If Train A is traveling East at 35 MPH and Train B is traveling West at 45 MPH ...

TomlinsonRunRR posted:

OK, this is sort of related ... Two Chinese trains pass at 261 miles per hour ...

http://tracks.lionel.com/high-...ains-pass-at-261mph/

There's something almost poetical about the portion of the video that shows the two trains passing.

Tomlinson Run RR (no math[s], I promise! :-)

I watched the video, how big of a jolt were they expecting? I mean I'm not being funny or sarcastic but with two trains traveling at 261 mph/420Kmh with a test crew of engineers aka-passengers,  on board, the expectations were obviously for both trains to pass each other as they did, but what if they hadn't, after all this was an experiment, which means there was a hypothesis and a suspected outcome. They must have at least measured the percentage of a derailment at that speed. Did they slowly work up to that point or did they just go balls to the wall and try this at full speed? No matter what , it still is a great video!

Conrailfan,

Good questions as to whether there were tests at other speeds, computer simulations, or whatever.  I was curious as well to learn more about the "jolt" and why it was the focus of the test. The camera does shake during that brief moment of the actual passing. But it was a shaky camera in general.  I would expect it would be something like when a big tractor trailer flies past a medium-size car and you get sucked in toward it a bit.  Except that these where two identical trains and matched speeds.  

On a side note, those uniforms were pretty snazzy. They had a definite military or airline pilot look to them.  It made me think of the RR engineers as somewhat like airplane test pilots.

TRRR

Add another 100 mph per train and you're looking at the speed of sound being the difference between them. A strong wind caught between them and there's no telling what might happen.

Adriatic posted:

Add another 100 mph per train and you're looking at the speed of sound being the difference between them. A strong wind caught between them and there's no telling what might happen.

Adriatic- and that's exactly my point, there's no telling what might happen and they're doing this experiment with real people, putting their lives at risk.

TomlinsonRunRR posted:

Conrailfan,

Good questions as to whether there were tests at other speeds, computer simulations, or whatever.  I was curious as well to learn more about the "jolt" and why it was the focus of the test. The camera does shake during that brief moment of the actual passing. But it was a shaky camera in general.  I would expect it would be something like when a big tractor trailer flies past a medium-size car and you get sucked in toward it a bit.  Except that these where two identical trains and matched speeds.  

On a side note, those uniforms were pretty snazzy. They had a definite military or airline pilot look to them.  It made me think of the RR engineers as somewhat like airplane test pilots.

TRRR

TRRR- I did notice those uniforms also- I liked them a lot, pretty sharp and snazzy! I also liked the video of the pantograph, that was cool, I just wish there was more of it.

When 2 Acelas pass on opposite tracks, there's a definite attention-getting sound.

Conrailfan:  So what's the difference between that and when a test pilot takes up a first flight of a brand new airplane design?

RJR,

Interesting information about passing Acelas generating a sound. It's been a while since I've been on one. I'm guessing it wasn't "woosh" :-)

'Though I'm not Conrailfan, if asked the question about the difference between the airplane and train test scenarios, I'd say that the airplane test pilots would have had helmets and parachutes.  That's what I was thinking when I offered the original technology comparison ... those hats sure were snazzy but they wouldn't offer much crash protection.  You have to wonder and imagine what other state-of-the-art safety things were engineered into those trains given the speeds.  Maybe a web search would turn up more?

Conrailfan, thanks for mentioning the computer close-up toward the end of the video.  I thought it looked like a pantograph with a pole moving across but then I didn't remember seeing a pantograph and thought I was wrong.  It was cool.

Tomlinson Run RR

I found myself wondering, would I board that test "rocket"?

Yeah, I think I would. Likely safer than 200+mph in a dragster or fancy Italian sports car too.

Two down one to go

RJR posted:

When 2 Acelas pass on opposite tracks, there's a definite attention-getting sound.

Conrailfan:  So what's the difference between that and when a test pilot takes up a first flight of a brand new airplane design?

 In past times when a test pilot or pilots would take up a brand new aircraft, there are normally one or two lives to be lost. I really hate to sound morbid, but that's the fact. And there is a price the manufactures place on a lost life. In today's society the aircraft manufacturers run extensive simulations for just about every possible failure on computer simulation models and in simulators. Believe me, a real aircraft simulator is nothing like Flight Simulator, no matter how extensive your home setup may be. I know, I've flown a 727 under the Golden gate Bridge in a simulator of course! But even then, by the time they put a test crew of people on the engineers are very confident the aircraft has no idiosyncrasies they don't know about. In this case what I was asking was did they do all the math models, computer simulations and such before they put a crew of test passengers, aka engineers on the train itself. I'm not faulting them (China) just wondering. Other countries do things way different then we do here in the U.S. and I was just raising the question and being curious, that's all.

I suspect it's a lot easier with trains.  One could run a series of tests with two trains from opposite directions, running at speeds where the effect is known, and then gradually increasing their respective speeds and monitoring changes in effect.

I once was chatting with an Acela engineer and asked him if, after a run, he had any effect from objects coming at him so fast.  He said "No, but I get a lot of speeding tickets."

If memory serves me correctly, when PRR started running the Metroliners, they had problems with some windows getting sucked out as they passed each other.

My guess is China did their research well beforehand. They don't seem to have as much of the apathy we attributed to them in the past. I think the opportunities the world economy has presented, along with 

Sorry "auto posted".

...along with their technology growth has them in a position where they would really like to avoid any technology failures. They are hungry to lead by example.

China probably sees an opportunity to construct railroads in other countries (maybe even USA), so they have to stay on the cutting edge of progress.  After all, they have to do something to invest the money that we USAers send them when we buy our model trains and other items.