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Painting the sides of railroad rails white to reduce derailment

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Re: Painting the sides of railroad rails white to reduce derailment

#11

Post by AlotOfReading »

kylehotchkiss wrote: post #7
jeffrallen wrote: post #4

Practical Engineering already explained the correct solution to this problem: https://youtu.be/zqmOSMAtadc?si=UUlmnk9sI-leq0SV But of course, American infrastructure was built on the cheap, and is not maintained correctly. This is why we can't have nice things.

We have like 220,000 miles of railroad. We do have nice things: a working freight railroad system that helps reduce transit costs.

If the freight rail system were as good as it should be, long distance trucking would be a rounding error instead of the dominant freight mode.

Re: Painting the sides of railroad rails white to reduce derailment

#12

Post by anonymars »

AlotOfReading wrote: post #11
kylehotchkiss wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have like 220,000 miles of railroad. We do have nice things: a working freight railroad system that helps reduce transit costs.

If the freight rail system were as good as it should be, long distance trucking would be a rounding error instead of the dominant freight mode.

Trucks and trains serve different purposes. My understanding is the US has a higher percentage than most of freight carried by rail. Indeed at the expense of its passenger rail

Re: Painting the sides of railroad rails white to reduce derailment

#13

Post by andrewflnr »

Animats wrote: post #5
atourgates wrote: post #3

In a somewhat related practice, some roads in the Tour de France this year have been painted with "white shit" (rider Tom Pidcock's words) in order to combat the asphalt melting in the heat, with the unfortunate side-effect that it seems to be slippery and several riders (including Tom Pidcock) crashed going around a corner when the lost traction. Coverage here: https://velo.outsideonline.com/road/road-racing/tour-de…

Pepe's Towing in Los Angeles reports asphalt collapses where loaded semitrailers are parked with the landing gear down. On hot days the concentrated load of the landing gear sometimes punches through the asphalt.[1] This is why truck dock areas are usually paved with concrete. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBrULmCGJfc

Motorcycle riders also report their sidestands sinking into asphalt on very hot days, to the extent that many of them carry some kind of wide weight-spreading thing to put under the stand. Apparently a face plate (?) for an electrical junction box works great.

Re: Painting the sides of railroad rails white to reduce derailment

#15

Post by earth-tattoo »

tiagod wrote: post #14

"That’s huge. If you’re not fighting the sun’s heat, you dramatically reduce the risk of the rail shifting.” Am I misreading or does this say the opposite of what they meant?

You are misreading. Basically the white paint is "fighting the sun's heat".

Re: Painting the sides of railroad rails white to reduce derailment

#16

Post by TylerE »

anonymars wrote: post #12
AlotOfReading wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the freight rail system were as good as it should be, long distance trucking would be a rounding error instead of the dominant freight mode.

Trucks and trains serve different purposes. My understanding is the US has a higher percentage than most of freight carried by rail. Indeed at the expense of its passenger rail

Airlines killed passenger rail, not freight. Prior to it all being rolled into Amtrak virtually every railroad was losing money on passenger service.

Re: Painting the sides of railroad rails white to reduce derailment

#17

Post by adrianmonk »

tiagod wrote: post #14

"That’s huge. If you’re not fighting the sun’s heat, you dramatically reduce the risk of the rail shifting.” Am I misreading or does this say the opposite of what they meant?

I think the safety officer meant that white paint prevents the rail from heating up. The heating of rails contributes to problems with derailment. If the heat isn't a contributor, that heat is one less thing you have to fight (as in account for).

But the photo caption paraphrases him and says that the white paint fights (as in prevents) the heat, which uses similar words but a different logic to it (but the same overall meaning).

If I've got that right, then I think the blame lies on whoever wrote this article for making it confusing.

Re: Painting the sides of railroad rails white to reduce derailment

#18

Post by acyou »

Paint everything white! Why stop at rails?

Mostly because it doesn't stay white and looks bad. But it doesn't stop people from painting their siding white, for example.

Why paint the sides of the rails? Well you can paint the tops, but it tends to gum up the wheels and get worn off.

You want a paint with high reflectivity and high emissivity. Just be sure you aren't using infrared light temp measurement as to measure and make claims about differences in temperature, emissivity is something to watch out for when measuring temperature in that way.

20 degrees is surprising, I sure wish my car was white in the summer.

I wonder if you have okay effects with white rails in the winter?

Re: Painting the sides of railroad rails white to reduce derailment

#19

Post by pacbard »

andrewflnr wrote: post #13
Animats wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pepe's Towing in Los Angeles reports asphalt collapses where loaded semitrailers are parked with the landing gear down. On hot days the concentrated load of the landing gear sometimes punches through the asphalt.[1] This is why truck dock areas are usually paved with concrete. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBrULmCGJfc

Motorcycle riders also report their sidestands sinking into asphalt on very hot days, to the extent that many of them carry some kind of wide weight-spreading thing to put under the stand. Apparently a face plate (?) for an electrical junction box works great.

Usually, a crushed soda can is good enough to prevent the kickstand to sync in the pavement. You can usually find a can in a random parking lot. That, or find a strip of concrete. That's why sometimes motorcycle park on the sidewalk in front of big box stores on a hot day.

Re: Painting the sides of railroad rails white to reduce derailment

#20

Post by jordanb »

Animats wrote: post #5
atourgates wrote: post #3

In a somewhat related practice, some roads in the Tour de France this year have been painted with "white shit" (rider Tom Pidcock's words) in order to combat the asphalt melting in the heat, with the unfortunate side-effect that it seems to be slippery and several riders (including Tom Pidcock) crashed going around a corner when the lost traction. Coverage here: https://velo.outsideonline.com/road/road-racing/tour-de…

Pepe's Towing in Los Angeles reports asphalt collapses where loaded semitrailers are parked with the landing gear down. On hot days the concentrated load of the landing gear sometimes punches through the asphalt.[1] This is why truck dock areas are usually paved with concrete. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBrULmCGJfc

Years ago Chicago started putting concrete pads on the road at bus stops because the busses stopping in the exact same spot repeatedly was carving ruts into the asphalt.
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