Laser and plasma jets zapping leaves on the line.

🛸 Space-age tech to zap #LeavesOnTheLine this autumn? 🍂
🍁 We're testing trains fitted with laser beams and superheated plasma jets to see if they're as effective as the current method of using high pressure water systems:
➡️ www.networkrailmediacentre.co...
#autumn

[@jonathanbaker3307]

« Thermally remove contamination » say it like it is Network Rail: You bought a laser train. I for one would like more of my tax money to go on laser trains

[@ImmortalAbsol]

You ever hear about the privatisation of rail?

[@joj.]

@@ImmortalAbsol You ever hear about the failure and re-nationalisation of Railtrack?

[@ScotSteam47]

@@joj. You all ever hear about saying ever hear too much to prove a point?

[@Dosedmonkey]

@@ImmortalAbsol like there is no subsidies 🤣

[@humtho08]

just think about how big the problem is that the water jet isnt solving it

[@weswheel4834]

"What's your job at NR?" "Oh, I'm the one who sticks leaves to the rail..." :)

[@garryferrington811]

This looks like it may be a very practical idea, and not very expensive. If effective, I can see nearly every railway on earth using it. Nice to see a heritage railway benefitting from this research!

[@marvintpandroid2213]

A train with fricking "lasors"

[@beeble2003]

Now we just need to recreate the American "shark-nose" locomotives of the 1950s.

[@cpm1003]

I once saw a Metra train come in a little hot, and he hit the brakes hard. The skidding wheels actually set some of the leaves on fire!

[@LightLyshat]

but I wanted to see leaves get incinerated by laser

[@AndrewG1989]

Awesome equipment. As always keep up the good work Network Rail. 🧡👍

[@ImmortalAbsol]

Love the modern use for the heritage line.

[@zoomer1979]

This is not a new technology. Plasma torches were used in the early 1970s by the British Rail Research Department. The main difference then was that vegetation was kept in check far more effectively and also train brakes were still mostly blocks on wheels, rather than discs on the axles. This means train wheels are not being cleaned when the brakes are used, exacerbating the problem. Neil.

[@navorski7660]

My solution would be to put some brushes in front of the wheels to like maybe MOVE the leaves off the rail before they get run over by the wheels. I think it is way simplier and I dont see any downsides other than the brushes waering off overtime.

[@uu9rj]

The issue is the coating compressed leaves leave on a rail over time, much like rail grinding with this solution you can send the train down the line once and its good to go versus relying on everyone fitting their trains with another maintenance item. And even if all had a brush system equipped it wouldn't be perfect and you'd still need something to clean off the rail more intensively.

[@M3PH11]

Actually this wouldn't work. The reason is the leaves are already dead and decomposing. Once they are wet they turn to a kind of paper like material. Next time it's raining and your walking down the street, check out the leaves on the pavement. You will notice they are all wafer thin and very damp. This creates a suction this like force with the ground. if it's windy you will notice these leaves will not get blown away, or at least not easily. This is the same problem with the track. Once the track is wet and you get those dead leaves on it they stick, then sit there and rot. The decomposed matter then gets compressed and turns into the material described in the video. Brushes would not be able to excert the force required at the correct angle to shift the matter from the track. Now some form of scoop or blade would work better but it wouldn't be perfect and you then also have the problem of having what is basically a snow plow attached to the train for 6 months a year and as Rodrigo pointed out, Rails companies don't like do more maintainence than is legally required.

[@ronblack7870]

you would need some rotary brushes that press on the rails and rotate at high speed. i suspect they would wear down too quickly and over time would actually wear the rail.

[@garryferrington811]

George Stephenson probably tried it.

[@trainsimulatordriver]

They'd get stuck in points and wire bonds. Been there done that.

[@23wjam]

This would be cool to watch at night

[@therealchayd]

I swear this was tried a few years back (maybe early noughties?) Looks like a neat idea.

[@jamesmarks8099]

One day when I grow up I want to be an engineer so I can glue leaves on the rail.

[@henrytwigger2245]

How did they deal with the problem in the days of steam trains and semaphore signals ?

[@drmarkintexas-400]

🏆🏆🏆✌️🇺🇲🙏 Thank you for sharing

[@Wildstar40]

Why no close up of the finished track ?

[@bb-3653]

Had a feeling it would strip rust away

[@DaHitch]

I bet it'll be called "Lasery McLasertrain"

[@kirar2004]

If the leaves are finally being removed by heat then it would be interesting to know its effect on wheel-rail adhesion (the improvement of which is the obvious goal) and subsequently how this is impacting the braking distance. The other thing I would like to know is how frequently in a day this operation is done on the tracks?

[@Dosedmonkey]

Yes I wonder if it improve adhesion or smoothes the rail, and how much rail wear there is.

[@kirar2004]

@@Dosedmonkey I think, it surely improves adhesion, otherwise they would not use this device. However, it still remains to know how much is the improvement. Also, your question about wear is interesting. Yes, it would be interesting to know the impact on rail wear due to this device.

[@kirar2004]

@@Dosedmonkey Do you work in railways?

[@humtho08]

@@kirar2004 it does improve the adheasion and also helps with breaking distance and flat spots on the wheels

[@291281]

Great video Network Rail

[@kiddywolf1837]

There were no leaves on the the line in the 1960’s because vegetation alongside the rails was cut back. Now they have cut the permanent way workers they have to spend millions on “new technology”.

[@CycolacFan]

How quickly in that initial meeting did someone instead suggest simply killing all the trees?

[@topduk]

Are they government? Sounds like something a government would suggest.

[@bakedbeings]

Please minaturise and release as 18v tool for clearing and drying skateparks, kthx.

[@M3PH11]

0:53 well that maybe true but for this case you need to use the description of what it physically is. The answer that question is superheated ionized gas.

[@daverobinson6110]

Didn't really show the rail after blasting it with the laser. Just kept putting leaves on lol.

[@soupdragon12345]

The question is ? Did it work??

[@trumpingtonfanhurst694]

I can't think of a single thing that could go wrong.

[@ajwright5512]

More of this.

[@lutomson3496]

Laughing at lasers vs water here in the west US starting fires trains already start enough fires

[@N00N01]

Lets go, lazer RHTTs

[@snubbedpeer]

That's fine as long as no unintentional fires are lighted in dry grass etc. by the track.

[@paullangford8179]

The fires are intentional...

[@garryferrington811]

That would probably negate the use of this system in California, where the sagebrush can quite literally be explosive. Not sure if that might be true of Australia as well.

[@chmarr]

one problem .... it sets leaves on fire

[@sooz7256]

whatever happended to sand droppers and steam blowers

[@masonsmainlineroblox]

you do realise they are running right now

[@beeble2003]

Nothing. They still have them. The problem is that trains used to be hauled by a heavy locomotive that could basically squeeze the contamination off the rails with its weight. But now, passenger trains are much lighter, so leaf contamination is more of an issue.

[@masonsmainlineroblox]

@@beeble2003 oh ok

[@Daimo83]

Not very green though is it. Using thousands of watts of electricity instead of tapwater.

[@Bungle2010]

No green? It's greener that using water, as it says.

[@Daimo83]

Ok, but why?

[@humtho08]

@@Daimo83 because the range and power consumption of water are both bad , especially compaired to the laser train

[@WhiskeyGulf71]

I can’t see how it can work ? The current RHTTs travel at a reasonable speed & is slotted in between trains, this MPV is moving way slower & will not be able to be slotted in to normal train running schedules. Why can’t normal service trains use high pressure air to clear the rails of debris before it’s compacted ?

[@Lillstisse661]

Because then one service train has to be run a couple of minutes before the normal train goes. Every time.

[@Daytona2]

That isn't it's operational speed.

[@Dosedmonkey]

This is just slow as on heritage line testing calibration and settings I presume. They don't want to damage mainline rail with tests.

[@humtho08]

the laser train can run at 60 mph

[@WhiskeyGulf71]

@@Lillstisse661 service train are normal trains.

[@ronblack7870]

seems you have 2 systems here. a plasma system and a laser system. plasma is not laser . it literally a plasma cutter creating an arc to the rail and forming a cloud of super hot plasma . lasers are high intensity light

[@unknown-xf4ko]

Is any such as equipment used on North American freight railways?

[@RedArrow73]

American climates vary much more widely, so in our semi-arid or desert areas there may actually be a fire danger. But our Northeast being similar to UK climate. we'd need a disaster to start the inertia for this type of change. Remember, in most of America, the COMPANIES own the Permanent Way.

[@humtho08]

LIRR and MNR in new york both have laser trains

[@jwhite5008]

Sorry for stupid question, but did you try to actually brushing leaves with a roller before first axle of EVERY train? If brushes get dirty too quickly, how about pressurized air? (I guess it is loud, but so is water cleaning). If you do that, almost no leaves don't get compressed into the rail and so should mostly clean normally.

[@cor7740]

Most trains have pilots in front of wheels to stop debris potentially derailing the wheels. however for brushes or compressed air systems on every train for track cleaning, they don't have them because basicaly safety, you don't want debris or ballast stone from the track being kicked up at High speed and potentially launched at oncoming trains causing damage or launched off the side of the railway and damaging people, property and trackside infrastructure. A ballast stone being lobbed at 20mph can be deadly never mind at 125. The water jetting will also kick up some debris but they move slowly and its more controlled and they will have restrictions in place on the line when they are doing it to minimise potential damage.

[@beeble2003]

@@cor7740 Right, but you don't need powerful systems to remove leaves before they get crushed onto the rail. (Or maybe it would need to be pretty powerful, since it would have to get the leaves out of the way fast enough to stop them being run over by a train potentially doing 100mph.) I suspect the actual problem with this idea is that leaves get blown around as the train passes, so it's not enough to protect the front axle. You'd need such a device each side of every axle or bogie.

[@jwhite5008]

@@cor7740/videos Makes sense! Thanks a lot for explanation. In that case I would try to opt to fling debris inside instead, covering sides with thick stationary brushes, and vaccum it, but it's probably not realistically possible to retrofit every train with such a system because it would necessitate deep modifications to every undercarrige, never mind the production and maintenance cost of such system...

[@LadyAnuB]

As pointed out in the video, it is the compacted leaves that are the issue and what you propose works for loose leaves before compaction but once compacted, what can you do? I do hope this tech works then we can call it Burning Rail instead of Burning Man. 😅

[@beeble2003]

@@LadyAnuB If every train could clear the leaves before running over them, no leaves would ever get compacted to the rails!

[@bbgun061]

No one thought of bolting a broom to the front of the train?

[@frrlokn3536]

Actually this wouldn't work. The reason is the leaves are already dead and decomposing. Once they are wet they turn to a kind of paper like material. Next time it's raining and your walking down the street, check out the leaves on the pavement. You will notice they are all wafer thin and very damp. This creates a suction this like force with the ground. if it's windy you will notice these leaves will not get blown away, or at least not easily. This is the same problem with the track. Once the track is wet and you get those dead leaves on it they stick, then sit there and rot. The decomposed matter then gets compressed and turns into the material described in the video. Brushes would not be able to excert the force required at the correct angle to shift the matter from the track.

[@PlanePreacher]

How about just blowing air in front of the front wheels? Stop the problem before it happens.

[@Bungle2010]

No it wouldn't............

[@epicspacetroll1399]

You'd need quite powerful air jets to get the damp, decomposing leaves off the track in front of a high speed train. Then you have the issue that turbulence sucks the leaves back under the wheels just a car or so back.

[@georgec2126]

Oh, come on! What's wrong with brushes? Also: What system do you use for the wrong type of snow?

[@trainsimulatordriver]

Pew Pew Pew lasers baby!

[@davefroman4700]

Tell me again that the railroad industry today is not capable of automating with the application of AI to the network........

[@rolandharmer6402]

Carefully lay leaves on the rails - THAT will stop the train!

[@roboftherock]

It's not the first train which passes over and crushes the leaves that has the problem - it's the subsequent ones. Placing leaves on the line is one way to simulating a leaf fall. Another way would be to gather a large bucket of fallen leaves and drop them on the track. Same end result - leaves on the line. So carp and criticise all you want, at least NR is looking into resolving the problem.

[@xr6lad]

@@roboftherock a problem no other country I live in has. Maybe carping should be done. Maybe it can start by stop playing environmental games to please activists and start, you know, doing their job and running a train service for train customers. Like CUTTING back trees away from the line like they used to; having spray trains and spraying the track and line side instead of allowing the lines to become weed fest. These are railways first, not wildlife reservations.

[@beeble2003]

@@xr6lad The lack of tree cutting by railway lines is because of cost, not environmental concerns. But the main reason the problem is bigger today than it used to be is that most trains aren't locomotive-hauled any more. The trains are lighter, so they can't force the crushed leaf matter out of the way as much as they used to.

[@jajwarehouse1]

I am sure small fans to blow the leaves off would be cheaper, and much less likely to cause forest fires.

[@tjfSIM]

That's not an option. The problem is that the leaves are compacted and pressed onto the rail head by passing trains, and it's that greasy residue that causes the adhesion problems. That's what's being burnt off here, not the leaves themselves.

[@UKLevelCrossingAndBridges]

Network rail. I have an name for a new level crossing. You can use Dan lane level crossing.

[@cannadineboxill-harris2983]

I needed to know why don’t dig a tunnel and do an extension for the main line Train so that they could extend the new abandoned underground stations. Why couldn’t they use the part D78 Stock train doors on the sides and also restructure the front face of the A60 and A62 stock and that includes the class 313, class 314 and class 315 remix and make them all together and also redesign them an overhead line and also make them into six cars per units and also having three Disabled Toilets on those six cars per units A60 and A62 stock trains and also convert the A60 and A62 stock trains into a Scania N112, Volvo TD102KF, Volvo D10M, Volvo B10M, Gardner 6LXB, Gardner 6LXC and Gardner 8LXB Diesel Engines and also put the Loud 7-Speed Voith Gearboxes even Loud 8-Speed Leyland Hydra cyclic Gearboxes in the A60 and A62 stock, class 313, class 314, and class 315 and also modernise the A60 and A62 stock and make it into an 11 car per unit so it could have fewer doors, more tables, computers and mobile phone chargers. A Stock Trains and also having 8 Disabled Toilets on those A stock trains. why couldn’t we refurbish and modernise the waterloo and city line Triple-Track train tunnel and make it bigger and extend it to the bank station, making it into a Triple-Track Railway Line so those 4 European countries such as Germany, Italy, Poland And Sweden to convert the waterloo and city line Triple-Track Train tunnel into a High-Speed train? The Third Euro tunnel Triple-Track Train line to make it 11 times better for passengers so they could go from A to B. then put the modernised 11 car per unit A Stock and put them on a bigger modernised waterloo and city line Triple-Track train tunnel so it could go to bank station to those 4 European countries such as Germany, Italy, Poland And Sweden. The modernised refurbished 11 cars per unit A stock could be a High Speed The Third Triple-Track Euro Tunnel Train So it is promising and 37 times a lot more possible to do this kind of project that is OK for London Germany, Italy, Poland And Sweden. oh by the way, could they also tunnel the Triple-Track Railway Line so it will stop from Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex so that the Passengers will go to Germany, Italy, Poland and Sweden and also extend the Triple-Track Railway Line from Bank to Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex Stations so that more people from there could go to Germany, Italy, Poland And Sweden Easily. Why couldn't they extend the Piccadilly line and build brand-new underground train stations so it could go even further up to Clapton, Wood Street and make another brand new tunnel train station in Chingford and could they extend the DLR? All of the classes 150, 155, 154, 117, 114, 105, and 106, will be replaced by all of the Scania N112, Volvo TD102KF, Volvo D10M, Volvo B10M, Gardner 6LXB, Gardner 6LXC and Gardner 8LXB Diesel Six carriages three disabled toilets are air conditioning trains including Highams Park for extended roots which is the Piccadilly line and the DLR trains. Could you also convert all of the 1973 stock trains into an air-conditioned maximum speed 78 km/hours (48 MPH) re-refurbished and make it into a 8 cars per unit if that will be alright, and also extend all of the Piccadilly train stations to make more space for all of the extended 8 car per unit 1973 stock air condition trains and can you also build another Mayflower and Tornado Steam Locomotive Companies and they can order Every 17 Octagon and Hexagon shape LNER diagram unique small no.13 and unique small no.10 Boilers from those Countries such as Greece, Italy, Poland, and Sweden, can they make Mayflower and Tornado Steam Locomotive speeds by up to 117MPH so you can try and test it on the Original Mainline so it will be much more safer for the Passengers to enjoy the 117MPH speed Limit only for HS2 and Channel Tunnel mainline services, if they needed 16 Carriages Per units can they use those class 55’s, class 44’s, class 40’s and class 43HST Diesel Locomotive’s right at the Back of those 18 Carriages Per Units so they can take over at the Back to let those Mayflower and Tornado Steam Locomotive’s have a rest for those interesting Journeys Please!!, oh can you make all of those Coal Boxes’s 16 Tonnes for all of the 117MPH Mayflower and Tornado Steam Locomotive’s so the Companies will Understand us PASSENGER’S!! so please make sure that the Builders can do as they are Told!! And please do something about these very important Professional ideas Please Prime Minister of England, the Prime Minister of Sweden, the Prime Minister of Germany, the Prime Minister of Lathe ly, the Prime Minister of Poland and that Includes the Mayor of London.

[@markfryer9880]

What has this comment got to do with autumn leaves being crushed onto the rail head?

[@xr6lad]

Here’s an idea. Actually perform maintenance. Do what you used to do. Cut back trees. Spray the track and line side. Stop trying to tick boxes for activists and actually run a line maintenance service. Never met a country; and I live in several, for ‘leaves’ delaying trains.

[@jwhite5008]

Maintenance and gardening is a must - yes. However, if trees are nearby, and there are a lot of them, that alone doesn't help because of wind. Wasting water is a real concern, with more and more droughts occurring because of climate change. This is a real problem across the world in any place where trees shed leaves seasonally. It gets different levels of attention due to multitude of factors - one of which is that your trains run much faster than where I live.

[@topduk]

@@jwhite5008 "More and more droughts" - false. Water flowing into the ocean is the only "waste" of fresh water, anyway it is recycled through a natural geological process.

[@jwhite5008]

@@topduk Yes and no. Droughts occur in different *place* from where the water is dumped. Aquifers generally redistribute water to a large area but their reach is ultimately limited both horizontally and vertically. Natural geological/hydrological processes are being disrupted by transporting water to "unexpected" locations and dumping it in concentrated spots. Ecology and geology might take thousands of years to adapt but during that time humans will change things again a lot of times - *that* is the main problem with the antropogenic ecological catastrophe we are experiencing. This particular case is not necessarily "bad"/disruptive enough, and water loss being discussed is absolutely minuscule in comparison to e.g. agricultural water use, and most likely won't change anything *on its own* , but thought process is going in the right direction.