A railroad rolling-stock question

IaLeo · Mar 9, 2019

This year, again, on our trip from IA to CA, I saw many long trains of double-stacked shipping containers on low-boy type cars. Some cars had the typical double axle (bogies?) trucks and the car deck lowered between end. Then there were cars with what looked like single axles on each end, they looked shorter and wheels looked to have a smaller diameter?
Question: are these cars still called flatcars? Or is there a different designation for them?
Leo

whereswaldo · Mar 9, 2019

Google 'Roadrailer'. I think that's what you saw.

IaLeo · Mar 9, 2019

Well, these were all double-stacked, but your reference was very interesting. Wonder just how many they can pull in a string based on truck-trailer strengths. Thanks
Leo

Dave H (MI) · Mar 9, 2019

Is this what you saw? I think it is just a specialized intermodal car.

Steve@Advance · Mar 9, 2019

There are some called "unit spine cars" that are flat beds, or special cars designed for containers or trailers.

They have various combinations of shared trucks, single and tandem, other special configurations depending on the weight and length of the load and how they are loaded.
Unit Spine Cars

Zachary Hoyt · Mar 9, 2019

I see variations of those container cars going by here regularly, I guess they're going up into Canada. I don't know what they're called, but there are often different sorts in
the same train, mixed up with all the other kinds of cars.
Zach

oldtanker · Mar 9, 2019

Intermodal ones like Dave mentioned don't really put a lot of stress on anything. That is keeping in mind that most often the container will at some point be transferred to a trailer then moved on the road. The trucks hauling containers have the same rules that any other Semi has. Plus the average container and chassis combined weigh about 4000 pounds more than a trailer. So each container that will go directly on a truck carries about 4000 pounds less than a conventional trailer.

So what you see really doesn't weigh that much as opposed to a fully loaded conventional rail car.

Rick

redforlife · Mar 9, 2019

They are a specailly made car for the purpose of containers. I have never seen single axel trucks on these such as
in Dave H (MI)'s photograph. I am thinking this might be a new thing with the single axel. I live close to a busy
line that alot of stack trains travel and I have not yet seen these. But I know it is real common to see 3 cars
perminately linked together, and at the perminate link, they use a shared double axel truck for both cars. The
three cars linked together are made this way.

J. Schwiebert · Mar 9, 2019

Road railer is where there is one axle on the end of the trailer and they are coupled together very close.

Russ from MN · Mar 9, 2019

I just read where the trains across the Canadian prairie are going to be about 3 miles long. They cross into MN at Ranier,
it's a main line from China to Chicago.

Bob M · Mar 9, 2019

It's officially a "well car", though is also known as a double-stack car or simply a stack car.

There are several basic configurations: A single well car with standard two-axle trucks and couplers at both ends; a 3 unit articulated triple with standard trucks and couplers at both ends and standard trucks shared between the two end units and the middle unit (8 axles total); and a similar but larger 5 unit articulated (two additional center units resulting in 12 axles total).

There also exists a high load capacity 3 unit well - essentially 3 single wells semi-permanently connected with drawbars instead of standard couplers (12 axles total). These are less common than the other configurations.

paul · Mar 9, 2019

Googled and saw a YouTube of those semi rail things, never saw anything like that!

Paul

RedGreenGuy · Mar 9, 2019

Railroad engineer for 33 yrs. They can pull as many as they can tie together. With todays computer operated slave locomotives you may have 2 on head end and 2 placed at equal locations throughout the train and/or more on rear pushing. All operated by one engineer on the lead locomotive. Just had to remember the slaves responded 4 seconds after your moves on lead locomotive. The last I ran had the capability to operate so all repeated what the lead locomotive did or they could be operated up to 6 different sets from the 2nd computer screen. Our division normally had 2 on head end and one on rear. They were coal train averaging 7500' long and 16 - 18,000 tons. Longest train I ran was tad over 14,000 ft. long. So no limit just problem parking them while enroute with blocking lots of crossings and getting them into a rail yard or unloading facility.

jeffcat · Mar 9, 2019

Someone else said they call them moon wells but think is guy is wrong.Double stack single car and triple well I have seen. Watching the curve on Utube you can watch a lot of action. I think there are single wheel units but I am not going to swear. In the two captures you see a single car with conventional trucks. Then the photo shows a triple with shared trucks. Need to see if I can catch those singles wheel units.

A railroad rolling-stock question

IaLeo

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whereswaldo

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IaLeo

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Dave H (MI)

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Steve@Advance

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Zachary Hoyt

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oldtanker

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redforlife

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J. Schwiebert

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Russ from MN

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Bob M

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paul

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RedGreenGuy

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jeffcat

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