Re: Getting a vintage tram system going in Melbourne

-Greg, a bit of a delay responding to this interesting info,W3 and W4 class cars had truck mounted brake cylinders and with cast iron shoes admittedly were worst braking cars on the whole system.Am not suggesting that this will apply to new braking system and I agree that braking problem was largely percieved.In my earliest days on the front all cars had castiron shoes and all cars were hard to stop,some depots were worse than others,as I remember Kew was worst and Brunswick the best especially their incomparable Clydes.Ferodo shoes made the cars much quieter,stopped the jangling of castiron shoes,when rolling slowly the cars seemed to whisper along.Obviously the friction between shoes and wheels was much better,the treads had been quite a dull and pitted silver,they became very shiny with Ferodos,service braking required about half the application and held smoothly on gradual release to a stop.I find it hard to visualise that you could stop a conventionally braked car quicker than with a 1st emergency stop{properly applied]on a Ferodo braked ca.Provided you maintained adhesion by sanding early enough and cutting a notch to be on the safe side you could push the brake handle through the gate and just about stand the car on its nose,I don't think I ever pulled the key after we got Ferodos and that was in 6 or 7 years of 6 day weeks in traffic that was much less disciplined than it is these days with many,many more pissed motorists than now.We had very inadequate running times up till about 1972/3 with no recovery at terminuses so better braking cars made life much less stressful,once we got an extra car on each road it became an absolute doddle and much easier for the older blokes who had been doing it flat out 6 days a week for years,in my ten years at South Melb.I only knew of 2 blokes reaching retiring age as drivers,many went out medically unfit and a couple died before retirement,most of the older blokes were returned servicemen and war service would have taken its toll too.Better braking probably came too late for most of them.To get back to the subject,its all about maintaining adhesion which surely comes back to driver training eventually.Will the rebuilt trucks have track brakes too?The other part of the equation is standing passengers[can't bring myself to call them customers,next thing they'll be clients].I was once on 980,our lonely PCC car,as a passenger.The driver had to drop anchor coming the hill to Elizabeth in Bourke,the connie took off and hit the drivers door on the full and she was taken away in an ambulance.A compromise has to be reached.Regards to all,Peter B. -- In TramsDownUnder@y..., "Greg King" <tramway@a...> wrote:

Hi Pete,

Similar, the cars run clockwise and counter clockwise around the outside
streets of the city Spencer, La trobe, Spring and Flinders. They run every
day from 10 till three untill all the W's are back them they will revert to
10-6 as they do all weekend, the service is free, hence no ticket machine to
screw up the brake rigging.

Contrary to what other posts have intimated, the project is well under way
to reinstate the cars, admittedly, the companies don't want them and it is a
condition of their franchise. The reason for the long drawn out delay with
the "route" or green cars is, the CC cars are restricted to 25kph, the green
cars won't be and they want a more effective braking system and Westinghouse
has developed a new truck mounted brack cylinder actuator system that
removes the need for any rigging on the car at all, as soon as this is
perfected on car 983, the rest will be done quickly, being overhauled as the
trucks get done, this is ongoing as we speak. It is proposed that all cars
are to be on the road by June/July, all Yarra's drivers are to be retrained
by March, I don't believe there is the need for all this as the previous
problems were all "percieved" rather than real but with all the hype, the
government had no choice, there was a large group of drivers who did'nt want
to drive them and strangly, it was only those that had trouble with them!!!

I am having a meeting with someone about the museum situation soon and I
intend to cover all aspects of traditional cars at that time, when I know
something, so will you guys.

Greg

Further to my post #1183 wherein I discussed how to get a vintage tram
system started--and a booster group, many of you have mentioned City

Circle.

Since this has W class trams on it, this may be a good place to start.

I'm

not really aware of what City Circle does. Sounds like it may be like San
Jose's daytime Transit Mall vintage operation.

Milantram

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