopping.  It will incrementally start the brake application quicker in the rear portion, but the brakeing curve will be the same (sme brake valve, same brake pressure, same brake shoes, same wheels, same friction on the same rails).

 

4)    Reduction of jackknifing and pileup due to reduction of the stopping time, which is due to the simultaneous application. 

The jacknifing is due to the derailed cars stopping more quickly than the rear of the train (higher coefficient of friction shoving a car across the dirt than on the rail).  A very common arrangement after a derailment is the head end, on the rails, one or two derailed cars attached to the head end, a gap in the train, the pile of cars, then the rear of the trains.  The pile was caused by the rear running into the derailed cars, not the head end.

 

 

 

[/quote]

[Buslist]

dehusman

A 100 car train is roughly 6000 feet long.  The emergency application propogates at about 900 ft/sec.  Since the emergency propogates in both directions from a train separation, it effectively moves at about 1800 ft/sec.  That takes about 3-4 sec to propogate through the entire train.  Since the brakes are setting while that is happening, there is some brake application during that period.  Assuming a linear propogation, that is effectively 1/2 braking force for 3-4 seconds, then full braking after that.

Assuming 40 mph, that's about 1 car per second (59 ft/sec).  Assuming that the braking effort while setting has no effect on the speed of the train, the train will move about 4 car lengths during that 4 sec.

The millions to buy ECP is buying you about 4 sec of increasing the brake force from half to full effort and about 3-4 cars, 200-250 ft of distance before the brakes begin applying. 

Once the brakes are fully applied, the braking rates between the conventional and ECP trains will be nearly identical.

 

 

Oh come on who cares about facts?

If you ever listened to Car Talk on NPR the Click and Clack brothers had an interesting question. When someone posts an erroneous opinion in a blog and someone else posts an equally errouneous response, do we know more or less as a result of the posts?

[Euclid]

I understand that once the emergency application is made, there will be no difference between the effect of ECP versus PCP brakes.  Whether there is enough difference prior to an emergency application to justify ECP brakes is the pertinent question.  No single solution is going to be the answer.  So, as the article says, PHSMA is seeking a multi-faceted solution.  In my opinion, ECP brakes will offer a vast improvement compared to the improvements in the 1232 tank car that have been implemented. 

In my list of ECP brake advantages above, I speculate that item #3 will be the most advantageous.  I will also add to the list item #5, which I think would be the second most advantageous factor. 

Item # 5: Reduction of jackknifing and pileup due to a delay in its onset, because of the elimination of severe slack run-in caused by the PCP sequential application (such run-in depending on where the derailment is located in the train).   

[jeffhergert]

I have no statistics, but I think most cars that derail because of severe slack action, whether from train handling or an emergency application, will be an empty car.  Even then, it's going to be an empty that's in a train consisting of mixed loaded and empty cars.

As to slack, I just don't think there's that much in an oil train.  I think going to draw bar connected cars isn't going to gain you that much.  It could cause more headache than it's worth if you make the blocks of drawbar connected cars to big.  Not from needing slack to start (I've only had to take slack 3 or 4 times since I went into engine service in 2004. All of those times were from having an unplanned stop on the side of a heavy [for us "flat landers" anyway] grade with a heavy train.), but from what to do with the blocks/train when a detector sniffs out a defect that needs to be set out.  Plant rationalization has reduced a lot of set out points to just a few cars, assuming MOW doesn't have them locked out with machinery.  Even if you can set out the block, all the other loads in good cars are delayed.  Not only from sitting waiting for the car men to fix the defect, but also now those cars are most likely going to continue to their destination using the manifest (loose car) system.  Instead of one train to their destination, they may now see a few yards and trains to get their.

I don't want to even think about cars with special couplers that won't interface with normal couplers.  Set one of those babies out on line, and you are either going to have to have the capacity to install a temporary compatible normal coupler or hope a train with the same equipment comes along soon after it's repaired.  Some places that might not be a problem.  Other places, it might be.  Some routes might only see a unit train once a week, or the destination may only receive a train that uses a particular route weekly.  (An originating point may send trains to a few different receivers.  A receiving point may get trains from different originating points.)

Jeff

 

[BroadwayLion]

jeffhergert

I don't want to even think about cars with special couplers that won't interface with normal couplers. Set one of those babies out on line, and you are either going to have to have the capacity to install a temporary compatible normal coupler or hope a train with the same equipment comes along soon after it's repaired. Some places that might not be a problem. Other places, it might be. Some routes might only see a unit train once a week, or the destination may only receive a train that uses a particular route weekly. (An originating point may send trains to a few different receivers. A receiving point may get trains from different originating points.)

Of the transit type couplers espoused by the LION, they couple and uncouple in the field just like any other coupler. It is a coupler after all! You use a key in stead of a bar to open it. No big deal, any CR can do it. Each car does have a "mini=knuckle" that fits into the coupler to allow connection to other equipment. --[It *is* Railroad equipment, designed and used by railroaders == they know how to make things work.]--

The ones that I have seen on the LIRR or MNCR are rather small things, so you will not go fast or far or pull a heavy load, but you can get a car back to the nearest yard if you tack it on to the back of any train.

You can see a pair of such adapter knuckles hanging to the left of the coupler on this LIRR service/protect locomotive.

ROAR

[Euclid]

Dave,

I understand your points.  My item #4 just means that the trains stops quicker so the hind end cars have less time to feed cars into the derailment.

Regarding my item #3: The reduction in jackknifing would result from delaying its onset to the extent that it is caused by more braking ahead of the derailment than behind it, due to sequential application of PCP brakes.  Any delay in the onset of jackknifing gives more time for the braking and the derailed cars to dissipate kinetic energy; so once jackknifing begins, its duration will be shorter, and the pileup will include fewer cars.     

[zugmann]

I wonder if the ECP brake movement kind of went out the window due to more AC engines with extended range dynamics being added to the roster.  Those things are amazing.  

If you have older DC engines and are going down a grade, even with full dynamics applied, there are many times you have to squeeze 10# or so on.  The newer AC engines?  Half the time you have to back off the dynamics so you don't stop.  

Granted I don't work in any severre grade territory, but we have a couple hills that have been known to stall trains out.

[BroadwayLion]

Euclid

Regarding my item #3: The reduction in jackknifing would result from delaying its onset to the extent that it is caused by more braking ahead of the derailment than behind it, due to sequential application of PCP brakes. Any delay in the onset of jackknifing gives more time for the braking and the derailed cars to dissipate kinetic energy; so once jackknifing begins, its duration will be shorter, and the pileup will include fewer cars.

In experience of LION (for whatever that is worth) trains do not derail because they jackknife, they jackknife because they derailed. Most deralments (that I have read about) are probably laid at the doorstep of MOW (collisions notwithstanding).

Something in the middle derails, and you have a jackknifed accordion before any emergency brakes (to say nothing of service brakes) can begin to apply. Thus the LION's *SUGGESTION* of Guard rails (inside the gauge) and guard timbers (outside of the gauge). You tell me this is not practicle, and that it will not work anyway. OK, LION can accept that, scratch that Idea. Does anybody have any other ideas?

PS. It works on railroad of LION, but then what is railroad of LION except a toy train up in the attic.

 

ROAR

[schlimm]

jeffhergert

I have no statistics

 

"In this paper, we have examined the probabilities of derailment for freight trains and freight cars as affected by train length, train speed, and positioning of cars within the consist. "

 http://railtec.illinois.edu/CEE/pdf/Conference%20Proceedings/2005/Anderson%20and%20Barkan%202005.pdf

and another:

http://www.afpm.org/uploadedFiles/Content/Policy_Positions/Agency_Comments/Documents/AFPM%20CBR%20Comments%20and%20Exhibits.pdf

[dehusman]

Euclid

Item # 5: Reduction of jackknifing and pileup due to a delay in its onset, because of the elimination of severe slack run-in caused by the PCP sequential application (such run-in depending on where the derailment is located in the train).   

 

Only if the run in is causing the jacknifing.  Based on my experience and all the reports I've read, that has not been the case.

 

Here's a thought.

 

The derailment is detected when the train goes in emergency (regardless of brake system.) 

What causes the emergency brake application?  Normally the brake application happens when the air hoses between the cars become uncoupled. 

What has to happen to get the air hoses to uncouple? Normally either the air hoses are dragging on the ground or the cars are at such an angle to each other that the hoses are pulled apart.

If the cars are at an angle to each other great enough to cause the air hoses to come apart, the baby is pretty much born, they are in the process of jacknifing already. 

Since air hoses are generally high enough to clear the top of rail when the car is on the rail, they air hoses are high enough to clear the top of the ties when derailed.  The only way they come uncoupled is to catch on something on the top of the tie.  If that is a switch or a road crossing then the impact may knock the wheels out from under the car, cause the derailed car to go off the ends of the ties or cause the car to be skewed to one side or the other.  Pretty much in each of those cases, the jacknife is in progress.

It is only in the very small group of derailments where the derailed car remains upright, in line and on the ties there the slack might be a contributing cause to the pileup.

 

ECP doesn't stop slack, it reduces it.  ECP doesn't apply the brakes any harder, it just applies them at near the same time.  In a mixed freight train there will still be slack because different weight cars will stop at different rates.  In a unit train the stopping will be be much more uniform because the cars are typically a near uniform weight, and may have similar brake systems with similar brake shoes.

 

You are over emphasizing the role slack plays in the train dynamics of the derailment and the jacknifing.

 

 

[Randy Stahl]

The biggest problem are the double shelf couplers. I've seen many minor derailments turned into major derailments because the cars would not come apart and pop the air hoses apart, double shelf couplers insure that most (if not all) of the train will derail. If the idea is to get the train into emergency and the brakes applied this is a problem. I'd rather have the cars come apart and leave at least some of the cars on the track.

 

Now I understand why they are there but I don't think it was well thought out.

[tree68]

Here's your derailment dynamics right here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-smEEHYdGQ

This is the well known video of the train hit by a tornado.  What's important for this discussion is at the end - where the trailing part of the train, whose brake line is clearly disconnected (which means the trailing part of the train is in emergency) piles into the locomotives.  Note that the car that hits the locomotive is also derailed and being pushed by the consist behind it.  Note, too,  the accordian pile-up that follows.

 

[schlimm]

 

"Cars positioned near the front or rear of a train have the lowest probability of being derailed in a derailment. As train length is decreased or train speed is increased, the conditional probability of derailment increases for all cars within the train consist." 

[zugmann]

schlimm

 

"Cars positioned near the front or rear of a train have the lowest probability of being derailed in a derailment. As train length is decreased or train speed is increased, the conditional probability of derailment increases for all cars within the train consist." 

 

I'm wondering how they figured that one out.

If you have a 5 car train at any speed and hit a broken rail, there's a good chance you're going to have all 5 cars derailed.  

 

While a 50 car train at the same speed, the rear cars are going to stop long before they hit the point of the broken rail.

 

 I'm nto saying the statistic is wrong, but the way it is presented may be misleading.

[schlimm]

zugmann

I'm nto saying the statistic is wrong, but the way it is presented may be misleading.

It was pretty clear, but check the article linked above.  The article is fairly short.

[Euclid]

Dave,

I understand your point about item #5.  The only time it would apply is if the brake hoses parted prior to the cars separating because once they separate, jackknifing would begin.  So it would be too late for an ECP caused subdued slack run-in to help.  And I can see your point that most of the time, the hoses will not part until the cars separate.