Before being placed on
permanent loan
to the Gulf Coast Railroad Museum, No. 1237 carried helium from the
Texas
Panhandle to the Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Florida.
The gas is used by NASA to pressurize Space Shuttle fuel tanks.
The helium car's acquisition was spear-headed by NASA
Astronaut and
Gulf Coast Chapter Member Mario Runco, shown at left above with Gulf
Coast
Railroad Museum Past President David Taveirne.
The car is composed of a series of 30,
3/4" nominal
wall "long bottle tanks" to house 3000 lbs of helium under pressure.
The
tanks are laid out in a array of 5 rows, by 6 tanks wide. One end of
the
car has large steel doors that open to expose the control valves and
pressure
regulators.
Tare (empty) weight is 235,000 lbs
(115 tons),
making these cars among the heaviest freight cars ever built. Two
totally separate braking systems are used on the car (one set per
truck)
to provide the braking force needed for the heavy car.
The unique helium car has been on display at the museum
since 1999.
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