Bob
I know using the MR is a good practice, but with the
air dumps, you are stopped, when dumping most of the
time anyway. With a spreader behind the air dumps
(which it usually is) it was "buried", so that the
higher trainline pressure was used. When you got the
big air tank on the spreader charged up, you could
move the wings and etc. a lot before the brakes would
start to set,(when the trainline pressure dropped to
75 psi or so). Also, the reason for the 3 hoses on the
air dumps was to set them up so that they could all be
dumped at once if so desired. This was a real
advantage when working on a high fill so that a man
didn't have go along side the train and dump each car
one by one. He could dump the all string from the end.
But you are right, using the MR was the best way to do
it but the old heads did like they still had steam
engines so that was the way I learned it!
John
--- amtrak347@a... wrote:
> In a message dated 10/10/02 12:35:31 PM Central
> Daylight Time,
> cbqrr47@y... writes:
>
>
> > Marshall
> > In work train service with air operated equipment
> (air
> > dumps, spreaders, rail loaders, etc.), the feed
> valve
> > was set up to 110 psi, so-called "passenger air"
> and
> > the throttle was set in notch 3 or so when the
> unit
> > was stopped, to give plenty of air.
> > John
> >
>
> Marshall, John -
> Screwing the feed valve up to "passenger air" should
> have been used only when
> the air operated equipment was buried in the train.
> Of course, in this
> situation, anytime the spreader or air dumps were
> actuated, the brakes would
> set on the balance of the train and you couldn't
> move until the air was
> pumped-up (great move when you're on overtime). The
> ideal situation is when
> the dumps or spreader are coupled to the engine,
> then the locomotive main
> reservoir MU hose could be coupled and charge that
> huge air reservoir on the
> spreader or air dumps. All the air-operated
> equipment I saw, had stenciled
> on the air tank "Tested to 150 psi" and considering
> the locomotive MR
> maintained between 130 & 140 psi air pressure, this
> was well within the range
> of safe operation. The rear of the spreaders had
> two air hoses, one for the
> trainline (brakes) and one for the reservoir (to
> control wings,
> plow/flanger). The air dumps had three hoses on
> each end of the car; one
> trainline and two reservoir hoses. Usually you see
> the two reservoir hoses
> coupled together under the drawbar at each end of
> the car. A work train with
> more than one air dump should have the reservoir
> hoses coupled between each
> car and then to the MR on the engine for optimum
> performance. Each piece of
> equipment had a valve between the reservoir and the
> trainline that determined
> the source of air supply. Determining this source
> required a little bit of
> effort/planning on the part of the person in charge
> of the work train. In
> practice, though, be it a lack of knowledge or
> laziness, the locomotive MR MU
> hose, generally, was not used, and the spreader/air
> dump reservoirs were
> charged off the trainline.
> Bob
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been
> removed]
>
>
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