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Reply to "White painted tracks"

Number 90 posted:

During high temperature periods, railroads, these days, enforce reduced speeds for trains, and send Track Inspectors out in a Hy-Rail, twice daily on busy main tracks, and sometimes ahead of each train (especially HAZ trains) on lesser-used tracks, if personnel are available.  And, if you go down to your local heavy duty main track, you will see rail anchors clipped to the rail between ties, to keep rail from creeping.

In the past, when all track was jointed rail, there was also a section gang about every 10 or 15 miles, and they patrolled the track in very hot temperatures.  The Section Foreman also knew his territory, and that included knowing where any track buckling was most likely to occur based on track condition and engineering.  Jointed rail has the ability to absorb a small amount of linear expansion and contraction, more than welded rail.

A bit of railroadiana here. Dad went to work for the BR&P in 1928, first as a section hand and quickly as the Cook on a camp train. As such he got to know about track. When laying or re-laying rail the gap at each joint was adjusted according to a temperature chart. The lower the temperature at the time of the work the wider the gap was set, to allow for expansion at higher ambient temperatures. The gap was carefully measured using a set of feeler gauges each section foreman kept.

Lew

OGR Publishing, Inc., 1310 Eastside Centre Ct, Suite 6, Mountain Home, AR 72653
800-980-OGRR (6477)
www.ogaugerr.com

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