Western Railroad Discussion > Coal Train Unloading

On average, how long does it to take unload a coal train if 130 cars is about the typical size of the train? Does it make any difference if it's a tub type car that gets a spin or a bottom dump? Does it take significantly longer in the winter when all that coal may be frozen into one big lump? Thanks.

I can't speak of coal train unloading except that the aluminum cars have a notice advising not to use open flame on the exterior of the car to thaw out contents.

I do know that Quebec Cartier Mining, which ships sinterised ore rather than concentrate pellets has a ten car capacity heater shed for unthawing ore cars at Port Cartier.

How long it takes to unload a coal train depends largely on the unloading facility. Typically it can be anywhere from 4 hours to 24 hours. The fastest method is the bottom dump trestle where the cars have automatic doors. The train can move a continuous low speed of less than 1mph. Rotary dump facilities typically have a arm that moves the train ahead and spots the cars. It generally takes 8-12 hours to rotary dump a train. There are also single spot unloading facilities using bottom dump cars without automatic doors, and they can take one or more days to unload a long train.

Frozen coal can really slow down the unloading process, particularly at facilities not equipped to handle frozen coal. If the coal is loaded frozen and stays that way during the trip, there generally isn't a problem to unload it. But coal that freezes after it has loaded can become a huge problem. Coal that is rained on and then freezes can become such a huge problem it may take up to a week to unload.

Ted Curphey
Ontario, OR

At Muscatine Power and Water it takes an average of 4 minutes per car, using rapid discharge bottom dump hoppers. The belts are the limiting factor as they cannot take the coal away as fast as the crew can spot and dump one car at a time.

Our loop track is not long enough to allow dumping the entire train, so we dump it in halves, at approx. 4 hrs per half (58 cars).

Andy

At La Due, MO at the Kansas City Power & Light Montrose Power Station (located on the MNA) they can dump a 126 car rotary dump train in as little as 9 hours if everything goes great. Typically the train crew dumps the head 15-20 cars (depending on train size) before turning it over to the KCPL fuel yard crew, where they slap on their arm and dump the rest.

Limiting factors include them busting the air, hydraulics on the arm screwing up, the wheel locks messing up, conveyor belts stopping, or malfunctioning, and of course high leveling. High leveling is when they raise the conveyor over the stockpile up as far as it goes, but the pile grows large enough to reach the bottom of the end of the belt boom, and they must bulldoze the pile down and spread it out before they can unload anymore.

1.) My train, formerly UP Train CETLU9 01 sitting just outside the dumper room.
2.) View from said engine, facing towards the dumper room.
3.) The plant.

All taken on 2-3-10, La Due, MO.


Pump



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/30/11 13:01 by UPTRAIN.

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Are there ever problems of spontaneous combustion of coal, either in cars or in the piles at the mine or power plants? Bunker fires were a continual problem back in the days of coal-fired steamships, and it was a general rule not to bunker a ship with coal that was less than a month from the mine, to give the volatiles some time to evaporate. One theory for the sinking of the battleship Maine in Havana harbor was a coal bunker fire, though it's not widely accepted.

On the Deseret Power Ry. in eastern Utah the train size is always 44 cars. The cars are bottom dumpers. The entire train is normally unloaded in about 2 hours.

Dick
Roosevelt, Utah

ddkid Wrote:
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> Are there ever problems of spontaneous combustion
> of coal, either in cars or in the piles at the
> mine or power plants?

Coal isn't generally in the cars long enough to spontaneously combust, but it can and does burn on the pile. They try to keep the pile compacted to keep oxygen out, with varying degrees of success.

If coal is allowed to sit in the bunkers for an extended time it will start to burn. If planning falls down and it looks like a bunker will sit for an extended time it'll need to be emptied.

Andy

AndyBrown Wrote:
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> ddkid Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Are there ever problems of spontaneous
> combustion
> > of coal, either in cars or in the piles at the
> > mine or power plants?
>
> Coal isn't generally in the cars long enough to
> spontaneously combust, but it can and does burn on
> the pile. They try to keep the pile compacted to
> keep oxygen out, with varying degrees of success.
>
> If coal is allowed to sit in the bunkers for an
> extended time it will start to burn. If planning
> falls down and it looks like a bunker will sit for
> an extended time it'll need to be emptied.
>
> Andy

There is a very large difference in Eastern and Western (Powder River) fuels and their propensity to spontaneously combust. The Eastern fuels generally do not have problems and it is rare to have storage piles or bunker/silo fires.

The PRB coals are a whole 'nother ball game. Compaction of the storage pile is the minimum needed for long term storage, and there have been plants that have tried sealing the pile, watering the pile and other methods, with, as stated above, varying degrees of success. Within the plant there are usually very specific equipment modifications and specific courses of action if there is fire detected in the bunker or the pulverizers. When a plant switches to PRB there is a very interesting learning period that has a few fires, a "puff" or two or three, and endless meetings to find out how to just get back to running a plant without the drama.

Another part of this equation is the original design of the unloading facility. At the Sunflower Electric Holcomb plant, the design was for 100 ton steel cars. It took just a bit over 4.5 hours if all went well. Pump noted much of what can go wrong. However, with the increase in car capacity and then length of train, the conveyor system could not keep up. So the process became much longer as they have to wait after about every 6 cars for the conveyor system to catch up. This obviously increased the time to unload plus the additional cars.
So once again, there is no simple answer. It "Depends"..

Clarence