Blue Paint?

[NW Mailing List]

Gary,
That is interesting.  Thanks for the correction. I probably misunderstood
there being both 'red' and 'yellow' defects in rail.  
I guess somewhere there's a standard for MofW paint markings.  There are
still a couple people I see occasionally that could shed some light on this.
Next time I see one of them I will ask.
John


-----Original Message-----
From: nw-mailing-list-bounces at nwhs.org
[mailto:nw-mailing-list-bounces at nwhs.org] On Behalf Of
nw-mailing-list-request at nwhs.org
Sent: Friday, October 17, 2008 11:18 AM
John,
?
?We use yellow paint on a tieplate and rail to designate the end of a
tangent,at the beginning of a curve and at the full body(highest elevation
reached) and back down to the end of said curve before entering the next
tangent. The paint is accompanied by marks on the rail that inform us on how
many feet to reach a certain elevation in the curve,(ex. 00-300 feet>4inch)
meaning from 0 elevation you have to gradually put enough lift in the track
over a span of 300 feet to reach?4 inch elevation?at the highest point in
the curve.
Could this?M-O-W yellow paint?that they didn't want to be confused with? I
have only seen red paint used with Sperry and NS inspection trains these
days.
?
Gary Price
Keeping the ole' N&W safe...one tie at a time.

--- On Sun, 10/12/08, NW Mailing List <nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org> wrote:

From: NW Mailing List <nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org>
Subject: Blue Paint? (NW Mailing List)
To: nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org
Date: Sunday, October 12, 2008, 5:30 PM

Ben and Dave,
C&S Dept. used yellow paint until the 90's.  I was in the office then
and
part of my job was working with standards. I was given a note from the AVP
Maintenance of Way for handling.   It seems MofW was using yellow paint on
the rail also.  I believed it had something to do with rail defects found
with the Sperry car.  If I remember right red paint meant immediate
replacement, yellow paint was sprayed on a less urgent defect.  In any case,
being the inferior group, WE had to change.  I sent a note back asking about
orange or white. They were turned down too....other uses by MofW.  I then
sent a rather terse note back to the AVP, asking him if there was ANY part
of the color spectrum that C&S could use.  I got an equally terse reply.
"Blue."
So blue it was and still is.  I didn't like it because it was harder to
see,
but being the lesser group, C&S had to again bow to the wishes of M of W.
(Actually I had more friends than foes in MofW so I'm not hateful.
That's
just the way it is.  We're often in a turf war and with fewer troops.)   
We put blue in the standards.  And ironically some MofW supervisor made the
mistake of using blue paint for something on the track.  We got word of it
and balked ...successfully I might add.

John Marbury
Buford, GA