Possibly dumb question?

There are/were turntables at every loco depot and on most branches, but they are/were used to turn locomotives. The couplers (Norwegian chopper) standardized in 1870 are directional. (center buffer with one added hook per mating pair) It's very handy for train operating crews to know where the brake levers/wheels are, given that the NZ concept of "flat" equates approximately with the British concept of "mountain". NZ's geography is long and narrow with mountains up the middle so the railways tend to follow the coasts or cross the mountains at right angles. (horrible over-simplification but ...) Branch lines were built outward from the relevant main line. In the few places where loops were created (such as Wellington-Palmerston North) the connections were made in the same direction, which is logical given that traffic flows were in those directions. Of course their has to be an exception and that is at Christchurch where the northern and southern routes both went to the port creating a "Y". Modern Diseasels can of course run longer distances than the 2-4-0t and

0-6-0ts of 1863, so some trains need to operate from south of Christchurch to Picton/Wellington so the third leg of the "Y" was added. This requires return Picton-Christchurch wagons to be run around the "Y". The couplers (Norwegian chopper) standardized in 1870 are directional. (center buffer with one added hook per mating pair)

Regards, Greg.P.

And back!

Greg.P.

Err, basically the South Island is two tectonic plates pushing together and gradually rising, with the errosion detrius forming the eastern (Canturbury) plains. The North Island is a collection of overlapping active/semiactive/temporarily dormant volcanoes. We're not in the least bit worried about any land sinking, but we do tend to worry a little about earthquakes and the odd puff of smoke above local cones.

Greg.P.

No, silly, the Flying Coriolis were the ones who helped Mussolini make the trains run on time.

If you watch a train going by once in a while 9assming you're lucky enough to have an accessible grade crossing near you), you'll see that it doesn't matter.

Not all unit coal trains are like this, I saw a train today with mixed standard and rotary couplers, and they were all randomly turned.

Wolf Kirchmeir wrote in news:46e87142$0$31081 $ snipped-for-privacy@news.newshosting.com:

Yes I have a local grafe crossing, but I rarely get stuck. Drat!

Anyway, thanks guys. I can be obvsessive about details sometimes but the more I thought of it I kinda figured the answer would be "don't matter".

Now to go randomize my freight yard.

Frank

In message , snipped-for-privacy@earthlink.net writes

Of course. It all depends where they are being unloaded. The example I gave was for the unloading at Roberts Bank. If the cars were being unloaded at Grande Cache, Alberta [1] they use two overhead CAT shovels to unload the cars so it wouldn't matter which way round they were.

However, many of the outbound coal cars are off loaded at Roberts Bank and for this they have to be in same direction.

From a modelling point of view this means that you could see empty and loaded coal cars travelling in each direction. ]

1] It's a strange situation here because although there is a power station and a coal mine on the same site, the mine was closed for a number of years, the power station then made a contract with another company to deliver coal which is still in force today. I'm told that the power company wants to buy the local coal, but at lower than market rate (excl. transport) while the coal company is holding out for a market rate. As the coal is (Iam told) of high calorific value it is easily sold so the coal company will probably get the contract when it comes up for renewal.

Do you have a precisely defined formula for doing that?

Greg Procter wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@ihug.co.nz:

Don't get me started. ;)

Frank

On 9/13/2007 7:17 PM Gray Ghost spake thus:

I suggest a pseudo-random Poisson variability plot using a Gaussian distribution.

David Nebenzahl wrote in news:46ea045c$0$22189 $ snipped-for-privacy@news.adtechcomputers.com:

You'll have a lot more fun batting a small plastic ball around like a cat. Whatever cars it touches, you rotate. ;-)

Puckdropper

Whadda fish gotta do with it, you surrender monkey?

"David Nebenzahl" wrote

I find that an old-fashioned 7 or above on the Richter Scale randomizes car locations quite nicely.

Living in southern California isn't *all* beer and skittles.

Yes, the brakewheels had to face forward.

One of the biggest problems was depressed center flatcars. They had brake wheels on each end. This caused many brakemen to go insane and they had to be put down. Conductors were issued a pistol for just that reason.

Eric

Don't forget the rare case of a unit train equipped with rotary couplers. They would all have to be lined up the same way. I've been told that is wy cars with rotary couplers have one end painted a bright colro.

dlm

On 9/14/2007 12:24 AM P. Roehling spake thus:

*7*??? Sheesh; we up here in the Beige Area are all happy and stuff when we get a nice 4.2 (like the one a couple months ago that woke me up at 4:30 am and scared the crap out of me).

"David Nebenzahl" wrote

I was wrong. Google tells me that the first (Landers) quake was a 7.5, and the Big Bear quake that followed it a few hours later rated a mere 6.5 on the Richter scale.

The first one scrambled my staging yard quite nicely, derailing or knocking over nearly every car. The second quake just shoved things around a little more.

Oddly, the locos all remained on the track.

That would be "cars with a rotary coupler". You only need one per car and two would make getting meeting couplers in sync more difficult. The bright painted end almost certainly indicates the rotating coupling end.

Greg.P.