Dispatches from a Cargo Cultist

[pieces o nine]

I liked binzzorz.

Even more fun to say than binznizzle.   

[Lindorm]

While the selection process is far from over, I have also been doing some other stuff lately -including teaching, of all things.

Most recently, I have thaught a bit about "Tågfärd i system M" -"Train operations, system M". This is basically how to run trains using old-fashioned methods. Instead of the relay interlockings, automatic signalling and computer-controlled route setting that is the norm on most of the Swedish railways today, you go back to basics.

Essentially, Signaller A calls up Signaller B (or, earlier, telegraphed), asking if the line is clear between A and B, and B can accept a train. If B answers affirmatively, A then dispatches the train and then notifies B that "Train 01 departed A right time". Both A and B then make a note in their logbooks that the line is blocked due to a train being on the line. When train 01 then arrives in it's entirety in B, the signaller in B calls up signaller A and reports that "01 has arrived in B". Signaller B might then ask signaller A if she is ready to accept train 02, and so on.

The safeworking of the trains thus depends on the signallers exchanging correct information with each other before dispatching any trains, as well as a few other extra checks. For example, the driver of a train might have a safety order stating that "Train 01 to meet train 02 at B", and thus, the driver of train 01 must not depart from B before train 02 has arrived, or train 01 has recieved a safety order stating that the meet is cancelled or moved to another station.

Most of our trainees have only seen modern automatic signalling (and will only work in those areas, too), so this is something of a cultural shock for them. With modern signalling, you cant go too wrong with the basic assupmtion of "if the signal is green, go, if the signal is red, stop".  However, in System M, the signals are essentially controlled by the signaller with a light switch, and there are several scenarios where it is perfectly possible to have a green light into an occupied track, or out from a station on to a stretch of line which is occupied by another train. Indeed, in some cases you as a driver must not, under any circumstance, move your train, even if a signal is green, until you have recieved a manual dispatch hand signal from the signaller. In other cases, the rules state that you are perfectly allright to pass a certain signal at danger on your own authority, without even contacting a signaller. You should, however, report the fact to the signaller "at a convenient time". Oh, and there are stations and interlockings that are completely without signals, too -which is complete and utter bizarro land to the trainees,

Confusing at times, but it's quite fun, and you get a course in the underlying principles of railway signalling as it developed in Sweden over the years.

Here's a picture of some of my whiteboard drawings when I held a few lessons covering the basic principles.

From left to right, we have "Knotträsk", Gnatmarsh, a fairly large station with some interlocking and signalling, and permanently staffed by a signaller (bevakad), the guy with the red cap. Train 01 is supposed to meet train 02 here, and the signaller is to dispatch trains by hand signal ("TKL ger körtillstånd).

We then come to Svältböle ("Starvecroft"), a station that has fallen on hard times. It is only staffed at certain times (tidvis bevakad) and, at the moment, unstaffed (obevakad driftplats). The signals are set to clear in both direction of the single track -the station is essentially not there for most purposes. Since it is unsupervised, trains can not meet there. However, the siding to the Starvecroft peat bog is of a special type, where a train can gain access to the siding by using a special key to unlock a set of points, enter the siding and then lock the set of points behind them, thus clearing the line for other trains.

After Starvecroft, we come to Wrångsjöö gruva, the old Lake Morose mines. This is a Linjeplats, essentially a set of points located on the line between two stations. These points are uncontrolled by any signaller, and operated by the train crew themselves, again with a special ("K16") key. Again, a train can enter the Lake Morose spur, throw the points back after them and lock them again. They then report to the signaller at the station where they picked up the control key stating that they are clear of the running line and they have the K16 key with them. The signaller then removes the notification in her logbook about a train on the line between Gnatmarsh and Midgewater and can then resume running trains on the line. The words used for this report are "jag har k16 i handen" -literally "I have the K16 key in my hand". Jokes about rules-bending work train crews getting tattoos of K16 keys in the palms of their hands are mandatory at this point.

We finally arrive in "Myggvattnet", Midgewater, yet another continously staffed station with a signaller on duty at all times.

Midgewater is, by the way, the site of a hugely popular annual country fair, with dumpling-eating contests, fierce rivalry between Ladie's Associations as to who makes the most scrumptious rutabaga mousse as well as a cattle exhibition. The throngs of people swarming Midgewater are enough for the railway to lay on a series of extra trains, necessiating the manning of Starvecroft with a extra signaller in order to provide a meeting place for extra trains and enabling the running of several trains in a convoy after each other. The traditional farmhand fight after the country fair of course always makes the last train from Midgewater late, so trains will have to recieve special orders about cancelled and moved meets, as well as new meets with extra trains.

On the other end of Gnatmarsh, there's the coastal town of Herrington and a branchline to Herrington Docks. Herrington station is a very confused place, displaying examples of just about any oddity you can imagine signalling-wise. This sorry state of affairs has fortunately not discouraged the local signaller, TKL Hume, who considers it a learning experience -but that is for another day!

[pieces o nine]

Apparently, it's not all natural leadership ability and waving from the engine...   

[Swatopluk]

An old system is the token on the one track line. It requires that the number of trains going into one direction is the same as in the other. In Britain the token was a ring hanging from a hook on a pole at the height of the driver's side window. A driver coming to one end of that single-track line would take the ring and drive through. Then he would put the ring onto the hook at that end. If there was no ring on the hook, the driver would have to stop and wait for the next train from the other direction bringing it back.
I don't know what happened when some never-do-good country boy stole the ring

[Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith]

An old system is the token on the one track line. It requires that the number of trains going into one direction is the same as in the other. In Britain the token was a ring hanging from a hook on a pole at the height of the driver's side window. A driver coming to one end of that single-track line would take the ring and drive through. Then he would put the ring onto the hook at that end. If there was no ring on the hook, the driver would have to stop and wait for the next train from the other direction bringing it back.
I don't know what happened when some never-do-good country boy stole the ring

Is that the source of the name "token ring" which describes a communication protocol in electronics? 

[Swatopluk]

No idea. I just collect the British Transport Film Collection of the BFI and that was in a short on the first disc.

[Griffin NoName]

An old system is the token on the one track line. It requires that the number of trains going into one direction is the same as in the other. In Britain the token was a ring hanging from a hook on a pole at the height of the driver's side window. A driver coming to one end of that single-track line would take the ring and drive through. Then he would put the ring onto the hook at that end. If there was no ring on the hook, the driver would have to stop and wait for the next train from the other direction bringing it back.

They could make that an Olympic relay sport !!

[Lindorm]

Apparently, it's not all natural leadership ability and waving from the engine...   

Oh no, you have to be passionate about customer service, make a perfect milkshake every time and the only fault in your character is that you are too humble and modest, too.

Actually, the milkshake part could be something useful -at least it would show an ability to read and follow written instructions. 

[Lindorm]

An old system is the token on the one track line. It requires that the number of trains going into one direction is the same as in the other. In Britain the token was a ring hanging from a hook on a pole at the height of the driver's side window. A driver coming to one end of that single-track line would take the ring and drive through. Then he would put the ring onto the hook at that end. If there was no ring on the hook, the driver would have to stop and wait for the next train from the other direction bringing it back.
I don't know what happened when some never-do-good country boy stole the ring

The Token Block system is still alive and well in quite a few parts of the world -it was widely used wherever the railways were built with a british operational philosophy. The british, being awfully clever chaps and all, soon came up with several ingenious solutions to the problem of all tokens being in on place, and all the trains somewhere else. The pinnacle of token block systems uses two or more interconnected token block machines, one at each station. The signallers at both end have to operate electrical instruments to enable the release of one token from one end only, after which the staff instruments locked up. They could then only be opened and issue a new token when the first token had been inserted in the staff instrument at the other end of the section of track. The staff instruments had magazines of token staves, so they could cope with imbalances in the service patterns.

German railway signalling developed along slightly different lines, instead opting for the use of block field instruments with indicator discs showing the signaller if the line was occupied or clear.

Theft or loss of tokens as well as other mishaps were handled by an extensive and very thorough system of rules and working procedures. In a way, British railway operations philosophy has put a great emphasis on always ensuring a clear run for the driver and eliminating any possibilities of signalliing faults or even degraded working. The drivers were more or less ensured that if they got a clear signal, they could depend on that signal aspect and then left to run their train as skillfully as possible. Those trains, on the other hand, were and are a bit special. No headlights on the locos, no speeds signposted -the driver was expected to know his lines and their permissable speeds, and, of course, the "unfitted freight". Unfitted, as in not fitted with any brakes on the wagons -they only had brakes on the loco and a hand brake on a brake van in the rear, staffed by a guard.

In Germany, on the other hand, they seemed to delight in inventing new and unusual ways of permissive working, special working, degraded working, exceptional working and so on, making a clear aspect on a german signal something to be regarded with a healthy pinch of salt, or perhaps through rose-coloured glasses. The germans were the one who invented as special supplementary signal attached to a main signal to show that the main signal was not working properly, and then attached further supplementary signals to show the driver how this faulty signal might be passed -all with their own fail-safe and discrete circuits. They also installed propane-fuelled signal lights up until quite recently, all fitted with complete electrical circuitry to monitor the propane flame and sound an alarm if the flame was extinguished. But making the signal itself electric? Undenkbar! 

Is that the source of the name "token ring" which describes a communication protocol in electronics? 

The way a token ring network operates is certainly very similar to how one of the above mentioned networks of electric staff instruments work, as well as a old-fashioned open railway telegraph or telephone network.

Do not forget, the railways were very much into secure and reliable communications protocols from a very early time. Some of the earliest modern communications research was carried out on behalf of the railways. Quite a few railways, for example the no-defunct Southern in the US, were also pioneers in the use and construction of computer mainframe networks and computer communications.

[Swatopluk]

The favorite way of a certain kind of 'Chaots'* around here is to cut the signal cables (electric and mechanic) at crucial points of the railway network. These guys have become experts in bringing the system to a standstill with minimum effort. Much more effective than the usual cable thieves (copper prices are high).

*people declaring themselves to be leftist revolutionaries but actually being in it primarily for the joy of creating chaos.

[Lindorm]

On the proper and not-so-proper methods of lubricating your trainees
===========================================


First of all, I must say that the current bunch of trainees that I have are really an excellent lot. There's a general sense of comradeship, enthusiasm and all-around good will in the class, and I do enjoy working with them tremendously.

At the moment, half of the class is away on practice secondments, and the other half is having a theory block with me back in school. We are going through a basic vehicle technology course, having looked a bit at the fundamentals of electric traction (series motors, separately excited motors, asynchronous AC motors, what is the point of a traction converter, how do modern computerized trains really work...)

Part of this course is having a look at reality, in the form of going to a nearby goods yard and borrowing a locomotive from my former employer Green Cargo and letting the trainees loose on it under my supervision. The locomotive class, Rd, is actually a very good teaching aid, since it is a late seventies construction that has been extensively refurbished and modernized just a few years ago, so get a lot of rail vehicle development in a single convenient package. Also, you can make pop corn in the microwave in the B end cab.

Now, I had had the trainees in small groups all day -it was a marathon day for me, since I wanted to get all the groups done in a single day due to scheduling issues. Time had come for the last group, and we had crawled round on the loco, looking at this and that, opening the high-tension cubicles and looking really closely at the transformer and main circuit breaker and all that, and were wrapping it up for the day.

Then, one of the trainees, M, opens her mouth and says those fateful words: "Would it perhaps be possible to have a teeny-tiny look at one of the diesels, too, since I am about to drive that very class on my practice secondment." I like M. She is a good student, not only keen and intelligent, but also someone who has a lot of common sense and is very down-to-earth. She is also not afraid to pull up her sleeves and dig in when that has to be done. The other trainees are also a good bunch -K is a quiet guy with a very nice attitude and a keen sense of humour, N is the kind of girl who doesn't say that much and mostly keeps quiet, and when you are not looking, it's her who puts the matchsticks in the tire valves of that illegally parked SUV.

So I said, OK, if everyone is up for it, we can take a little look.

Of course they are up for it, so off we go to have look at the T44-class diesel loco. Licence-built by NOHAB here in Sweden back in the early seventies, a big hunk of Detroit Iron with a GM 12-645E diesel engine, antediluvian technology, but also some very interesting and extremely robust technical solutions. We open some of the hood doors to have a look at the engine, we pop the cylinder top covers to have a look at the cylinder tops with the rockers, camshafts, injectors and all that, and then we fire the diesel up and look at all those parts moving.

Then, I get an idea.

Ideas that you get after having worked for 12 hours straight are seldom that well-thought out.

I decide to show them how you can manually operate the motor governor, opening up the fuel rack and increasing the speed of the diesel engine.

The cyilnder heads are cooled by lube oil being sprayed on them and circulated in a oil circuit. The lube oil is pumped around by a plunge pump that is directly driven by the engine. If you increase the engine RPM, you also increase the pressure in the oil circuit and the frequency of the spraying.

You can see where this is heading?

I couldn't.

Lindorm leans on rocker shaft to motor governor, engine revs up, slowly and with the characteristic GM/EMD lag, and accompanied by a very nice bass throbbing. And literally a shower of lube oil, out of the ejector nozzles and straight on top of my trainees. N managed to duck behind a hood door, but K and M where looking like dalmatians.

I wanted to die of shame there and then. I felt really, really terrible. Good lord, what had I done?

And then M said "Cool, they would never have taken me seriously if I had shown up in clean hi-vis at my practice secondment. Anyone got a tissue?"

Anyhow, we all helped in getting each other mopped up, and then took the loco out for a little spin -but this time, with all doors, covers and hatches properly closed. And lots of bad jokes about "Hey, teach, thanks for giving us a few splashes of reality" and "Is this how train drivers are baptized?".

I don't think I will do that particular blunder again....


But the kids are a really, really nice bunch!  

[Opsa]

An unfortunate but hilarious episode! Your students will never forget you, and I mean that in a good way. And they really learned a valuable lesson, too!

[Darlica]

I doubt L will ever forget it either... there's apparently even a video file of the event... 

It could have been worse, these three seems to have both their hearts and brains in the right places. And M has a point, no one in completely clean hi-vis is taken seriously... 

_{(I guess it's because "Management" wears clean hi-vis clothing, it's the same in the Metro where I work)}

[Aggie]

Yep, some stains on your coveralls are good for job cred.  I did ask to buy a new set once, for going door-to-door in a 1 km radius around the worksite after we accidentally discovered an old mercaptan pod in the ground...  one wants to look one's best when telling the public that the giant stink cloud was one's fault. 

_{eh, it didn't go further than 15 km downwind, from the reports called into the gas company.} 

[Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith]

Thanks, L...

... that was hilarious... your description gave me an excellent visual picture of the whole process...  movie-quality hilarious, even.

It's even funnier because you didn't do it on purpose.