Ballast Spreader

The following article is from The Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1979). It might be outdated or ideologically biased.

Ballast Spreader

 

a self-unloading railroad hopper car designed to haul ballast and dump it on a railroad roadbed in the required amounts while moving; the dumping process is mechanized. A ballast spreader consists of a body with dumping hatches and a metering device positioned below. The metering and dumping unit has a pneumatic drive fed by an air compressor in the locomotive. The car can carry 60 tons of ballast and has a volume of 32–36 cu m.

The Great Soviet Encyclopedia, 3rd Edition (1970-1979). © 2010 The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.