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Released:11/19/2014

Getting back on track on November 11

Many PATCO riders experienced minor delays getting to and from their destinations on Tuesday, November 11 during their afternoon and evening commutes. PATCO would like to share details about the unexpected and rare situation with you.

On Tuesday, November 11, PATCO passengers experienced minor delays getting home during the afternoon rush hour. What the passengers didn’t realize was that these minor delays were the side effect of a bigger problem – a train disabled east of Haddonfield with a blown motor and a locked axle

Smoke signals

Just after lunchtime, the operator of a eastbound PATCO train noticed smoke coming from the engine. He immediately stopped the train, inspected it for damage and determined that the train could not continue its eastbound trip. A new train was sent to pick up the passengers and get them safely to their destinations.

When PATCO maintenance staff opened the engine compartment, they discovered that the motor – just put back into service the previous Thursday after a major overhaul that cost $17,000 – had completely blown, and the thousands of feet of copper wire that should be wrapped around the motor core had come unraveled. “It looked like spaghetti,” says John Rink, PATCO General Manager.

Ordinarily, PATCO crews can just turn off that particular motor to move a disabled train out of the way, since the wheels can still turn. This time, though, the axle that the motor powered had seized due to the failure, and the wheels wouldn’t turn.

Imagine trying to push a shopping cart with a frozen wheel - now imagine trying to push a train car that weighs about 80,000 pounds, also with a frozen wheel. This was clearly a problem.

Compounding the problem, the disabled train was stopped on top of a switch which allows trains to move from one track to another. Since the train was stuck on the switch, no other eastbound trains could get by and the only way to run trains around the disabled train would have been to direct all trains to go to the next closest switch located between the Collingswood and Haddonfield Stations, cross over to the west track and then travel eastbound all the way back to Woodcrest station in order to get back on east track. This required a lengthy single track operation since trains cannot travel in both directions on one track. That is a huge distance to go with single track, resulting in a very limited service schedule that would have caused significant delays. PATCO crews were determined to move the train off the switch to avoid major service disruptions.

Keep the trains running

Fortunately, this incident occurred in the middle of the day, rather than during rush hour, so PATCO staff had time to plan for the afternoon rush hour. “Our main priority was to keep the trains running and provide the most service possible,” Rink says. “We realized we could provide full service during the afternoon rush-hour and come back later to move the disabled train.”

Using another train, crews slowly and carefully moved the disabled train off of the track switch track, to enable power to the signaling system to be restored and to allow PATCO to operate a full service for the rest of the afternoon, albeit with some delays. Just after 5:15 pm, though, because of the increasing volume of rush-hour trains, PATCO passengers began to incur delays between 5-12 minutes until shortly after 6 pm.

It wasn’t until much later that evening that crews from several PATCO departments – Transit Services, Equipment and Way & Power – teamed up to move the disabled train back to the main yards in Lindenwold.

Hello, dolly!

Luckily, they had the right tool for the job – a special dolly that could be placed under the frozen axle, enabling the wheels to roll. They placed the dolly on the track and then, using a large rail-mounted crane, lifted the car just enough to slide it into place beneath the seized axle’s wheels.

“We bought that dolly about ten years ago just for a situation like this and thankfully never had to use it,” Rink says. “We’d practiced with it in the shop yard, but this was the first time we needed it.”

They placed the dolly on the track, then, using an enormous crane, lifted the car just enough to slide it into place. Using the crane is limited to main-line tracks in New Jersey where there is nothing overhead.

“The effort could have been even more complicated.” says Rink. “If it had broken down underground in Philadelphia or Camden or on the bridge, where there’s restricted vertical clearance, we would have had to use hydraulic jacks and it would have taken several hours to raise the car."

Once the seized wheel had been lifted onto the dolly, which took about an hour and a half, the train could be pushed back to the yards. To prevent further mishaps, the crew moved the train at about 5 mph, a little faster than a person walking briskly.

Way & Power personnel inspected the rails at Haddonfield for possible damage from the seized axle, pronounced the track good for operation at normal speeds, and PATCO was ready for the Wednesday morning rush-hour.

The overhauled motor is still under warranty and is being returned to the vendor for a failure analysis. While the cause of the motor’s failure has not yet been determined, and despite the fact that such incidents are very, very rare, Rink will be demanding a detailed explanation from the vendor. Other PATCO employees with many years of service commented that they had only seen one other motor come apart enough to lock an axle like this in their 20-plus year careers on the line.

Hitting “rewind”

The motor had just been refurbished, as part of a $2 million project to ensure the motors are ready for the upcoming winter season. Having a motor rewound and overhauled at a cost of about $17,000 provides significant savings versus the expense of engineering, designing and building replacements. The cost of a brand new motor is approximately $30,000.

PATCO has stepped up the pace of refurbishment, though, trying to get the fleet ready in case the Greater Philadelphia region experiences another bad winter like last year. “We check all the motors every 30 days,” Rink says. “What’s different is that in anticipation of the cold weather, we adjusted the maintenance criteria to send our motors for refurbishment sooner to maintain maximum performance of the inventory.”

Crane in place to lift train car

Dolly to be used to move frozen wheel axle

Train car lifted just enough to slide dolly under wheel

Dolly in position under frozen wheel axle.
Note yellow hoist at end of car that was used to lift the train car.

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