Western Railroad Discussion > Smarter than the coupler

>I've been doing this 42+ years as a brakeman/conductor and as an engineer and I have never seen or heard of knuckles being broken like this.

Agree, and add my 41½+ years of doing the same things to this.

There's something missing from the story. Perhaps it's the guy who told the OP what was happening and conflated "knuckle" with "coupler", or something like this.

LarryDoyle Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> In fact, in the movie Danger Lights (1930) the
> hero of the movie, my namesake Larry Doyle, is an
> ex-railroader turned hobo down on his luck, is in
> a roundhouse in Scene II, and sees the front of a
> Mikado with its knuckle open. He closes it and
> shouts sarcastically, "That's a fine way to leave
> an engine." I love the symbolism, as his luck
> changes.
>

Just for fun, Here's a clip of that scene.

-John

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EtoinShrdlu Wrote:
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> >I've been doing this 42+ years as a
> brakeman/conductor and as an engineer and I have
> never seen or heard of knuckles being broken like
> this.
>
> Agree, and add my 41½+ years of doing the same
> things to this.
>
> There's something missing from the story. Perhaps
> it's the guy who told the OP what was happening
> and conflated "knuckle" with "coupler", or
> something like this.

Agreed. I've been run into cuts with closed knuckles hard enough to knock me off the seat and never broke one.

highgreengraphics Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> ...
> Before that it seemed tradition to always run with
> the front knuckle shut, old timers said in a grade
> crossing collision if open the coupler tended to
> lock a vehicle onto the front of the locomotive
> rather than allowing it to glance off to one side
> or another. ...


Unless I'm on a local I ALWAYS close the knuckle on the lead unit of my train, always have and always will. My reasoning is for the reason stated above about hitting cars but if as another poster said about that bringing good luck then I'll take that also.

Usually what happens with both knuckles closed is they are forced sideways or "pass". If impact is great enough, it will force the car sideways and turn the rail over. (A source of embarrasment, so don't ask)

Posted from Android

To those who say slamming closed knuckles together does not lead to broken knuckles you need to spend time in the coal fields especially in the cold winters. The slack running out on a grade packs a lot of wallop against the knuckle faces. A rolling cut of about 25 loads kicked just a bit hard to a joint on 75 cars in emergency can break iron as well. I only spent 7 years in the coal fields and saw this a few times. I never saw it in the other 26 years I railroaded, though.

Posted from Windows Phone OS 7



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/14/14 14:43 by fbe.

>To those who say slamming closed knuckles together does not lead to broken knuckles you need to spend time in the coal fields especially in the cold winters.

No dispute here. If you ever see cheap tools for sale which were used on the Alaska pipeline, don't buy them because they are mild steel so they don't get brittle in the cold, not the drop forged steel used for the lower 48.

>The slack running out on a grade packs a lot of wallop against the knuckle faces.

The pulling faces? Nothing new nor unusual about that.

Not the pulling faces but two closed knuckles, shoving to a joint after setting out a bad order. Slack is bunched but the cut will stall short of the joint so the engineer releases the air, slack runs out, bang, busted metal.

Why were both knuckles closed you ask? Stuff happens especially when people are in a hurry.

Posted from Windows Phone OS 7