VIA Rail

[Bordercollie]

Given VIA’s crewing situation I don’t know that it’s fair to say that they can simply take a hit of 3/4 hr per segment especially when the next segment starts 3/4 hour in the hole.

Hopefully VIA have spent the weekend marshalling some longer Venture trainsets, reactivating that last Renaissance consist, hell maybe even those two Panoramas they won’t fix up can still turn a wheel on the back of a venture set. At least the rail photographers would be happy.

Apparently they don't have enough equipment to make the trains longer. Also canablizing a train set will only get you two middle coaches unless there is a way to convert the semi permanent coupling to the knuckle kind. I'm sure it's possible but you would need to order them and have it retrofitted. Also having two cab cars at the front means that passengers cannot move between the first cab car and the second one. Or it Will be for crews only. Similar to having two locomotives per train.

 

[Urban Sky]

Apparently they don't have enough equipment to make the trains longer. Also canablizing a train set will only get you two middle coaches unless there is a way to convert the semi permanent coupling to the knuckle kind. I'm sure it's possible but you would need to order them and have it retrofitted. Also having two cab cars at the front means that passengers cannot move between the first cab car and the second one. Or it Will be for crews only. Similar to having two locomotives per train.

Agreed, cannibalizing the Siemens sets to form seven-car consists is a non-starter. Honestly, I don‘t see them making any major operational change, just biting the bullet and tolerate the additional delays while waiting until the shunt enhancers arrive and get installed one-by-one across the fleet. This ain‘t a second „operation axle“…

 

[Bordercollie]

Agreed, cannibalizing the Siemens sets to form seven-car consists is a non-starter. Honestly, I don‘t see them making any major operational change, just biting the bullet and tolerate the additional delays while waiting until the shunt enhancers arrive and get installed one-by-one across the fleet. This ain‘t a second „operation axle“…

They also accelerate faster so hopefully they can make up time that way.

 

[smallspy]

Questions;

1) This isn't an issue for GO trains on the RH line? How many axles is a 6 coach GO train? GO ran 4 coach trains on the RH line during covid.

All of GO's equipment use tread brakes. This regularly cleans the wheel surfaces, and ensures good contact is made. Thus, the only restriction that comes about is CN"s own 12-axle restriction.

2) This is only an issue for VIA's newer Siemens fleet? VIA ran their older fleet for decades and this never appeared to be an issue.

The Siemens cars and locomotives don't use tread brakes, only disc brakes. Thus there is no active cleaning of the wheel treads in service.

The Budd cars were built without tread brakes and most of them still operate without them, but (1) this issue is not an issue on CP where they spent the first half of their lives, (2) they operate in conjunction with equipment that does use tread brakes, and (3) they frequently operate in longer consists than the Siemens sets.

The LRCs were built without tread brakes, and did have issues with triggering signals and crossing protection early in their lives. They were retrofitted with scrubbers early in their lives, and its not really been an issue since.

3) How many coaches would VIA need to extend their trainsets by inorder to reach 32 axles?

2. The current trainsets are 24 axles (1 loco and 5 coaches times 4 axles).

Dan

 

[Bordercollie]

All of GO's equipment use tread brakes. This regularly cleans the wheel surfaces, and ensures good contact is made. Thus, the only restriction that comes about is CN"s own 12-axle restriction.


The Siemens cars and locomotives don't use tread brakes, only disc brakes. Thus there is no active cleaning of the wheel treads in service.

The Budd cars were built without tread brakes and most of them still operate without them, but (1) this issue is not an issue on CP where they spent the first half of their lives, (2) they operate in conjunction with equipment that does use tread brakes, and (3) they frequently operate in longer consists than the Siemens sets.

The LRCs were built without tread brakes, and did have issues with triggering signals and crossing protection early in their lives. They were retrofitted with scrubbers early in their lives, and its not really been an issue since.


2. The current trainsets are 24 axles (1 loco and 5 coaches times 4 axles).

Dan

So with history repeating it's self, if they had the problems with the LRC's they didn't think that the same would happen?

 

[smallspy]

To elaborate on the above, the requirement is now for 32 axles per train. Whereas the current set up for the Ventures is 24 axles.

This means VIA has to alter the make up of the sets and add, typically, 2 older cars into the mix to meet the count.

Please be aware that there are a huge number of factual errors in that article.

Not clear to me in the piece above is why a detector can't work properly with 24 axles passing over it, and why 8 more would be statistically likely to work any better.

The issue is not necessarily that they don't work with 24 but they do with 32, but rather that the probabilities of failure are higher with 24 versus 32.

And in large part that has to do with the physics of having a steel wheel rolling over a steel rail. As each wheel passes over any given spot of the rail, the contact patch of the rail gets cleaner and cleaner. Fewer wheels are not able to provide enough cleaning action (thus CN's 12 axle restriction).

What complicates this is the lack of tread brakes on the Siemens equipment - the wheel itself will never be fully cleaned as there is nothing scrubbing its face. And because the contact patch of the wheel is variable in the sense it moves from side-to-side as it travels (axles are inherently self-centering, but that action is easily overcome by other forces - irregularity in the surfacing of the track, curves, acceleration or deceleration forces, etc.) it will never get clean enough that they can ensure that it will have proper continuity.

It sounds more like a fault w/the detector than w/the number of axles on the train consist.

In a manner, yes.

Because of the low shunt voltage used by CN, it is harder for it to overcome the effect of dirty wheels and track. More axles gives it more opportunities to be detected.

But I will await thoughts from our expert crew @smallspy and @crs1026 as well as from @Urban Sky on the implications for VIA if it has to sustain this new arrangement.

It will be tough.

A lot of the LRC fleet has been removed from service. It is unknown whether some proportion of it can be returned to working order.

Adding additional non-Siemens passenger cars to the sets is a non-starter. The Siemens sets use a different connector standard for MU and COMM. TC mandates that all of VIA's passenger cars have functioning on-board bearing monitoring, and that is tied into the COMM system - if a car gets a hot bearing, an alarm is supposed to go off in the locomotive or cab car so that the crew and stop and investigate. Any tacked-on HEP or LRC cars would not be able to have their bearings monitored from the cab, and thus would be in danger of not having a hot bearing condition picked up by the operating crew.

They have more Siemens sets than they strictly need for service, so in theory they could lengthen the trains with additional cars from these additional sets. This would probably be the ideal situation.

Dan

 

[smallspy]

So with history repeating it's self, if they had the problems with the LRC's they didn't think that the same would happen?

LRCs ran in smaller consists than the Siemens sets do. They're fixed length, after all.

Why would you think that the same would happen considering that?

Dan

 

[Northern Light]

@smallspy Thanks Dan; great insight, as always

 

[Bordercollie]

Please be aware that there are a huge number of factual errors in that article.


The issue is not necessarily that they don't work with 24 but they do with 32, but rather that the probabilities of failure are higher with 24 versus 32.

And in large part that has to do with the physics of having a steel wheel rolling over a steel rail. As each wheel passes over any given spot of the rail, the contact patch of the rail gets cleaner and cleaner. Fewer wheels are not able to provide enough cleaning action (thus CN's 12 axle restriction).

What complicates this is the lack of tread brakes on the Siemens equipment - the wheel itself will never be fully cleaned as there is nothing scrubbing its face. And because the contact patch of the wheel is variable in the sense it moves from side-to-side as it travels (axles are inherently self-centering, but that action is easily overcome by other forces - irregularity in the surfacing of the track, curves, acceleration or deceleration forces, etc.) it will never get clean enough that they can ensure that it will have proper continuity.


In a manner, yes.

Because of the low shunt voltage used by CN, it is harder for it to overcome the effect of dirty wheels and track. More axles gives it more opportunities to be detected.


It will be tough.

A lot of the LRC fleet has been removed from service. It is unknown whether some proportion of it can be returned to working order.

Adding additional non-Siemens passenger cars to the sets is a non-starter. The Siemens sets use a different connector standard for MU and COMM. TC mandates that all of VIA's passenger cars have functioning on-board bearing monitoring, and that is tied into the COMM system - if a car gets a hot bearing, an alarm is supposed to go off in the locomotive or cab car so that the crew and stop and investigate. Any tacked-on HEP or LRC cars would not be able to have their bearings monitored from the cab, and thus would be in danger of not having a hot bearing condition picked up by the operating crew.

They have more Siemens sets than they strictly need for service, so in theory they could lengthen the trains with additional cars from these additional sets. This would probably be the ideal situation.

Dan

How hard would it be to convert the semi permanent coupling to knuckle couplers to be able to use the locomotive or can cars at the ends of the train?

 

[crs1026]

How hard would it be to convert the semi permanent coupling to knuckle couplers to be able to use the locomotive or can cars at the ends of the train?

It isn’t the coupler that is the limiting factor, as @smallspy pointed out…. It’s the need for the coaches to talk to each other for things like journal monitoring. Bottom line, the Ventures cannot be mated with other equipment.
As much as VIA may be loathe to rejig all its bookings and equipment cycles, one has to wonder if that might be doable at least to a leaser extent. If VIA sacrificed two Venture sets, it would provide enough cars to lengthen four consists. Add to that the fact that J trains will be exempt, and the restriction may not apply between Brockville Ottawa and Coteau….and there are LRC trains in the Corridor running at 6 or 7 cars, and those runs would be a good fit for lengthened Venture trains… awkward, but perhaps the impact is manageable without making every train a milk run or wasting empty seats.

- Paul

 

[Bordercollie]

It isn’t the coupler that is the limiting factor, as @smallspy pointed out…. It’s the need for the coaches to talk to each other for things like journal monitoring. Bottom line, the Ventures cannot be mated with other equipment.
As much as VIA may be loathe to rejig all its bookings and equipment cycles, one has to wonder if that might be doable at least to a leaser extent. If VIA sacrificed two Venture sets, it would provide enough cars to lengthen four consists. Add to that the fact that J trains will be exempt, and the restriction may not apply between Brockville Ottawa and Coteau….and there are LRC trains in the Corridor running at 6 or 7 cars, and those runs would be a good fit for lengthened Venture trains… awkward, but perhaps the impact is manageable without making every train a milk run or wasting empty seats.

- Paul

What I mean is that to break up delivered but not yet scheduled venture sets and tag them into the ones used for service. But the cab car and locomotive has the wrong coupler. I guess you could pair the can car with the locomotive and couple it to the end of the train. The middle cars can be used as is in other trains.

Cab car, locomotive, locomotive, 4 coaches, cab car
Or cab car, 6 coaches, locomotive.

That would give you enough axles.

 

[nfitz]

One quick temporary solution would be to run all the trains in pairs (one consist without altering any of them), and adjust the schedules.

 

[Urban Sky]

One quick temporary solution would be to run all the trains in pairs (one consist without altering any of them), and adjust the schedules.

This would be certainly an option for TRTO-OTTW, where departures are often scheduled just an hour apart…

 

[Bordercollie]

This would be certainly an option for TRTO-OTTW, where departures are often scheduled just an hour apart…

But what's the difference between the train hitting a crossing they doesn't properly active at 50 mph instead of 90 mph? It's not like at 50mph the train can stop in time for the conductor to stop and flag the crossing. If safety is ready an issue they should have to stop and flag every crossing. A train hitting a car at 90mph has the same effect as 50mph.

 

[crs1026]

But what's the difference between the train hitting a crossing they doesn't properly active at 50 mph instead of 90 mph? It's not like at 50mph the train can stop in time for the conductor to stop and flag the crossing. If safety is ready an issue they should have to stop and flag every crossing. A train hitting a car at 90mph has the same effect as 50mph.

The requirement is for trains to have slowed to 45 mph by the whistle post, which is usually one quarter mile from the crossing. At that point, the crew is required to visually confirm that the crossing has activated… if so, the train is allowed to proceed, maintaining the 45 mph until the crossing is occupied. If the protection is not seen to be operating, the train must make a hard stop and the crossing is protected manually, ie the crew flags down traffic before occupying the crossing.
The whole point is for the train to have stopped in time or at least have slowed to a less lethal speed.

- Paul