From: ce11son@yahoo.ca   
      
   On Tue, 5 Aug 2014 08:46:37 -0400, "conklin"   
    wrote:   
      
   >   
   >"Charles Ellson"  wrote in message   
   >news:csuot9toui5a2uuokiu924r7vkicmkts6n@4ax.com...   
   >> On Sat, 2 Aug 2014 00:46:58 +0000 (UTC), David Lesher   
   >>  wrote:   
   >>   
   >>>John Albert  writes:   
   >>>   
   >>>   
   >>>>Yes, George, they still use them.   
   >>>   
   >>>>Blocks, or chocks.   
   >>>   
   >>>>After you tie down a piece of equipment with the hand brake,   
   >>>>you find something (wheel chock, or just a piece of wood)   
   >>>>and wedge it between the wheel and rail.   
   >>>   
   >>>Is there such a thing as a chock that is bolted to the rail; and   
   >>>restrains a consist, not just a sole car?   
   >>>   
   >> I've seen devices on television programmes (in German marshalling   
   >> yards and/or sidings ?) like a pair of scotches hinged longitudinally   
   >> so that they rest on the railheads when in use which should hold a   
   >> fair number of vehicles; out of use they swing down on to the   
   >> sleepers. They were similar to some derailers but designed without   
   >> that function in mind.   
   >> I don't recall seeing a more mobile version (i.e. something suitable   
   >> for carrying on a locomotive) but even a basic wooden scotch which   
   >> isn't secured to the rail has been observed to put up a fair bit of   
   >> resistance when I watched someone trying to move a train without   
   >> removing the scotch first. On roughly 50% of occasions, carrying such   
   >> devices (the heavy duty version not the Mk1 piece of wood) on a   
   >> locomotive will guarantee they are at the wrong (uphill) end of the   
   >> train anyway; the amount of metalwork to be moved probably won't do   
   >> the crew any good either (before worrying about lack of daylight,   
   >> weather etc.) so in the end you're back to securing individual   
   >> vehicles. The traditional "fail safe" is a hand brake but plan B could   
   >> be something that depends on a locking/pinning action rather than   
   >> clamping a wheel/disk; if it is easier to apply than a handbrake then   
   >> there is also less incentive not to use it.   
   >   
   >I guess, from what you write, even a good-sized tree branch would work some   
   >of the time.   
   >   
   In the right place it probably would (but only "probably"). I can't   
   see it getting past the relevant approvals body though. ;-)   
      
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