9,000 gallons

[AskNott]

Maybe it was a rush shipment for PETA fur-splashers, but, hey, it’s outa season! Maybe it was for Kill Bill, Vol. III

However, as some wise person reminded me, “Blood is thicker than water. Adjust your recipes accordingly.”

[Johnny_L.A]

Acutally, after thinking about it: off to a sausage plant to make blood sausage with, perhaps?

That’s what I thought of today around noon. Of course, by the time I actually get around to opening the thread to post it…

[tremorviolet]

@vunderbob

OK, he thought and rigged the two cranes so they could drag the car out of the drink. They started to pull, and nearly overturned both derricks. They couldn’t figure out why a boxcar loaded with steel plates would be so heavy. Some schmuck from the crew had to wade out to the car, slide open a door, and look inside.

What he found was that the ‘manhole covers’ were actually a car full of Maxipads, which immediate absorbed as much water as they could. The boxcar they expected to weigh 100 tons with load was now about 500 tons once the water was figured in, and was beyond the capacity of the derricks to handle. The car, on it’s side, had to be manually unloaded before the crew tried again to recover it.

OK, not to bring facts into MPSIMS but water weighs 64.2 (or is it 62.4? I always forget, but it’s close enough) pounds per cubic foot. Steel weighs 490 pounds per cubic foot. It’s a cute story but thre’s no way in heck a box car full of water would weigh anywhere close to a load of steel.

[VunderBob]

@tremorviolet

OK, not to bring facts into MPSIMS but water weighs 64.2 (or is it 62.4? I always forget, but it’s close enough) pounds per cubic foot. Steel weighs 490 pounds per cubic foot. It’s a cute story but thre’s no way in heck a box car full of water would weigh anywhere close to a load of steel.

I’m not going to get into a big debate over this, but an empty boxcar weighs about 20 tons, and depending on the constuction style, would have a lading capacity between 50 and 80 tons. Granted, 80 tons of steel plate manhole covers will no way fill the car in the volume sense, with what I know of the paper and woodpulp industries, I also have a hard time (no pun intended) that a boxcar load of maxipads would weigh 80 tons, maybe 40 or 50.

However, the point of the story is that this boxcar, with 50 tons of maxipads fell in the river, so the water weight is in addition to the load. Also, railroad wreckers are built to be most stable lifting vertically (or very close to), and dragging operations are dangerous because they put a significant load on the X and Y axes.

I reported the story nearly verbatim, and considering the source, I wouldn’t doubt in the least that his reported weights are wrong, but I have no doubt that the incident did occur.

[Diceman]

All rail cars have weight limits. For something like steel plates, you are going to reach those limits long before the car is filled. Volume-wise, a boxcar loaded with steel would be mostly empty.

[tremorviolet]

@vunderbob

I’m not going to get into a big debate over this, but an empty boxcar weighs about 20 tons, and depending on the constuction style, would have a lading capacity between 50 and 80 tons. Granted, 80 tons of steel plate manhole covers will no way fill the car in the volume sense, with what I know of the paper and woodpulp industries, I also have a hard time (no pun intended) that a boxcar load of maxipads would weigh 80 tons, maybe 40 or 50.

However, the point of the story is that this boxcar, with 50 tons of maxipads fell in the river, so the water weight is in addition to the load. Also, railroad wreckers are built to be most stable lifting vertically (or very close to), and dragging operations are dangerous because they put a significant load on the X and Y axes.

I reported the story nearly verbatim, and considering the source, I wouldn’t doubt in the least that his reported weights are wrong, but I have no doubt that the incident did occur.

Ok, I can buy that. In fact, it occured to me late last ngiht that the bill of lading probably had the payload on it and they wouldn’t be expecting the additional water weight.