SEPTA Silverliner Woes
#1
Friday evening July 1st one of the newer Silverliner V cars was seen leaning as compared to her sister car. SEPTA cars always travel in pairs or more linked together. This was a good thing, since it was noticed early.

After a few hours of trail and error, it was found (early Saturday morning) that the Equalizer Beam Plate on one truck had a crack that failed and the 2 pieces fortunately wedged together. This could have caused a derailment at high speeds.

They immediately began inspecting all the "bends" in all the trucks of all the cars that were in the shops for normal service.... they found more stress cracks. They ordered all the remaining Silverliner V cars to operate at reduced speed and to report to the repair shops. There are 8 of these bends (Where the springs rest) on the trucks, 4 per truck, 8 per car. It takes 1/2 hour to 45 minutes to visually inspect each car. They have worked around the clock and have inspected approximately 100 cars as of 2:00 Sunday July 3rd.

Most have stress cracks!! They are still under warranty and SEPTA is petitioning Hyundai (lowest bidder out of 4) to investigate the manufacturing process and honor the warranty. They are also asking NJ Transit and Amtrak for help in borrowing cars and rail clearance for rush hours beginning Tuesday the 5th.

This is 1/3 of the SEPTA fleet and it will have a huge impact on travel in Philadelphia and the surrounding suburbs. Here is a link to the story:

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://6abc.com/traffic/septa-1-3-of-regional-rail-fleet-going-out-of-service-/1411365/">http://6abc.com/traffic/septa-1-3-of-re ... -/1411365/</a><!-- m -->

Technical items:
~~ The cracks are supposedly due to a weld between 2 sections that were manufactured at 2 different places and brought together for assembly where they were welded.
~~ They are trying to determine what could have caused the fractures.
~~ The actual fractures are cumulative stress fractures at the weld.
~~ They are small, hairline cracks on either side of the beam. So they can start anywhere near the weld and progressively grow since these are weight (spring) bearing beams.
~~ NTSB and the Railroad Safety Board of the Federal Railroad Administration have been notified (as per regulations)
~~ The SEPTA Board of Directors are fully supportive of the decision to sideline all 120 cars.
~~ Some of the trucks are being switched around so that some cars have 2 good trucks so they could be put into service Tuesday, but this is a very low number of cars.

More to come as the news gets updated!!!!!
(Some of the above information was from a press conference held at 2:00 pm today)
~~ Mikey KB3VBR (Admin)
~~ NARA Member # 75    
~~ Baldwin Eddystone Unofficial Website

~~ I wonder what that would look like in 1:20.3???
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#2
There was a cartoon many years ago:
Space capsule orbiting. "Doesn't it make you proud to know this was all built by the lowest bidder?"
David
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#3
BR60103 Wrote:There was a cartoon many years ago:
Space capsule orbiting. "Doesn't it make you proud to know this was all built by the lowest bidder?"
Yeah... They say that in the movie Armageddon too Smile It's funny and sad at the same time.
~~ Mikey KB3VBR (Admin)
~~ NARA Member # 75    
~~ Baldwin Eddystone Unofficial Website

~~ I wonder what that would look like in 1:20.3???
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#4
BRING BACK THE BUDD CARS!

Oh wait... to late....

I think there is one St. Louis car co Silverliner III hanging around due to a lawsuit. Maybe that thing can still run!

Apparently, the Denver RTD Silverliner Vs don't have this problem-

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://billypenn.com/2016/07/06/why-denvers-silverliner-v-cars-still-run-while-septa-pulled-phillys-off-the-tracks/">http://billypenn.com/2016/07/06/why-den ... he-tracks/</a><!-- m -->

Quote:The Denver Regional Transportation District employs 60 Silverliner V cars. As of now, all of them are still in service, and RTD has no plans to pull them out.

“Our engineers have been carefully inspecting them since we heard about what happened in Philadelphia,” said RTD spokesperson Nate Currey.

“We have a slightly different model,” he continued, using an airline industry analogy. “It’s kind of like comparing a Boeing 737-500 to a 737-900er.”

One difference is weight: RTD’s cars are 5,000 lbs. lighter than SEPTA’s (which ended up 10,000 lbs. over-budget because of last-minute changes to meet new crashworthy standards put out by the Federal Railroad Administration).

A second distinction is in the equalizer bar itself.

“Our equalizer bars were machined flat, to prevent them from gathering water,” Currey said, “so I believe they were attached with a different style of welding.”

Additionally, there were various small changes to multiple parts of the general design to accommodate RTDs specific needs. Instead of having platforms at multiple levels like SEPTA, all of the Denver commuter rail platforms are at exactly the same height. The ultra-modern railway, which just came online this spring, was the first local transit built from the ground up to incorporate Positive Train Control — the automated system that helps avoid high-speed crashes and derailments — so that also induced some design tweaks, Currey said.

All of the above could be relevant to why Denver isn’t worried about SEPTA’s current issue.
Modeling New Jersey Under the Wire 1978-1979.  
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#5
I spoke to an employee... he thinks SEPTA will be paying and paying for these cars for a long time... Sad collectively they have a bunch of issues... Also, from that RTD article, I wonder if SEPTA is covering a 3 year warranty, saying it's a 7 year warranty. Icon_lol Icon_lol
~~ Mikey KB3VBR (Admin)
~~ NARA Member # 75    
~~ Baldwin Eddystone Unofficial Website

~~ I wonder what that would look like in 1:20.3???
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#6
According to NPR, SEPTA will be borrowing one Amtrak trainsets consisting of an ACS64 and a few amfleets, a NJ Transit "ALP" locomotive (probably an ALP46, possibly an ALP45, would be interesting if it was a stored ALP44) with comet cars, and a trainset from MARC, though no mention of any locomotive.

Sounds like the upper level of 30th street will get interesting!

Might be nice commuting in Amfleet cars as well.
Modeling New Jersey Under the Wire 1978-1979.  
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#7
Saw 2 of the MARC cars on a NB Train on the NEC about 6:30 PM today... Really neat!!!!

Also... there's a rumor going around that they may have to replace the pieces, not repair them Sad Sad Sad
~~ Mikey KB3VBR (Admin)
~~ NARA Member # 75    
~~ Baldwin Eddystone Unofficial Website

~~ I wonder what that would look like in 1:20.3???
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#8
ngauger Wrote:Saw 2 of the MARC cars on a NB Train on the NEC about 6:30 PM today... Really neat!!!!

Also... there's a rumor going around that they may have to replace the pieces, not repair them Sad Sad Sad

Cool! I'm gonna have to actually go out and train hunt one of these days (I rarely go trackside). Should be interesting stuff on the rails.

As far as the pieces go, I think you're right. the trucks aren't capable of supporting the weight. Here is a neat graphic-

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.philly.com/philly/business/20160706_The_mechanics_of_the_SEPTA_crisis__Why_cracks_can_form.html">http://www.philly.com/philly/business/2 ... _form.html</a><!-- m -->

[Image: 0705SEPTA-2.jpg]
Modeling New Jersey Under the Wire 1978-1979.  
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