Dockside Crane crossing Railway Trackwork?

[Ralf]

Hi Folks, 

 

Hoping to include a Dapol Dockside crane on a forthcoming OO-SF Micro layout - see link (https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/153445-siddals-road-quay-changing-the-plan-again/), but looking to include some point work along the dockside which is also where the crane and it's rails will be modelled (the crane is planned to be static, so only cosmetic rails). The big question was how the crane would traverse across such diverging bits of railway if you get my drift... 

 

Then this thread and picture from @Schoonerappeared, can anyone give me any other examples or what the other options were especially later in history 60s/70s preferably... I suspect the answer is that generally cranes were just on long straight sidings and it was a rare problem to have? 

 

 

 

 

Thanks

Ralf

 

Edited May 3, 2020 by Ralf
Layout plan thread link added

[jim.snowdon]

There are plenty instances of crossings that accommodate both single flange (railway) wheels and double flange (crane) wheels. It's not particularly challenging.

 

Jim 

[pb_devon]

Jim is right....it’s not uncommon.

The arrangement I have seen, not infrequently, is where one of the crane rails is used as one of the railway rails. I’ve never understood how that was supposed to work in practice! 

[dvdlcs]

Would I be right in assuming that the crane rails are purely for positioning the crane and once it was bearing a load it wouldn't move along them, just swing on its axis from the loading to unloading position?

[Edwin_m]

In that picture it looks as if the crane must have multiple wheels, some of which are unsupported as it passes over the railway rail.  Either the crane rails are higher at that crossing, or the landward wheels are unflanged with all guidance coming from the double-flanged seaward wheels.  

[Siberian Snooper]

1 hour ago, dvdlcs said:

Would I be right in assuming that the crane rails are purely for positioning the crane and once it was bearing a load it wouldn't move along them, just swing on its axis from the loading to unloading position?

 

 

That's the way a lot of the Devonport Dockyard cranes worked, they would quite often remain in the same place for most of a refit,  where they were required to be more mobile they had dedicated track, not that there was much if any rail traffic.

 

 

[Yardman]

Dock side cranes do travel down the quayside. In the picture shown only the wheels on the side nearest the ship would be flanged and the wheels are flanged both sides. The other wheel-sets that have to cross the railway tracks are not flanged and can cross other rails without problems. Dockside cranes had to be able to move in order to line up with the ships holds. A lot of dockside cranes are electric and run on trailing cables. Either from a powered cable reel on the crane or plugs and sockets on the quayside. It is common for dockside crane to straddle railway tracks for ease of transfer from ship to rail and vice versa. Only very small dockside cranes work from normal railway tracks and are usually for maintenance or ship repair. The Airfix/Dapol crane is fairly lax in its portrayal of a dockside crane and much simplified.

 

[steve W]

 I suspect the inside crane/railtrack has a moveable bolted section of track at the crossing. I have seen this in a few places where separation of the lines could not be achieved and allows for the usual double flanged wheels on the crane bogies.

 

[Yardman]

3 hours ago, steve W said:

 I suspect the inside crane/railtrack has a moveable bolted section of track at the crossing. I have seen this in a few places where separation of the lines could not be achieved and allows for the usual double flanged wheels on the crane bogies.

 

As I stated previosly , not needed the wheels running on this rail are flangeless!!!!

[Artless Bodger]

There are crane tracks crossed by train tracks on the wharf by Bristol M Shed museum, along with 4 Stothert and Pitt dockside cranes. Looking at photos available on the web, the intersection is plain - the slot of the inset train rail is intersected by the slot of the crane rail. Looking at a close up of the crane bogies - there are 2 wheels per bogie, 1 bogie on each crane leg and the wheels are centre flanged on both rails, the rails are symmetrical centre flangeway (unlike the inset train rail). This must have involved some careful gauging when the crane tracks were inset. The cranes are fitted with rail clamps on each bogie and so probably are secured in place while lifting and will not be required to travel loaded. I think the M shed cranes have cable spools and plug into dockside sockets. The Stothert and Pitt cranes we had at New Hythe used trolley wires bracketed off the buildings for normal use, but had a cable spool for travel beyond the trolley wires if needed. The cranes used for unloading coal in west mill were required to travel loaded and were on occasion used to shunt empty mineral wagons by dropping the grab into the wagon and engaging travel - not apparently an approved procedure.

 

Attached electrical diagram for one of the cranes - I think they were 400V DC.

Elec_Schem_22t_Toplis_Grab_Crane.pdf

[The Johnster]

They move only to position, and their provision means that the wharf space is far more flexible, as the crane comes not just to the ship, but to the individual hatch on the ship. There is a financial reason for this; the dock company wants to be competitive in attracting ships, and the shipowner wants his ship in port for as short a time as possible as she is incurring wharfage and service charges.  Both parties want her back out at sea, preferably with another cargo, asap.

[Ralf]

7 hours ago, Yardman said:

In the picture shown only the wheels on the side nearest the ship would be flanged and the wheels are flanged both sides. The other wheel-sets that have to cross the railway tracks are not flanged and can cross other rails without problems. 

 

Thanks Yardman that makes a lot of sense! 

Ralf

[jim.snowdon]

12 hours ago, Yardman said:

As I stated previosly , not needed the wheels running on this rail are flangeless!!!!

It's worth going back the thread from which picture was taken (the link is there in the original post) as there is a much fuller explanation of how it was done. Briefly, it involved a section of removable rail.

 

The crane, which was hydraulic by the way, would require to be supported at all four corners as it was moved and an added consideration is that the land side rail had to be broken twice to get through the crossover track. The leading leg would reach that gap at close to the time the at the rear leg reached the gap that is in the picture.

 

The giveaway to the crane being hydraulic is that vertical tower . It will contain a hydraulic jigger for taking in and paying out the lift rope. The jib is fixed, so there is no luffing mechanism.

 

Jim 

Edited May 5, 2020 by jim.snowdon
Correction of typo.

[Yardman]

8 hours ago, jim.snowdon said:

It's worth going back the thread from which picture was taken (the link is there in the original post) as there is a much fuller explanation of how it was done. Briefly, it involved a section of removable rail.

 

The crane, which was hydraulic by the way, would require to be supported at all four corners as it was moved and an added consideration is that the land side rail had to be broken twice to get through the crossover track. The leading leg would reach that gap at close to the time the at the rear leg reached the gap that is in the picture.

 

The giveaway to the crane being hydraulic is that vertical tower . It will contain a hydraulic jigger for taking in and paying out the lift rope. The jib is fixed, so there is no luffing mechanism.

 

Jim 

I'm not talking about that crane in particular, which is obviously a very old crane and nowhere near the same vintage as the proposed model Airfix/Dapol one. The propulsion method is irrelevant whether hydraulic, steam or electric. (Hydraulic is not a propulsion system in its own right it still needs a prime mover of some description to generate fluid pressure).

It was the travel system we are talking about and in particular the support and guidance. There may well be removable rails, insets or whatever, but it's not normal practice. It is only required for the crane track to have a flange gap for the rail vehicles on the land side. Unless Ralf is intending to model a first world war vintage railway I would suggest that crane is not a suitable prototype to follow. There are plenty of rail mounted travelling dockside cranes still around they are not all in museums. Search the internet for photos.

[jim.snowdon]

5 hours ago, Yardman said:

I'm not talking about that crane in particular, which is obviously a very old crane and nowhere near the same vintage as the proposed model Airfix/Dapol one. The propulsion method is irrelevant whether hydraulic, steam or electric. (Hydraulic is not a propulsion system in its own right it still needs a prime mover of some description to generate fluid pressure).

It was the travel system we are talking about and in particular the support and guidance. There may well be removable rails, insets or whatever, but it's not normal practice. It is only required for the crane track to have a flange gap for the rail vehicles on the land side. Unless Ralf is intending to model a first world war vintage railway I would suggest that crane is not a suitable prototype to follow. There are plenty of rail mounted travelling dockside cranes still around they are not all in museums. Search the internet for photos.

No, but someone else did raise the question as to what it was, and it is only polite to answer it.

 

As regards crane tracks, there are several possibilities, as has been discussed, ranging from double flanged on both rails (a common method), centre flanged, double or centre flanged on one side and flangeless on the other (more common, I suspect, on funicular railways for different reasons). They're all valid engineering solutions, and all capable of being integrated with rail crossings. 

 

jim

 

 

[Dagworth]

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@51.4478217,-2.5984365,3a,15.3y,82.69h,82.58t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sAF1QipPmQWQoPU4rKCiPRRHF1zLFBZSyIKFEi5615ARP!2e10!3e11!7i7200!8i3600?hl=en

 

Bristol Harbour Railway at M-shed

 

Andi 

[Yardman]

18 hours ago, jim.snowdon said:

No, but someone else did raise the question as to what it was, and it is only polite to answer it.

 

As regards crane tracks, there are several possibilities, as has been discussed, ranging from double flanged on both rails (a common method), centre flanged, double or centre flanged on one side and flangeless on the other (more common, I suspect, on funicular railways for different reasons). They're all valid engineering solutions, and all capable of being integrated with rail crossings. 

 

jim

 

 

True Jim, its just that this forum has a nasty habit of drifting off topic and never answering the original question. One thing that hasn't been mentioned is it is quite common for the cranes to have rail clamps to clamp the crane in position for loading/unloading together with screw down hand brakes on the track.

 

Tony

[Siberian Snooper]

3 hours ago, Yardman said:

True Jim, its just that this forum has a nasty habit of drifting off topic and never answering the original question. One thing that hasn't been mentioned is it is quite common for the cranes to have rail clamps to clamp the crane in position for loading/unloading together with screw down hand brakes on the track.

 

Tony

 

The rail clamps should also be used when strong winds are forecast, on at least two occasions that I know of have resulted in cranes falling over, the first one trundled along the track until it got to the end stops and then blew over, the other one just blew over, the jib landing on the hangers of two frigates. Both would have been prevented if the rail clamps had been used.

 

 

[Phil Traxson]

On 03/05/2020 at 21:21, Ralf said:

Hi Folks, 

 

Hoping to include a Dapol Dockside crane on a forthcoming OO-SF Micro layout - see link (https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/153445-siddals-road-quay-changing-the-plan-again/), but looking to include some point work along the dockside which is also where the crane and it's rails will be modelled (the crane is planned to be static, so only cosmetic rails). The big question was how the crane would traverse across such diverging bits of railway if you get my drift... 

 

Then this thread and picture from @Schoonerappeared, can anyone give me any other examples or what the other options were especially later in history 60s/70s preferably... I suspect the answer is that generally cranes were just on long straight sidings and it was a rare problem to have? 

 

 

 

 

Thanks

Ralf

 

 

I'm going to be really radical here and look closely at the crane rail /railway intersection and suggest that the piece of rail, set for the railway in the picture, would only have to pivot to make a continuous rail for the crane and allow for double flanged wheels similar to the system used in the slate quarry railways I've seen in N. Wales. Or the odd piece of rail on the outer side is on a plate with the railway rail and the pair of them pivot , again making a continuous rail for the crane. Not really complicated.

 

Phil T. 

Edited May 6, 2020 by Phil Traxson

[Ralf]

6 hours ago, Phil Traxson said:

look closely at the crane rail /railway intersection and suggest that the piece of rail, set for the railway in the picture, would only have to pivot to make a continuous rail for the crane and allow for double flanged wheels

 

That's a very good point indeed Phil! It'd never have occurred to me but looking at it now it seems rather likely! 

 

I think I shall model as 1 set of wheels (seaward) are double flanged and the other set are flange-less nonetheless! 

 

Thanks

Ralf