General and Off Topic Pictures

[auntys_eyes]

Great pics there Nath, and thanks for the explainations. Often wondered what some of the older signals meant.

[Tyranus]

Great pics there Nath, and thanks for the explainations. Often wondered what some of the older signals meant.

ditto!

[Zebedee]

Great pics there Nath, and thanks for the explainations. Often wondered what some of the older signals meant.

Yeah - bloody good photography there Nathan, dunno how you managed to take the photos *and* be in them at the same time though, that's a clever trick

A bit more information on the signals for those who are interested.

The two signals in photo #4 are called "starters" - straight out is at Danger or stop, on a 45degree angle downwards is proceed. So when the train is ready to depart, the signalman will give the signal to proceed on whichever track the train is standing on - platform or the passing loop.

The points and signals are interlocked underneath the lever frame. Essentially it's a mechanical computer - if the points are set for the passing loop for example, a series of bars and rollers underneath the frame won't allow the signalman to pull the starter for the mainline. As with everything on the railway, things are designed to "fail-safe".

Nathan mentioned the three types of lever in the frame - points, point locks, and signals. You can't release the point lock until all the signals are back at Danger, and you can't move the points without them being unlocked, and so on. That way, it prevents the points from being moved against a displayed signal, etc.

So the correct sequence would be, for example: Release signals back to Danger, unlock points, move points, re-lock points, set appropriate signal/s to proceed.

The little "cheese-knob" hand-held points lever that was mentioned isn't linked into the lever frame, someone has to physically walk up to it and "throw" the points. A quick guide for those ones ... "white is right". One side is painted white, the other is black. In the photo, you can see the white face, which means the points are set for the right hand side, i.e. up the hill to where the passing loop joins back onto the main line. If the lever was showing the black side, it would be sending you off to the left, into the yards.

Last of all, the hand signals. Used primarily to make the guard feel important, and gives him something to do. An idle guard can get himself into trouble, so best make him feel like he's wanted and needed

An arm waved from straight out to up, bending at the elbow is the signal for "come to me". Arms over the head, bringing the hands together, then apart, then together again, etc (as in the photo) means "come to me slowly". An arm waved in a circular motion away from the body means "go away from me". Both hands held in front of you, with pointing fingers, making circles in opposite direction means "go away from me slowly". (For that one, think of an Aussie Rules umpire giving the "goal" signal, but moving his pointing fingers in circles.) Last of all is "stop" which is both arms straight up, hands flat.

There's other hand signals as well, but they're the main ones

In picture number 8, as the train is heading into the Village Junction station, it's going through a complicated set of points-work called a "scissors cross-over". There's two levers as Nathan mentioned. Each one controls two sets of points, diagonally opposite from each other. Attached to the lever is an indicator board, either red or green (as Nathan also mentioned). If it's green it means the points are set to the "straight". If it's red then it's set to "cross". In this case, a driver needs to pay attention to both indicators, depending on what he's doing and where he's coming from. It's possible for example to go through one set that are at straight, and then meet the opposing set that are at cross. That wouldn't be good and would ruin everyone's day...

In the case of that journey, both sets of points were set to "cross" as it's the most efficient way. The train comes in from the bushland loop track, as shown in the photo, and crosses over to platform 1. When the locomotive then "runs around the train", it goes up the hill slightly, comes back down and through a set of points to bring it into platform 2, then through the other arm of the scissors cross-over. The guard can then reset both sets of points at the same time to bring the locomotive back onto the end of the train, ready to depart for Mussel Pool.

BTW these systems are basically the same as was used on the WA Government Railways in the days before the modern electric signals, etc. The systems may be old, but they still work!

Nobody can say that WARSUG isn't educational!!!

[auntys_eyes]

=D> =D> =D> =D> =D>

[Nafenn]

Oh yeah... thanks to doug for taking time off from hamfest and taking photos

You can also see the Scissor Crossover in the first image, with the one on the Right set to crossover and the one on the left set to Straight... this was because i forgot to set them on the last run, so ran down to change them over, and only had time to set one, before we had to get going

oopsies

[Nick]

I have a picture of a Darwin and Katherine traffic vehicle, if someone wants to post them, pm me with an email address I can send them to. Taken a week ago.
Nick

[Tyranus]

if you still have my email address send them through.
if not, my email address is in my profile.

[Tyranus]

Katherine traffic vehicle. Barrett Hf on the back (cannot see). I note that NT appear to still be using the National 64 channel block-but encrypted.


Darwin traffic. Inboard radar. Hiding in a 40kmh zone near the military museum

These photo's were supplied to me by Nick who photographed them to be uploaded so that the board members can have a look.

[Nafenn]

At the moment, i am in Broome, relaxin... here are some photos from the flight (Two pilots, sharing the flying time) up:



Below the cloud on the way out of perth (i think we were in CTA at this point)



After finding a hole in the clouds - beautiful isnt it?



Our first fueling stop... Meekatharra - this shot is of the town on the way past



On the base leg of our circuit into meekatharra - you can see the airfeild out the window. CJ (the other pilot) was flying at this point



Flying up the coast



Final Approach into Broome (note the position of the road, the next photos were taken from there)



a Fokker 100 on short final into broome (about 50' above my head)



the Fokker over the runway... i like this shot



Saw this and couldnt help but laugh... Note the registration: VH-FML (http://fmylife.com)

[richard omeara]

Can you send some of that weather down here.great picks.

[treeny]

found this old photo in my computer, thought id try posting it.



I came across it on the way to work one day. so i got out and took a photo. i found out later apparently the car spontaneously combusted????

[Nafenn]

Finally got my hands on my Broome Trip photos



The approach over Meekatharra. The Circuit takes you over the Township and the mine (this is a shot of the town over the nose)



Base leg of the Circuit into Meekatharra (thats C.J. flying)



Me flying at 8,500' XD (about 2.5 Kilometres, or 1.6 Miles up)



Lunch at Meekatharra... Mmmmmmmmmmmm... turkey



Final Approach into Broome (our final Destination). The glidepath takes you over one of the main roads into broome at about 50-100 feet, depending on how low you are, and/or where you are landing. After we landed i commented "i wonder what that ute driver was thinking when we went over his head at about 40 Feet". we were a bit low )



a Skywest Fokker 100 on short final into broome. The plane was about 100' over our heads. Taken from the Airport fence (about 10m back from the road)



The Fokker 100 after it went over our heads, going off into the sunset onto the runway



The plane we flew up at sunrise in Carnarvon airport... pwiddy!



At Broome there were LOTS of float planes - this was one we saw on the day we were leaving Broome.

so there you go... my trip to broome. (not alot of photos on the way back, because i was flying most of it)

[written_ficton]

Broome is an interesting place - alot of aviation work out there is your prepared to work hard. Most of the floats do crew changes either on the rigs or pearls and general 'charter work'

Had the opportunity to place a DHC6-300 on floats up there, lost out to a Cessna 208 both perfect machines...

[spartacus]

To the Admin/Mods.

Firstly, I have no objections whatsoever to people posting pictures of non-WA emergency services. It's good to see what other departments have. Also, I don't have a problem in creating a new topic every time for OT pictures, (Keep the great snaps coming w_f ).

However, just a thought, could we have an Off-Topic Pictures Sub-forum for non-emergency related pictures (like the one in the FESA section)? It will allow everyone to post there own pictures, and if others don't care, they don't look. This "General and Off Topic Pictures" was a success to some extent, but I am finding that now, with all these pics on the same page, the time for them to load is... well.... you know.

This is just a suggestion that I would like you to take the time to consider.

Thankyou,

Sparts.

[written_ficton]

No problems...

Hey don't mind either way, just throws some variety out there and fits well within WARSUG. The only reason I create seperate fields is

A - Different states
B - Cause I upload them, they take an awfully long time so its a slow process

I'm easy where to post them, but having multiple forums will be completely midboggling. [Here at work, my desk has three trays. New, WIP, Completed - hey pestro clear cases pretty quickly]

Cheers