HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE SEPTEMBER 2008 ISSUE
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RSI/CMA Preview: What's ahead in R&D
America takes the train, and railroads are enjoying the ride
Industry attendees will gather at the Hilton Chicago & Towers Hotel Sept. 21-24 for Global Railway Tech 2008, marking “The RSI in its 100th Year.” They’ll also participate in the 47th Annual Technical Conference of the Coordinated Mechanical Associations, including The Air Brake Association, International Association of Railway Operating Officers, Locomotive Maintenance Officers Association, and Mechanical Association Railcar Technical Services. Together, the participants will pursue an ever-moving goal: making the most efficient form of land transportation more efficient still.
In some ways, the pressure is more intense than ever, paradoxically because America’s railroads have benefited from heightened public interest during 2008, prompted by the nation’s energy outlook and angst. The Class I’s and their suppliers have been long-distance marathon runners in the never-ending race to improve efficiency, but few outside the industry have taken notice.
The 10,000-foot train’s a-comin’
“How do you stop something that long?” an average onlooker might ask when observing a coal consist or container train of great length—and getting longer. BNSF Director-Train Handling/Operating Practices Bill Barrington will provide some answers to professionals asking the same question by evaluating “Distributed Power Test on 10,000 Foot Trains,” one of the featured sessions on the agenda for The Air Brake Association.
“We had a previous limit with the distance between the lead locomotive and a distant locomotive of 8,500 feet,” Barrington says. “Intermodal equipment could handle a little more distance, perhaps, but not much.” BNSF has conducted a series of tests “to make sure the brake pipe and the distance is conducive to safe operation” while intermodal trains cover ground at speeds up to 70 mph.
Barrington will review some of the test results during the session, but he notes that BNSF currently runs two intermodal trains of 10,000-foot length per day from Long Beach, Calif., to either Chicago or Kansas City. Barrington also notes that the increased length of such trains, and their contribution to improved goods movement, generates some wonder among even professionals, let alone the casual wayside watcher. “They’re hard to photograph,” he quips.
Norfolk Southern was first among Class I’s in applying electronically controlled pneumatic (ECP) braking technology to its trains. BNSF followed soon afterward; both railroads, along with a representative from the Federal Railroad Administration, will provide an update on their results so far during a “Joint Session on ECP Brakes.”
NS Superintendent of Air Brakes Jamie Williams says the session will “look into the components themselves, the equipment involved, and what we’ve seen and experienced in getting the equipment out on the railroad and out into operation.” From NS’s vantage point, that includes “where we are today, what lanes we’re moving in, and what the future holds for NS with ECP.”
Inside the (virtual?) cab
Simulators have become as much a part of the railroad industry as anywhere else, but “Remote Control Locomotive Simulators” will highlight the efforts to use one new technology to maximize the effectiveness of another. Union Pacific Director-Train Handling Improvement Keith Jensen says that the young, and perhaps young at heart, comfortable with “Gameboy” technology might see how such leisure skills can translate to the workday world.
“Simulation tools, across the board, help employees on so many levels,” Jensen asserts. “In the yard, or on the road, they help with rule proficiency, and with safety in general. The simulations build confidence. And with price of fuel moving as it has, we’re getting into the whole issue of less fuel being used.” The economic, environmental, and safety aspects are, separately and together, too enticing to ignore.
Moreover, UP employees are enthusiastic about RCL simulation. “There’s not a day goes by that I don’t get a call from some employee thrilled over what they’ve learned,” Jensen says. He notes that newer (and presumably younger) employees are most enthusiastic. “The gamers; the gaming generation; that’s one of the things they really like,” he says. “They all play X-Box, they all know Wii. They take to it; they enjoy it. The simulation gives them stimulation; they can do it and learn from it, and it gives them confidence.”
UP’s RCL simulators “started out as a conductor program, where someone could learn the rules and operations in the classroom, and get used to switching the cars out.” The program was expanded, with the help of UP Information Technology personnel, to anticipate and prepare for growing RCL activity on the property. UP worked with Williamston, Mich.-based P.I. Engineering to design the RCL program.
Cab simulations—be they for RCL operations or anything else—can only be used to a point, however; eventually it’s time to climb into the real thing. BNSF’s Bill Barrington, pulling double duty during the convention, will co-host “General Electric Cab Standarization,” which he notes transcends the needs of any single Class I.
“We basically seek to standardize the control stands,” Barrington says. “When the North American comfort cab was established, there was a new desktop control stand established with it. It looks nice, but it’s not ergonomically comfortable for an engineer to operate. So all the railroads—not just BNSF—have been coming back to the ergonomically comfortable stand in their own way. This session is part of an effort to bring everyone, or at least all the Class I’s, back onto the same page.”
Locomotive maintenance diversifies
As locomotive emissions regulations are phased in for cleaner, greener locomotive fleets, expect to see more genset equipment, and expect railroads to work hard to meet the learning curve for maintaining them. So says Randy Slomski, account executive, short line and industrial rail, for Pittsburgh-based RailPower Hybrid Technologies Corp. Slomski will tackle “Locomotive Maintenance: Traditional Versus Genset” as one of the subjects to be reviewed by the Diesel Electrical Maintenance Committee of the Locomotive Maintenance Officers Association.
The session “will compare and contrast the differences and similarities between conventional locomotives and the new multi-genset locomotives,” Slomski said.
UP’s Tad Volkmann will add a Class I viewpoint on the matter in a separate session, “Maintenance Experience with Genset Switchers,” one of two updates scheduled for the LMOA’s New Technologies Committee
But conventional locomotives can be operated more efficiently as well, even without substantial technological upgrades, if operational habits and behavior are modified. To that end, “Locomotive Idle and Start-Up Exhaust Emissions Testing” may provide some unexpected information, says session speaker Steve Fritz, manager, medium-speed diesel engines, at Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio.
Along with SWI colleague John Hedrick, Fritz will provide data and research that “will try to put some numbers on one of the ‘old wives’ tales’—that you produce more emissions by shutting down an engine, then cranking it back up,” Fritz says. “We’ve tried to quantify that problem and, in general terms, the answer is: No, that doesn’t happen.” It’s true, he says, that the initial startup “puff” of exhaust mitigates some of the energy savings and air quality gains of shutting down an engine, “but if you plan to shut a locomotive engine down for any substantial time, 20 minutes or longer, and even 15 minutes in many cases, to reduce emissions, then by all means shut it down.”
Over three full days, the RSI/CMA technical sessions will cover roughly two dozen topics. Combined with the indoor and outdoor exhibits, there’s something there for virtually every railroader.
Photo by BNSF
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