Sugar Cane Railway Storage, Track and Maintenance

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Typical Storage:
 
Blakes Loops is typical of a storage yard close to the mills. The mills have full and empty bin yards as well as holding yards close by where yard locos can quickly bring a train of full bins into the mill full yard. From here the bins are moved into the tipper for unloading by hydraulic pushers that push against the bin chassis. The bins are then uncoupled and weighed before being tipped. Then they are re-coupled and dispatched to the empty bin holding yard where they are marshalled into trains to be taken back out and delivered into sidings to once again be filled. All of the yard management is automated. This work was (in years gone by) undertaken by many people and small yard locos and before them, horses!
 		 Blakes Loops is typical of a storage yard close to the mills
 A view of the full and empty yards at Marian Mill from the weighbridge.
 		 A view of the full and empty yards at Marian Mill from the weighbridge.
Looking at a yard full of full bins from the tipper Looking at a yard full of full bins from the tipper

Typical Track:

This is typical of our mainline. 60lb rail on concrete sleepers and ballasted. This is typical of our mainline. 60lb rail on concrete sleepers and ballasted.

Summit cutting:

This is what a 20 million dollar hole in the ground looks like!! This is on the Farleigh Mill North Coast line about 10 km from the mill. The gradient this replaced was a huge bottleneck on the Farleigh North Coast line. This section of track saw heavy traffic flow because of the 1:60 gradient, trains had to divide and make two trips over the grade. Up to 76 trains a day crossed the old summit. This new grade is 1:200 and has reduced traffic to 38 trains a day. It was not uncommon to see three or four locomotives hauling the one train over this grade in days gone by. This is what a 20 million dollar hole in the ground looks like

Marian Sand:

A typical service area for locomotives where they can fuel and take sand at the same time. Marian Sand A typical service area for locomotives where they can fuel and take sand at the same time.

Maintenance

Loco Maintenance Facility  - Racecourse Mill

Looking south, some of the locomotives stored outside the Racecourse Mill loco shed. Mostly 18t and 24t Clyde’s, a couple of Baldwin’s, an Eimco, a 94 class and a DH. If you zoom in and have a closer look at the Clyde and Baldwin at the extreme right of the photo, you will see they have had their wheels and bogies (not bogeys!) removed and had dummies placed underneath so they could be removed from the workshop. Looking south, some of the locomotives stored outside the Racecourse loco shed.
Looking East at the loco shed showing the four bays and concrete wash down area. Rolling stock from nearest the camera are an Eimco, a 15t bin, a Baldwin and a 94 class. If you look at the concrete area in front of the shed you will see new locomotive tyres stacked on several pallets. These tyres I believe are now sourced from none other than South Africa! Looking East at the loco shed showing the four bays and concrete wash down area

Plasser PBR 201 Ballast regulator

Track maintenance equipment - Plasser PBR 201 Ballast regulator Track maintenance equipment - Plasser PBR 201 Ballast regulator

Plasser KMX12T Tamper

Track maintenance equipment - Plasser KMX12T Tamper Track maintenance equipment - Plasser KMX12T Tamper