UP Autorack Dumps The Air after hitting Shopping Cart - Simi Valley, Ca

[MrMRL]

(02-23-2012 12:07 AM)SERRANO-HIGHBALL Wrote:  No, but you have to take RR 101 before you can take Advanced Locomotive Design 502.

The part you just described is the pilot plate

The pilot attaches to the pilot plate and extends down to just above the rails to deflect obstacles on the track, although it may also be designed to function as a snowplow as well.

s-h

Yeah... Exactly. Thank you, Wikipedia. But what's your point? You've still lost me on the reasoning behind your initial response. I don't recall ever referring to a locomotive's pilot.

Just trying to keep my response as forum friendly and subject specific as I can possibly muster at the moment... The UP train in the video above had a locomotive on the point with, dare I say it, a snowplow on the front. I wonder now, you figure that snowplow had any acting role in the shopping cart mysteriously ending up under the locomotive? Subsequently leading to an unfortunate opportunity to relieve the train of it's vitally important air pressure? Or, ( i know its late now...) are you really trying to convince me that a metal shopping cart passed harmlessly through a metal snowplow? Deciding only after miraculously passing through one solid object that it opted to immediately impact a second solid object, in this case the locomotive's metal pilot?

Best of luck with your crusade, especially with convincing the rest of the world to start calling snowplows snow-pilots.

Mr. MRL

[SERRANO-HIGHBALL]

Your Welcome, it just seemed as if you didn't know what there called.
Did you look it up on Wikipedia?

from FRA Railroad Locomotive Safety Standards, PILOT "its primary function to clear obstacles and prevent possible derailments, a Pilot is required to be installed on all locomotives to clear the tracks of small obstacles, which generally weigh less than 10,000 pound mass (lbm) such as shopping carts, tree branches, etc. "

As you may have noticed not all Diesel-Electric locomotives have a "pilot plate" some locomotives with a monocoque carbody just have a "pilot". Many Pilot designs can work as a snowplow but this is not there primary function. Railroads do have equipment specifically designed for clearing snow, either pushed or pulled by a locomotive.. they are generally called Snowplows.

S-H

(02-23-2012 01:36 AM)MrMRL Wrote:  

(02-23-2012 12:07 AM)SERRANO-HIGHBALL Wrote:  No, but you have to take RR 101 before you can take Advanced Locomotive Design 502.

The part you just described is the pilot plate

The pilot attaches to the pilot plate and extends down to just above the rails to deflect obstacles on the track, although it may also be designed to function as a snowplow as well.

s-h

Yeah... Exactly. Thank you, Wikipedia. But what's your point? You've still lost me on the reasoning behind your initial response. I don't recall ever referring to a locomotive's pilot.

Just trying to keep my response as forum friendly and subject specific as I can possibly muster at the moment... The UP train in the video above had a locomotive on the point with, dare I say it, a snowplow on the front. I wonder now, you figure that snowplow had any acting role in the shopping cart mysteriously ending up under the locomotive? Subsequently leading to an unfortunate opportunity to relieve the train of it's vitally important air pressure? Or, ( i know its late now...) are you really trying to convince me that a metal shopping cart passed harmlessly through a metal snowplow? Deciding only after miraculously passing through one solid object that it opted to immediately impact a second solid object, in this case the locomotive's metal pilot?

Best of luck with your crusade, especially with convincing the rest of the world to start calling snowplows snow-pilots.

Mr. MRL

[Axy_Dent]

..............and all this time I thought pilots flew airplanes.

Geez who would have guessed?

Axy

[TC Smith]

(02-23-2012 02:58 AM)SERRANO-HIGHBALL Wrote:  Your Welcome, it just seemed as if you didn't know what there called.
....

"They're". Tractors pull plows, some have dozers on them.


TCS - still calling it a plow.

[n6nvr]

"You're" welcome

[n6nvr]

Airplane pilots drive airplanes, but, River Pilots drive boats, not rivers, Harbor Pilots tell Masters and tugs where to go, but don't drive Harbors. Pilot lights set things on fire, well that or they are pilots that have finished Weight Watchers.

[chris_wlkr]

I thought airplane pilots flew airplanes. Dang.

Last time I built a model train the plow (full, half, snow .. whatever) was attached to a pilot. The diagram told me that as well.

   
Now some engines that do not have a plow just have extra thick plates at the bottom. (see my image above)

Perhaps this is the pilot plate being referenced? Certainly it would not deflect much but it appears bevelled by design which would serve some function.

Of course you had older engines with Pilot Steps around the same location which railroaders would ride on. Clearly these could not go on a plow.

[Myfordbrowning]

The use of the term snow plow for the attachment to the lower front (and rear) of locomotives is not new by railroads, From a 3-31-1970 toilet book (a nickname some friends had for a roster printed by the SP for their uses that showed data about each unit including the presents of a toilet) the term snow plow was used for units equipped with attachment to the pilot.

Pilot steps? I thought that they were foot boards.

Cliff

[n6nvr]

I thought foot boards were in Vaudeville Theaters

[TC Smith]

I thought a pilot was the guy who was qualified over the line your train was detouring on.


TCS - but where will you find BNSF power with footboards ?