Your basis for this statement is? I think you find the FRA outlawed real safety issues like certain types of wheels and other items with design issues. Even K triples still show up in the tourist world in spite of their limitations.

Robby Peartree

Here's the problem:

We are like antique classic car collectors.

We are asking to run in a commercial, high-priced environment where none of the mechanics know the first thing about how to diagnose a car that doesn't have an On-Board Diagnostics-II interface port, let alone what to do with a carburettor, specialized fuel (leaded? super octane?), non-standard tires, or a 6-volt electrical system.

I personally know/knew of carmen, road foremen, and other top RR supervisors who, much like car mechanics that read classic car magazines during their lunch break and have an old project car in the garage at home, knew and understood the "old ways" and personally would take on such challenges if they arose. They're the guys who shepherded old Pullman camp cars and vintage freight cars in clandestine moves not reported to superiors. I had one who still kept his old gauges and manuals in his car trunk--the Mazda that had "Lackawanna Railroad" emblems on the doors.......

The youngest of these guys I knew from those days is now 58 years old. He, like many others of his ilk, quit the railroad for his own sanity's sake. Others got driven off by the "Dilbert"-like insanity an inanity they constantly encountered. A few of the others still lurk here, acting as "boomer" mechanics or consultants, saving some of our collective butts.

Maybe we all need to get jobs in railroad middle management or something.......

My 'basis' is that plain journals have been replaced in normal RR use by roller bearings due to the fact that RBs have a statistically lower failure rate, extended service interval and lower maintenance cost (among other things), and therefor are no longer supported in training/knowledge, automated inspection, supply, or anything else (outside of preservation/tourist stuff). Those 30 year veteran car knockers that Nova55 mentioned who don't even know what plain bearings are would be hard pressed to prevent a derailment due to a burned off journal, so if AAR hadn't banned them FRA would have had to take action to prevent the safety problems inherent with fading tech/knowledge. Plain bearings would probably have ended up in 215 Appendix A, along with your K brakes.

"APPENDIX A TO PART 215—RAILROAD
FREIGHT CAR COMPONENTS
List of components whose use is restricted
by § 215.203 of this part.
A. Air brakes:
The ‘‘K’’ type."

Yes, you can apply for a waiver through proper channels, but I doubt you'll find even a single K brake setup on any class RR, unless it's an old hunk of rust shoved off in the trees long ago and never sees the light of day. Maybe UP has one in their collection of historic stuff in Cheyenne, but I wouldn't bet on it.

Roller bearing equipped freight cars have less drag than the old plain bearing cars. That's important in the age of PSR where you try to run longer trains with the minimum power needed. I can't imagine what sort of power a 2-mile plain-bearing train would need.

At what speeds? Because you will find the only advantage to roller bearings is from zero to 20 mph which made their application to passenger equipment first of particular interest.

Robby Peartree

My 'basis' is that plain journals have been replaced in normal RR use by roller bearings due to the fact that RBs have a statistically lower failure rate, extended service interval and lower maintenance cost (among other things).[/quote]

So you wnat the FRA to apply accounting reasons to a safety regulation? Most railroaders don't have knowledge of steam locomotives. Why not ban them? The industry interchange rules, how were suppose to play with one another is not the same as the FRA safety rules. The advantages to roller bearings you sited of the lack of knowledge of a car knocker can be over come with training. GCR ran both plain and roller equiped journals while I was there and i do not remember a hot box in eight years on the pain bearings. With proper inspector training and proceedure they are safe so why should the FRA outlaw them?

Robby Peartree

Robby -

The part you just quoted is only the reason the RRs went to RBs. The part about loss of knowledge and support and the resulting safety problems that it would bring about for the class RRs is the reason FRA would implement a ban or restriction. Trouble seeing the forest for the trees, huh?

I don't have time to dig it up right now, but IIRC it is/was AAR Interchange Rule 90. I seem to recall it's worded to say that participating RRs either aren't required to accept them in interchange or that they aren't allowed to interchange without a specific agreement in place. Either way the effect is a general ban from interchange service.

And yes, you can still find plain bearings in single line class RR use, mostly on M/W equipment. CR had plain bearing trucks on many of the snow plows until the end, and a few other special use items, like some of the steam crane/wreck train cars. Much was gradually converted over the years though.

You know you can not cure stupid and you can not regulate it away. You just made the argument against all historical operations of not only railroads but air planes, ships automobiles and other items. Lets Bann it all due to a lack of knowledge in the current world.


Robby Peartree

My question is this: what would you gain in replacing the plain bearings on the tender of a steam locomotive with roller bearings IF the bearings on the engine are most likely plain bearings and will remain that way? I know of several restorations with this situation. Are the Class Is more apt to flag the plain bearings on the tender than on the engine in deciding if they will let a steam engine move on their track?

Legend has it.... it was the Timken Company itself, that started using the term "friction bearings". A marketing ploy to sell their new "better" roller bearings into the very conservative railroad world. Plain bearings do have higher starting friction, but only for seconds. Once moving, the "bearing drag" is the same as RB's.

Timken used the higher starting resistance of a plain bearing, to their advantage.
The marketing dept. used publicity stunts such as this... young lovely's moving a RB equipped locomotive.
And the use of the term "friction bearings" in their print ads. Such as the March 2, 1929 edition of Railroad Age.