Amazing piece of machinery

Great post that Al thanks. I was musing over the amount of material that`s used in rail construction but when you consider that all of the materials are 100% recyclable in one way or another and the life expectancy of the rail system is infinite its probably the cheapest road form.

Bob
 
Wonder how many of those machines are around the globe, main trunk runs past my place and got a good look at it up close in action. Does not replace rails, only sleepers, concrete in this case, front of unit scoops up rail, rolls it along both sides then guides it back into place atop new sleepers. longest part of the job was prep work removing old bolts & plates from old wooden sleepers the days before. Old wooden sleepers were gone in about a week, sold off to garden supplies & hardwood processers.
 

Larry L.

Lifetime Supporter
Einstein himself would have to marvel at the engineering that went into the "3000". It's kinda the "Transformer" of cranes, innit.

(My guess is the price tag on one of those is 'a bit more' than a few hundred bucks...? :stunned: 'Same applies to the track layer!)
 
Back in the early 70's when I was young fit and bloody stupid, I worked first on the old Ghan Line from Adelaide to Alice springs, and then the Indian Pacific Sydney to Perth line doing exactly that, but back then we had to dig the old hard wood sleepers out with a pick, then a small track mounted crane type machine would pull the concrete sleeper into place, then we checked the spacing and fitted the spring clips with a blunt pick hammer.
it was all bloody hard work in some tremendous heat, and there were gangs of around 20 blokes living in converted railway wagons and no mod cons like air conditioning, on a spur all the way across the line

the only track machines we had back then was the ballast machine similar to the one in the vid, and the Electromatic, which both levelled and straightened the line , but it was nowhere near as flash at the one in the vid.

god i'd love to be doing it today,

cheers John
 
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