The colors themselves have no significance...they're the owner's (or lessee's) choice. Of course, that will be garbled when the operations change. I've seen plenty of coal trains with a large portion of the rainbow applied to different cars therein.A lot of these panels are not painted, but have vinyl applications of the appropriate color.An added point...older dumpers couldn't handle these cars, as they were smaller, and didn't rotate along the coupler line. If you see a train with the rotary couplers not all properly oriented, it's probably going to a place like this, where the cars have to be spotted and separated in the dumper. And one time I was the lucky guy who had to help make the air hoses at each joint before we hauled them out of the plant.If two rotary couplers are coupled together, the entire coupling is likely to swivel. It doesn't cause any operational difficulties until the cars are separated, and an attempt is made to couple them to something else. Been there, didn't do that...
Carl
Railroader Emeritus (practiced railroading for 46 years--and in 2010 I finally got it right!)
CAACSCOCOM--I don't want to behave improperly, so I just won't behave at all. (SM)
The industry term for the coloured panel is "stripe". As in "when switching is performed on unit trains of rotary dumping equipment the striping must be kept intact". It's not just coal, our bulk solid sulphur trains use the same type of car though the two fleets cannot be mixed (cross contamination is very bad for both products) and I have never seen a double rotary sulphur car.
These cars have both air hoses on the same side of the car, and the double rotaries are supposed to have them on the opposite sides from those on a normal freight car (some double rotaries have extra air hoses, one on each side of the drawbar at both ends of the car). So, in theory, a properly striped train should not have any air hoses coupled under the drawbars. These cars also have longer air hoses than most normal freight cars, so that they can reach around and not pull apart each time a car is dumped.
Some older rotary dumping car designs have the air hoses mounted farther away from the drawbars, so it is difficult if not impossible to couple them together under the drawbars. Sometimes a short hose extension (Dutchman?) has to be used in this situation.
I've never seen any rhyme or reason as to the colour choice or size of the stripe. It must be a customer option, just like any other paint scheme.
As you may have guessed, I used to work in a terminal with quite a bit of coal traffic, and making sure the trains were striped properly was a big part of our job. If a train came in with mixed up stripes we were required to switch them out, and either turn some cars on a wye or switch them to the other side of the double rotary, so that there were no two solid drawbars coupled together anywhere in the train. Sometimes a train would arrive without a double rotary, and if there weren't any spares on hand it would have to go out that way.
If the dumper crew doesn't notice this can happen. I believe both these trains originated from the mines I worked to, though I was working elsewhere at the time:
http://princerupertrailimages.blogspot.com/2010/03/why-they-mark-cars-with-rotary-couplers.html?m=1
The red marker light is lit on 8022, indicating that it is the DP remote on the tail end of the train:
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-aGZPdcABzGY/Txxj4oj6gJI/AAAAAAAAA48/NKF38i130Uk/s1600/rb1.jpg
Greetings from Alberta
-an Articulate Malcontent
I'm not sure if there's any significance to the color.
Some cars have a colored panel at each end to signify that both ends are equipped with a rotary coupler, to allow for cars that are oriented in the wrong direction to still be utilized without a lot of extra work to rearrange everything.
A double rotary is also obviously necessary if a locomotive would otherwise have been coupled to the non-rotary equipped end of a car.
BaltACD The painted panels signify which end of the car has the rotary coupler. A number of unloading locations have rotary dumpers where the cars are turned upside down to empty their contents - with unit train service it is desired that the cars remain coupled for this operation. With rotary couplers this can be done. The painted ends SHOULD ALL be on the same directional end of the car throughout the train.
Yes, the painted panels are all on the same directional end of the car throughout the train. And they are unit trains.
Why would there be different colors, i.e. white, green, red, etc. on the same unit train?
On the UP main, I see at least two very long coal unit trains eastbound and two empties westbound daily.
JPS1Coal traffic is down for sure. But it is not dead. I see at least two coal trains a week moving through Temple, TX, which is my favorite train watching spot during the warmer months. Many of the cars have all or part of a panel at the end of the car painted a standout color, i.e. white, yellow, blue, red. What does this signify?
The painted panels signify which end of the car has the rotary coupler. A number of unloading locations have rotary dumpers where the cars are turned upside down to empty their contents - with unit train service it is desired that the cars remain coupled for this operation. With rotary couplers this can be done. The painted ends SHOULD ALL be on the same directional end of the car throughout the train.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
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