switch stands

[NW Mailing List]

Abe,
Thanks for all the great information.  You keep spinning me yarns and I'll
keep knitting my brow (and asking questions).
Jim Cochran

On Tue, Dec 20, 2022 at 9:21 AM NW Mailing List <nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org>
wrote:

> Comrade Cochranovski, Excellency, et al :
>
> Just a few general (not location specific) remarks to guide you along this
> quest for knowledege:
>
> 1.  All the details you ask about were time and technology specific,  I.e.
> they changed from place to place, from road to road, and from time to time,
> as the technology developed. So no one answer will fit-all-sizes.
>
> 2.  Back in the early days, switch stands were "high."  Witness the old
> "Harp" type switch stands which operated stub switches (i.e. switches using
> non-mitered rails.)  This type construction was very likely done so that
> the brakeman could use the full weight of his body in moving the switch's
> operating lever, rather than just the muscles in his back (as would be the
> case with a ground-lever switch.)
>
> The high-level switch stand also had the advantage that the switch lamp
> could be mounted up high, where it had a better chance of being seen
> despite foliage, snow, etc.  (Witness the Southern Pacific, which had some
> switch stands with lamps 15 feet in the air, on the line over the Sierra
> Mountains at Donner Pass.  But then, those folks sometimes saw 20 feet of
> snow in a single Winter.)
>
> When I was a brakeman on the Punkin Vine (1967 and 1968,) all main track
> switches had high switch stands.  The Ramapo Ajax low-level switch stands
> were used only on yard and industrial tracks.  Trainmen loved the
> high-level stands, as they put less stress on one's back when operating
> them.
>
> 3.  The section gangs maintained the oil lamps on switch markers and the
> semaphores at depots used as Train order and Block signals.  Most of those
> had what was called the Seven Day Oil Fount, and (at least) once a week the
> designated section man would fill the fount, raise and trim the wick, and
> wipe the glass.  The rules of some railroads required the Operator to
> maintain the lamps on the signals at his own station, and he got a few
> extra pennies of pay for doing this.
>
> The N&W began installing two-arm Automatic Block semaphore signals in
> 1906.  But these were operated by "made" batteries, i.e. primary batteries
> right at the signal location, made in a glass jar of acid, Copper and
> Zinc.  Switches continued to have oil lamp illumination.
>
> Around 1913, the N&W began installing a form of signaling called Absolute
> Permissive Block (APB) using AC track circuits and semaphores operated by
> AC motors.  To habilitate this operation, the N&W (like many railroads)
> strung a 440 volt AC pair on its pole line, and in cases, even built its
> own small generating stations trackside, to supply the 440 line.  At
> signals, the 440 was transformed down to a voltage usable in the operation
> of track circuits, AC semaphore motors, and signal lamps.  This was the
> origin (at least on the N&W) of signal lighting by incandescent lamps.  Off
> this 440 signal power line, the railroad began fitting certain main track
> switches with incandescent lamps.  The decision on where to do this was
> probably ad hoc.
>
> 4.  As for what most people would call ground switches (i.e. low level
> switch stands of the Ramapo Ajax type,)  N&W practice was to illuminate
> with oil switch markers those on tracks where there was a significant
> amount of traffic, say yard ladder tracks.  There may have been a
> specification about where illuminated switch markers were to be used in the
> N&W MW Standard Plans; I do not know.  Or there may have been a legal
> requirement - in Pennsylvania, the Public Utilities Commission required a
> light on switches which saw, on average, more than six engine/train
> movements per 24-hour day.  I do not know what the formal requirements were
> on the N&W as my typical excuse applies:  my function on the N&W was to
> push box cars around in the darkness, not to wrestle with the formal
> regulations and policies.  Of course, the advent of Scotch-Light
> reflectorized tape spelled the death knell of illuminated lamps on most
> switches.  N&W switches were converted from oil lamps to that garbage
> sometime in the 1960s.  Radford was the last place I saw still using oil
> switch markers, and that was sometime in the 1970s.  Interlocked switches,
> i.e. power-operated switches within interlocking limits, have never, since
> the earliest days, required a switch marker.
>
> 5.  One final remark:  The N&W invested some well-spent money in those
> Ramapo Ajax switch stands.  The cheaper option would have been the New
> Century switch stand (which came out in the late 1890s.)  If a movement
> trailed through a New Century switch in the wrong position, the spindle
> inside was irreparably bent or broken.  Not so with the N&W's Ramapo Ajax
> switch stands - they could be trailed through without permanently damaging
> the mechanism.  BTW, the strange word "Ramapo" is taken from the town of
> Ramapo, New Jersey, where the Ajax Company had its headquarters.  The state
> of New Jersey had a lot of lower grade iron ore and an iron business sprang
> up there very early.  Wharton is another name you will hear in connection
> with New Jersey iron, as in the name of a still surviving company called
> Taylor-Wharton,  Ramapo, obviously, is an Indian word, but I have forgotten
> its meaning.
>
> I will attach a photo of an N&W oil switch marker and an N&W electric
> switch marker.  (Easy to tell the difference... the electric markers have
> no provision for venting the fumes from a flame.)
>
> Hope this helps.  If not, come back and I will spin you some more yarns...
>
>     -- abram burnett, LCTW
> (Licensed Clinical Turnip Worker)
>
>
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