Train of the Week

I've come across an interesting concept revealed by JR Hokkaido in 2006 (yeah, took me long enough) is exploring in order to reduce traffic congestion in the Seikan Tunnel after the opening of run-through high speed service on the Hokkaido Shinkansen currently being constructed. The Hokkaido Shinkansen, planned to open in 2015, is the first high speed link to connect the Japanese island of Honshu to the northern island of Hokkaido. Honshu side entrance of the Seikan Tunnel A little background. The Seikan Tunnel is the longest undersea railroad tunnel in the world. Narrow gage double track railroad mainline traverses through the tunnel. Track work is currently under way to upgrade the tunnel to dual gage trackage. Unlike the Channel Tunnel, the Seikan Tunnel uses a single tube for both tracks. Therefore, trains trailing both directions will need to pass each other at some point in the tunnel. Shockwaves created by pressure differential created by train moving at high speed i...

This week, we'll have more of a show and tell here. Apparently the Zefiro 380 (designated as the CRH380D by the ex-Chinese Ministry of Railways, now the China Railway Corp., a crown corp) has entered production some time in late 2012 and holy smokes is she a beauty. As the winner of 2012 IF Product Design Award, she's probably the most beautiful trainset I've ever seen (probably one of the very few vehicles of any kind that actually looks better than the pre-production artist rendering)! Anyway, since the pictures are not under GPL, the thumbnail to the right serves as hyperlink only. For more pictures, simply search for the keyword "CRH380D" or "Zefiro 380" on your favorite search engine. This hyperlink here takes you to videos found through Bing.

So I got a question on pantographs and did some Googling (thanks for your comment/question Tari btw). I'm not very familiar with them on a technical level, so I'm basically going to believe what the inter-web tells me. If anyone thinks what I'm writing here is a complete load of ___, please and please do leave some feedback! Pantographs , well, for those who don't know what it is, it's the mechanism (with arms and linkages and etc.) on top of an electric train, that collects electricity from the overhead cantenary for the train's propulsion. Maybe I can say it's a fancy version of the trolley pole for trolley busses and old school streetcars. Below is a picture showing the parts of a modern Z-shaped single-arm pantograph from the German Wikipedia page of pantographs (there are many types out there, I won't go into history and all that now but they are linked here). Unfortunately I have not a clue what it's saying... je ne comprends pas Allemand and...