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Double-stack Rail Transport
Double-stack rail transport is a form of intermodal freight transport in which railroad cars carry two layers of intermodal containers. Invented in the United States in 1984, it is now being used for nearly seventy percent of United States intermodal shipments. Using double stack technology, a freight train of a given length can carry roughly twice as many containers, sharply reducing transport costs per container. On United States railroads special well cars are used for double-stack shipment to reduce the needed vertical clearance and to lower the center of gravity of a loaded car. In addition, the well car design reduces damage in transit and provides greater cargo security by cradling the lower containers so their doors cannot be opened. A succession of larger container sizes have been introduced to further increase shipping productivity in the United States. Double-stack rail operations are growing in other parts of the world, but are often constrained by clearance and ot ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Consolidated Rail Corporation
Conrail , formally the Consolidated Rail Corporation, was the primary Class I railroad in the Northeastern United States between 1976 and 1999. The trade name Conrail is a portmanteau based on the company's legal name. It continues to do business as an asset management and network services provider in three Shared Assets Areas that were excluded from the division of its operations during its acquisition by CSX Corporation and the Norfolk Southern Railway. The federal government created Conrail to take over the potentially-profitable lines of multiple bankrupt carriers, including the Penn Central Transportation Company and Erie Lackawanna Railway. After railroad regulations were lifted by the 4R Act and the Staggers Act, Conrail began to turn a profit in the 1980s and was privatized in 1987. The two remaining Class I railroads in the East, CSX Transportation and the Norfolk Southern Railway (NS), agreed in 1997 to acquire the system and split it into two roughly-equal par ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wheelset (rail)
A wheelset is a pair of railroad vehicle wheels mounted rigidly on an axle such that both wheels rotate in unison. Wheelsets are often mounted in a bogie ("truck" in North America) – a pivoted frame assembly holding at least two wheelsets – at each end of the vehicle. Most modern freight cars and passenger cars have bogies each with two wheelsets, but three wheelsets (or more) are used in bogies of freight cars that carry heavy loads, and three-wheelset bogies are under some passenger cars. Four-wheeled goods wagons that were once near-universal in Europe and Great Britain and their colonies have only two wheelsets; in recent decades such vehicles have become less common as trainloads have become heavier. Conical wheel-tread Most train wheels have a conical taper of about 1 in 20 to enable the wheelset to follow curves with less chance of the wheel flanges coming in contact with the rail sides, and to reduce curve resistance. The rails general ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Truck
A truck or lorry is a motor vehicle designed to transport cargo, carry specialized payloads, or perform other utilitarian work. Trucks vary greatly in size, power, and configuration, but the vast majority feature body-on-frame construction, with a cabin that is independent of the payload portion of the vehicle. Smaller varieties may be mechanically similar to some automobiles. Commercial trucks can be very large and powerful and may be configured to be mounted with specialized equipment, such as in the case of refuse trucks, fire trucks, concrete mixers, and suction excavators. In American English, a commercial vehicle without a trailer or other articulation is formally a "straight truck" while one designed specifically to pull a trailer is not a truck but a " tractor". The majority of trucks currently in use are still powered by diesel engines, although small- to medium-size trucks with gasoline engines exist in the US, Canada, and Mexico. The market-share of electr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
25 KV AC
Railway electrification systems using alternating current (AC) at are used worldwide, especially for high-speed rail. It is usually supplied at the standard utility frequency (typically 50 or 60Hz), which simplifies traction substations. The development of 25kV AC electrification is closely connected with that of successfully using utility frequency. This electrification is ideal for railways that cover long distances or carry heavy traffic. After some experimentation before World War II in Hungary and in the Black Forest in Germany, it came into widespread use in the 1950s. One of the reasons why it was not introduced earlier was the lack of suitable small and lightweight control and rectification equipment before the development of solid-state rectifiers and related technology. Another reason was the increased clearance distances required where it ran under bridges and in tunnels, which would have required major civil engineering in order to provide the increased clearance ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Twistlock
A twistlock or twist lock, together with matching corner castings, as defined in norms including ISO 1161:1984, form a standardized (rotating) connector system, for connecting and securing intermodal, and predominantly ISO-standard international shipping containers. The primary uses are to securely ''stack'' containers, for locking them into place on a container ship, semi-trailer or rail carriage, and for lifting and handling by specific container-handling equipment, like straddle carriers, reach stackers, container-handling forklifts, sidelifters, and various types of container cranes. Twist-locks also have to be used when stacking shorter than 40-foot containers, together with 40foot (12.2 m) and longer containers. Shorter than 40foot containers must be joined together horizontally with twist-locks, to form a rigid combined whole of 40foot length, to make them stackable and be able to support and be supported by an ISO standard 40- or 45foot container stacked u ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Well Car
A well car, also known as a double-stack car (or also intermodal car/container car), is a type of railroad car specially designed to carry intermodal containers (shipping containers) used in intermodal freight transport. The "well" is a depressed section which sits close to the rails between the wheel trucks of the car, allowing a container to be carried lower than on a traditional flatcar. This makes it possible to carry a stack of two containers per unit on railway lines ( double-stack rail transport) wherever the structure gauge assures sufficient clearance. The top container is secured to the bottom container either by a bulkhead built into the car (e.g., bottom and top containers are the same dimensions of 40 ft.), or through the use of inter-box connectors (IBC). Four IBCs are needed per wellcar. In the process of an inbound train becoming an outbound train, there are four processes: unlock to unload the top container of inbound train, remove then unload bottom co ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Container Stacking
A container is any receptacle or enclosure for holding a product used in storage, packaging, and transportation, including shipping. Things kept inside of a container are protected on several sides by being inside of its structure. The term is most frequently applied to devices made from materials that are durable and are often partly or completely rigid. A container can also be considered as a basic tool, consisting of any device creating a partially or fully enclosed space that can be used to contain, store, and transport objects or materials. History Humans have used containers for at least 100,000 years, and possibly for millions of years.Clive Gamble, ''Origins and Revolutions: Human Identity in Earliest Prehistory'' (2007), p. 204. The first containers were probably invented for storing food, allowing early humans to preserve more of their food for a longer time, to carry it more easily, and also to protect it from other animals. The development of food storage c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Loading Gauge
A loading gauge is a diagram or physical structure that defines the maximum height and width dimensions in railway vehicles and their loads. Their purpose is to ensure that rail vehicles can pass safely through tunnels and under bridges, and keep clear of platforms, trackside buildings and structures. Classification systems vary between different countries, and gauges may vary across a network, even if the track gauge is uniform. The term loading gauge can also be applied to the maximum size of road vehicles in relation to tunnels, overpasses and bridges, and doors into automobile repair shops, bus garages, filling stations, residential garages, multi-storey car parks and warehouses. A related but separate gauge is the structure gauge, which sets limits to the extent that bridges, tunnels and other infrastructure can encroach on rail vehicles. The difference between these two gauges is called the clearance. The specified amount of clearance makes allowance for wobbling of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Overhead Wire
An overhead line or overhead wire is an electrical cable that is used to transmit electrical energy to electric locomotives, trolleybuses or trams. It is known variously as: * Overhead catenary * Overhead contact system (OCS) * Overhead equipment (OHE) * Overhead line equipment (OLE or OHLE) * Overhead lines (OHL) * Overhead wiring (OHW) * Traction wire * Trolley wire This article follows the International Union of Railways in using the generic term ''overhead line''. An overhead line consists of one or more wires (or rails, particularly in tunnels) situated over rail tracks, raised to a high electrical potential by connection to feeder stations at regular intervals. The feeder stations are usually fed from a high-voltage electrical grid. Overview Electric trains that collect their current from overhead lines use a device such as a pantograph, bow collector or trolley pole. It presses against the underside of the lowest overhead wire, the contact wire. Current collectors are ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Railway Electrification System
A railway electrification system supplies electric power to railway trains and trams without an on-board prime mover or local fuel supply. Electric railways use either electric locomotives (hauling passengers or freight in separate cars), electric multiple units ( passenger cars with their own motors) or both. Electricity is typically generated in large and relatively efficient generating stations, transmitted to the railway network and distributed to the trains. Some electric railways have their own dedicated generating stations and transmission lines, but most purchase power from an electric utility. The railway usually provides its own distribution lines, switches, and transformers. Power is supplied to moving trains with a (nearly) continuous conductor running along the track that usually takes one of two forms: an overhead line, suspended from poles or towers along the track or from structure or tunnel ceilings, or a third rail mounted at track level and contac ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
North America
North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Caribbean Sea, and to the west and south by the Pacific Ocean. Because it is on the North American Plate, North American Tectonic Plate, Greenland is included as a part of North America geographically. North America covers an area of about , about 16.5% of Earth's land area and about 4.8% of its total surface. North America is the third-largest continent by area, following Asia and Africa, and the list of continents and continental subregions by population, fourth by population after Asia, Africa, and Europe. In 2013, its population was estimated at nearly 579 million people in List of sovereign states and dependent territories in North America, 23 independent states, or about 7.5% of the world's population. In Americas (terminology)#Human ge ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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