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Length of freight trains

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Harlesden

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Cannot see a specific freight category on here.
Freight trains in the US can be up to 3,500 metres long (no idea why freight is metric) although that limit can be doubled by use of a second locomotive either in the middle or at the back.
The danger of one locomotive trying to pull say 250 wagons lies in the risk of derailment as the train is hauled around a curve.
I sense it is the rather tight curves in the UK rail system that keeps freight trains short. (Anyone on here with a freight-related website please holler back as I would enjoy a good read).
When transporting a train of flat containers, double stacking is often used.
Long trains also mean fewer trains which allows for fast running in desert or rural areas and also permits safe running through "dark territory", stretches of track in rural areas where there are no lineside signals whatsoever. The train stops and starts on the orders of a dispatcher by means of Track Warrants acknowledged (repeated back) by the train engineer and written down following a strict format laid down by General Code of Operating Rules.
Most railfans in the US concentrate their attentions on freight (passenger is a little dull so I understand) and enthusiastic railfans are sometimes disparagingly referred to as "foamers" by rail workers.
 
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edwin_m

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UK freight trains are indeed much shorter. Network Rail is working towards a length of 775m on key freight routes but in many cases even this length is not possible. I believe similar lengths apply in mainland Europe.

I don't think tight curves are the reason for shorter trains in Europe. Just as in America the lines are usually laid with fairly gentle curves, but tighter curves can be found in mountainous areas. However even in the flat parts of Europe the freight trains are shorter than in America.

The reasons are ultimately down to population density. Most European freight travels less far than in America, simply because places tend to be closer together and much of Europe isn't too far from a sea port. This means that road is more competitive with rail and therefore there may not be the volume on rail to make up a really long train. Most routes in Europe also carry what by American standards is a very intensive passenger service and there usually isn't the space for loops and sidings big enough for passenger trains to overtake very long freight trains.

In the north east of the US, between Washington and Boston, the railway looks much more like what is seen in Europe with large cities close enough together to sustain a fast and frequent passenger service. I don't know the details but I would expect that not much freight moves by rail totally within this corridor - it is mostly going to or from more distant places.
 

DownSouth

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I sense it is the rather tight curves in the UK rail system that keeps freight trains short. (Anyone on here with a freight-related website please holler back as I would enjoy a good read).
UK freight trains are indeed much shorter. Network Rail is working towards a length of 775m on key freight routes but in many cases even this length is not possible. I believe similar lengths apply in mainland Europe.

I don't think tight curves are the reason for shorter trains in Europe. Just as in America the lines are usually laid with fairly gentle curves, but tighter curves can be found in mountainous areas. However even in the flat parts of Europe the freight trains are shorter than in America.
I would say that the shorter freight trains in Europe are actually down to the high amount of essential passenger traffic which simply doesn't exist on rural lines in the USA outside of the occasional Amtrak train for tourists who don't care about speed. Long trains simply aren't fast enough to get into their slot and out of it. As pointed out above, the Northeast Corridor routes are pretty much the only European-style passenger-dominated lines in the USA outside of a few pinch points around other cities with commuter rail systems.

Australia operates kind of between the two. Freight trains up to 1800m long and 16,000 tonnes (bulk iron ore from far north South Australia to the port of Whyalla) gross run on the national network with trains of up to 1500m running between passenger services on lines radiating from Sydney, but this is only possible due to the power of modern 3,000+ kW diesel locos with AC traction motors, and the huge amount of work having been done to build good freight-only lines allowing them to bypass the areas congested by the busy metropolitan passenger networks and reduce the number of conflicts. The iron ore transport lines in the Pilbara region of Western Australia (currently closed due to Tropical Cyclone Christine, a category three cyclone) are the heaviest railways in the entire world, but they are completely separated from the national network and have never had any passenger traffic apart from some long gone trains for mining workers.

We have everybody firmly covered when it comes to passenger train length, The Ghan can run up to 1,200 metres long on special occasions and regularly exceeds 750 metres.

Freight trains in the US can be up to 3,500 metres long (no idea why freight is metric) although that limit can be doubled by use of a second locomotive either in the middle or at the back.
A couple of corrections here:

It's discussed using metric units because we're doing international comparisons and because it saves everyone the task of choosing which imperial units to use.

Secondly, a 3,600 metre consist would be the absolute longest you would see in revenue operation on a US railroad (i.e. not a one-off publicity stunt using unviable dual-crewed working), the maximum length of trains being restricted by the need to have a functional braking capability and codified by the AAR, though Canadian container trains do go up to 4,200 metres.

A 3,600m consist would have a minimum of six 4,500 kW locos depending on the terrain to be covered, usually 3-4 at the front and others as distributed traction controlled using the Locotrol radio system.
 
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yorkie

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Freight trains in the US can be up to 3,500 metres long (no idea why freight is metric) although that limit can be doubled by use of a second locomotive either in the middle or at the back.
The danger of one locomotive trying to pull say 250 wagons lies in the risk of derailment as the train is hauled around a curve.
tell me more about the freight locos near you which haul a train of that length, do you have any photos of them? How powerful are they?

I didn't think there was a loco anywhere in the world that could haul such a train on its own.
 

DownSouth

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tell me more about the freight locos near you which haul a train of that length, do you have any photos of them? How powerful are they?

I didn't think there was a loco anywhere in the world that could haul such a train on its own.
I believe I've already corrected this, I don't believe the OP really has that much of a clue about real freight operations. Any long freight train over about 700 metres would always have multiple locomotives if diesel-powered, though electrics could handle that alone if it was an intermodal (i.e. lightweight) train.

The maximum length which can be safely hauled by just locomotives at the front without any distributed traction is about 3,000 metres. Once you pass that point no amount of train control skill on the part of the driver will be able to avoid there being problems with string-lining on tighter curves (which do exist on most US routes, there are many pinch points among the long boring sections) no matter what the level of the driver's train control skills.

I suppose if you had a suitably straight and level track you could theoretically have a single loco pull a line of unloaded cars that long - a long train is not always necessarily a heavy train and exactly 50% of all bulk freight wagon movements are empty! The closest thing to that happening in real practice would be that some of the units directly behind the leading unit would be put offline but the distributed traction would still be powering.

The longest trains operated in Australia with only locomotives at the front are the daily 2,600 metre Flinders Power coal trains. The operator can get away with using just three locomotives for a total of 8,000 kW power (all DC traction motors) because the route is very flat the whole way and speed doesn't matter when it is segregated from the national network for all bar thirty metres of the trip where it briefly joins the national mainline from one side and then diverges again on the other side. This connection has deliberately not been grade separated because it is not a major obstruction and remains quite useful for allowing locomotive transfers.
 
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Harlesden

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Sorry yorkie, no pictures at all that I have taken personally.
Perhaps DownSouth might like to check YouTube where there are one or two videos shot by railfans clearly showing freight trains - very long by UK standards - with no sign of an additional locomotive either within the train or at the rear of the train. The trains are shown moving slowly simply because of the location, passing through populated areas and crossing over highways.
 

yorkie

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one loco? Again what type, power etc? How long are those trains?
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Sorry yorkie, no pictures at all that I have taken personally.
Perhaps DownSouth might like to check YouTube where there are one or two videos shot by railfans clearly showing freight trains - very long by UK standards - with no sign of an additional locomotive either within the train or at the rear of the train. The trains are shown moving slowly simply because of the location, passing through populated areas and crossing over highways.
why is it not possible to obtain a photo? If you really do live in the US (which I think is highly unlikely) it should be possible?
 

MidnightFlyer

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one loco? Again what type, power etc? How long are those trains?

I did a bit of YouTube browsing myself and I found a video of a train probably about the same length as the one jeffmartin1955 linked to - it was quadruple-headed...
 

DownSouth

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That train would have had 2-4 locomotives at the front even if they were full power locos like an ES44AC or SD70ACe - about 3,200-3,300 kW with AC traction. Even if the front had passed only just before the video started (unlikely, there was no loco noise on the clip) it is still easily too long for one loco, and while it could well be light enough the advantage of redundancy and sharper acceleration would still lean towards best practice being to run at least two. Unless it was a very long train over about 3,000 metres long (unlikely for a mixed freight service) and the video only caught the last 1000-1200 metres of it, there's no need for a lightweight train (not bulk minerals or double-stacked containers) like that to need distributed traction.

Let me repeat: a line of up to four locomotives would be assembled at the front before distributed traction even gets considered. The OP would do well to learn from sources other than YouTube, i.e. actually getting out to see what really happens on a freight-dominated railway instead of jumping to conclusions from videos which don't even show the line of locomotives at the front.


For what it's worth, here is one of the few mainline trains in Australia to use distributed traction, in this case controlled using the same multiplex bus as the ECP data. It's worth noting that the main driver for this decision is operational convenience, reversing at Spencer Junction simply being easier with locos at each end than running around. The locos in question are the GWA class, a variant of the GT46ACe (Australian-built locomotive effectively using a SD70ACe drivetrain with Mitsubishi electronics package) with 3,200 kW of power each, ECP and inline refuelling.

[youtube]5qaNJEkXl9E[/youtube]
 

CowboyGus

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Howdy y'all!

The average US freight train is anwhere from 60 to 80 cars with roughly 2 to 3 engines running on the front. The average length is anywhere in the ballpark of 3,500 feet (1, 066.80 meters) However the big thing out here is unit trains. Average unit grain train is 100 to 110 cars with 3 sometimes 4 locomotives. These trains are usually multiple-unit trains with two on the front and one on the rear. Unit coal trains average 120 cars with three engines. Typically these are set up with 2 on front and 1 on the rear. These unit trains are pushing close to a mile long (5, 280 feet - 1, 609 meters).

Longest unit train I ran was a unit oil train. It was 120 cars averaging close to a mile. I had 4 locomotives in distributed power, 3 on front and 1 on the rear. It weighed close to 12, 000 tons (12, 192, 562.91 kilograms).

I apologize if I messed up the meaurements, I'm no mathematician and I was using a unit converter. Thanks y'all!
 

HSTEd

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ECP is the future.

I actually checked the relevant Railway Group standards and it allows a 20,000t 6,000ft long BNSF Taconite train to stop in the Freight Train braking profile limits imposed on British Railways. Which is far less than its own length.

Which is really impressive.
 
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DownSouth

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ECP is the future.

I actually checked the relevant Railway Group standards and it allows a 20,000t 6,000ft long BNSF Taconite train to stop in the Freight Train braking profile limits imposed on British Railways. Which is far less than its own length.

Which is really impressive.
I agree that some of the performance on modern freight trains is pretty awe inspiring, and AC traction motors are just as responsible for that as ECP brakes.

The video I embedded above shows a train fully composed of ECP iron ore hoppers - 81 two-pack hopper wagons (braking and door release control systems are shared between the two-pack instead of every single wagon having them) plus a crew car and an inline refuelling tanker to be precise.

As well as allowing better brake performance, there is plenty of bandwidth for the rear locomotives to be controlled and monitored (including putting them offline when not needed) using the same data bus as the ECP brakes - removing the need for radio control of the distributed power units.

--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Howdy y'all!

The average US freight train is anwhere from 60 to 80 cars with roughly 2 to 3 engines running on the front. The average length is anywhere in the ballpark of 3,500 feet (1, 066.80 meters) However the big thing out here is unit trains. Average unit grain train is 100 to 110 cars with 3 sometimes 4 locomotives. These trains are usually multiple-unit trains with two on the front and one on the rear. Unit coal trains average 120 cars with three engines. Typically these are set up with 2 on front and 1 on the rear. These unit trains are pushing close to a mile long (5, 280 feet - 1, 609 meters).

Longest unit train I ran was a unit oil train. It was 120 cars averaging close to a mile. I had 4 locomotives in distributed power, 3 on front and 1 on the rear. It weighed close to 12, 000 tons (12, 192, 562.91 kilograms).

I apologize if I messed up the meaurements, I'm no mathematician and I was using a unit converter. Thanks y'all!
Speaking as a teacher of physics and maths - you got them all correct and you can continue to trust that unit converter :D

Instead of kilograms, you can use tonnes (1t = 1,000kg) which are close enough to the same as imperial tons (or long tons) once you're getting into measuring thousands of them.

The ore train I showed above comes in at around 1,800 metres long (about 1.1 miles or 5,900 feet) and weighs in at around 15,000 tonnes (close enough to 15,000 tons). The GWA drivers say the hardest thing to get used to with that particular train is the different performance of the loaded and empty runs - when empty the train only weighs about 25% of the loaded weight. This is is why the outbound empty journey runs with only the front pair of locomotives active (it would beat any passenger train in the country in a drag race if it had all four operating!) and is allowed to run at the speed of a passenger or intermodal train of 115 km/h (71 mph) while the loaded trip is restricted to 80 km/h (50 mph) by the axle loadings.
 
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CowboyGus

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Speaking as a teacher of physics and maths - you got them all correct and you can continue to trust that unit converter :D

Instead of kilograms, you can use tonnes (1t = 1,000kg) which are close enough to the same as imperial tons (or long tons) once you're getting into measuring thousands of them.

The ore train I showed above comes in at around 1,800 metres long (about 1.1 miles or 5,900 feet) and weighs in at around 15,000 tonnes (close enough to 15,000 tons). The GWA drivers say the hardest thing to get used to with that particular train is the different performance of the loaded and empty runs - when empty the train only weighs about 25% of the loaded weight. This is is why the outbound empty journey runs with only the front pair of locomotives active (it would beat any passenger train in the country in a drag race if it had all four operating!) and is allowed to run at the speed of a passenger or intermodal train of 115 km/h (71 mph) while the loaded trip is restricted to 80 km/h (50 mph) by the axle loadings.[/QUOTE]

Well many thanks friend! Im sorry I'm not sure how yall run trains in Britan and was hoping to learn more. I have figured it out over here after working for Union Pacific and seeing it first hand. The GWA driver is wise to understand the principles of loaded and empty trains. Obviously something heavier takes more to stop!

Not sure what sort of coullings they use but over here we have to contend with slack action. Slack is the free play between the couplers, and I think that's one of the factors limiting a trains weight. The longer the train, the more slack youll have. We've made some of it easier to deal with by using distributed power so the front and rear move at the same time.

We also dont get to run freight that fast. The maximum speed of a new ES44AC is around 70 MPH (112 K/H). The speed limits arent necessarily related to type of train, but the track its on. Most of the time that speed is in the range of 50 - 60 MPH (80 - 96 K/H) on the mainline.
 

jopsuk

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The video I embedded above shows a train fully composed of ECP iron ore hoppers - 81 two-pack hopper wagons (braking and door release control systems are shared between the two-pack instead of every single wagon having them) plus a crew car and an inline refuelling tanker to be precise.

As an aside, how many crew total are there with that train, how long is a single "turn" (ie how often do they go home) and what sort of range is there with fuel wagon included? Also, there's no fuel wagon at the rear- is there a pipe running the length of the train?
 

DownSouth

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Well many thanks friend! Im sorry I'm not sure how yall run trains in Britan and was hoping to learn more. I have figured it out over here after working for Union Pacific and seeing it first hand. The GWA driver is wise to understand the principles of loaded and empty trains. Obviously something heavier takes more to stop!

Not sure what sort of coullings they use but over here we have to contend with slack action. Slack is the free play between the couplers, and I think that's one of the factors limiting a trains weight. The longer the train, the more slack youll have. We've made some of it easier to deal with by using distributed power so the front and rear move at the same time.

We also dont get to run freight that fast. The maximum speed of a new ES44AC is around 70 MPH (112 K/H). The speed limits arent necessarily related to type of train, but the track its on. Most of the time that speed is in the range of 50 - 60 MPH (80 - 96 K/H) on the mainline.
I'm from Australia not Britain, and freight here uses exclusively AAR-type couplers. Trans-continental freight runs up to 1800 metres long and have a market share of land freight over 90% thanks to the long distances involved.

British trains mostly use screw links and buffers, though modern coal trains there do have AAR couplers. Passenger trains rule the rails, so freight trains are short and relatively fast.

Annoyingly, our mainline trains face dual restrictions of both narrow loading gauges (about halfway between British and US gauges) and low axle loads, these reasons combine to make it advantageous for operators who don't have remote fuel depots to use inline refuelling. The locos are mostly locally built by two manufacturers, one using GE 7FDL drivetrains and the other using effectively SD70ACe drivetrains.

The iron ore railways in the north-western part of Western Australia don't have those restrictions, they are the heaviest trains in the world and use full-size US-style locos including Dash 9s, some ES44ACs and a lot of SD70ACe locos - all specced with uprated air conditioning fit for use in extreme heat.

As an aside, how many crew total are there with that train, how long is a single "turn" (ie how often do they go home) and what sort of range is there with fuel wagon included? Also, there's no fuel wagon at the rear- is there a pipe running the length of the train?
The Arrium train operated by GWA is based out of Spencer Junction, just west of Port Augusta, and the round trip is a total distance of about 1250 kilometres.

I've drawn the rough rail route on this map here, note that all the lakes are salt lakes and some see land speed record attempts more often than a meaningful amount of water. To the west lies the famous 478 km of straight line across the Nullabor Plain (Nullabor = no trees!) which is about the same length as London-Penzance. To the north lies the north-south transcontinental route to Alice Springs and Darwin, to the east of Adelaide is Sydney and to the south-east is Melbourne.

Capture.png


The trip consists of basically six segments, 2x two man crews cover segments 1 to 3, and another two man crew covers segments 4 to 6 in the space of one twelve hour shift:
1. Spencer Junction GWA depot to Wirrida balloon loop (empty)
2. Six hours of loading the hoppers, the ore comes about 80 kilometres from the mine in massive mine trucks on a dirt haul road. The mainline locos haul the train through the loop for this, it's expensive but still cheaper than setting up a brand new depot with a shunter in the middle of nowhere.
IMG_9439_zps0b44c1f1.jpg

The balloon loop is on the right, another mining company has a siding to the left, and seperate haul roads for each company run off to the bottom-left.

3. Wirrida to Spencer Junction, axle load restricts this leg to 80 km/h.
4. Crew change, and a reversal ('rear' locos now lead) to drive to Whyalla.
5. Unloading at a purpose-built dual-gauge balloon loop also serving a shorter dedicated narrow gauge route to other mines.
6. Return to Spencer Junction, locos may be swapped for the next run or simply refuelled.

There are two of these sets in near-constant operation, with some spare hoppers to allow for maintenance rotations and the locos are substituted in/out as needed.

There is no fuel line running 1,800 metres! The fuel tanks are needed at the front only because the rear locos are shut down for the empty northbound run, and on the loaded run south the rear locos can be set to idle when the train is comfortably cruising. This train's fuel range is restricted by the heavy weight, intermodal trains can go much further than that with a tanker.
 

Genocide

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The bottom line is that in the UK we simply don't have the infrastructure or capacity to run big trains. The tractive effort available is largely irrelevant - a 66 or 70 could handle trains twice as long as they do here based on their US and Australian counterparts, but there would be a requirement to lift them from standing a lot faster to accommodate passenger workings - I believe that the 70's can do this if pushed!

Couplers - we're slowly moving from hook and chain to buckeye here - the equivalent of knuckle - but the length of trains makes slack action irrelevant.
 

DownSouth

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The bottom line is that in the UK we simply don't have the infrastructure or capacity to run big trains.
More importantly, you don't have trips long enough to make it an economical mode of operation. Creating larger freight terminals and increasing loading times is worth it if you're taking goods from Melbourne to Perth (a larger terminal is a lot cheaper than duplicating tracks spanning an entire continent) but it doesn't make so much sense in such a small country as Britain where it's easier to run more trips with shorter trains.

The tractive effort available is largely irrelevant - a 66 or 70 could handle trains twice as long as they do here based on their US and Australian counterparts, but there would be a requirement to lift them from standing a lot faster to accommodate passenger workings - I believe that the 70's can do this if pushed!
The issue with locomotives is more the mass of the loaded train than the length. If it's too heavy, simple add an extra loco.

Couplers - we're slowly moving from hook and chain to buckeye here - the equivalent of knuckle - but the length of trains makes slack action irrelevant.
The knuckle couplers used for freight in Britain are proper AAR knuckle couplers. The 'buckeye' couplers used for passenger service are ⅔ scaled versions of the AAR coupler.
 

HSTEd

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It is worth noting that with the latest technologies a CoCo 25kV only freight electric would probably be able to beat 10,000hp.

With the TE of a Class 70 and that much power, they could handle far heavier trains on our network than we have now.


EDIT:
Apparently the Re 465 locomotives in Switzerland have 9500hp on 84t, and do it all on the harder to use 15kV catenary system.

So 10,000hp is rather an underestimate probably.
In chian they have CoCo locomotives approaching 10,000kW.

A 10,000kW locomotive with the weight of a Class 70 would be able to sustain its 534kN starting tractive effort up to approximately 42mph.
Which is rather impressive really.
 
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jopsuk

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These locos are running on a 50kV line

Wikipedia gives their power output at 4MW, but the same figure regardless of whether 11-13.5kV, 25KV or 50kV- so it could be the data is rather incomplete.

(there's a small number of isolated, quite short, mine railroads running 50kV)
 

HSTEd

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There is a several hundred kilometre heavy haul line in South Africa doing it too.

But It appears that very high power electrics are available now which would enable enormously increased trainweights compared to the current diesels.

For instance at 60mph a Class 70 is only capable of 100kN tractive effort, whereas a 10,000kW freight electric would be capable of 370kN.

Such an electric would be able to haul ~2,250t weight up the Lickey Incline (and be able to restart the train if required) unassisted at no less than ~40mph.
A pair could handle ~4500t which would rather remove the need for bankers since with such high transit speeds on the rest of the route you would have fewer locomotives just by doubling up neccessary trains.

Or we could just route around Lickey and leave that for multiple units.....
 
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