Abstract: A vent valve made from a standard emergency brake valve portion. It includes an emergency portion body with an interface to be mated with the emergency portion interface of the pipe bracket. The body includes a casting with at least one cover and the casting including all the cast cavities and passages for an emergency portion. A vent valve selectively connects a first brake pipe port to a vent port on the body, A vent piston controls the vent valve and a discharge valve pneumatically controls the vent piston. An emergency piston is responsive to brake pipe pressure for controlling the discharge valve. The body does not include at least one of an inshot valve and an accelerated application valve.

Abstract: Method and apparatus for compensating for transient effects in pneumatically operated air brake system for a railway vehicle. A look up table or experimentally determined second order correction values is stored in a memory. Based on the magnitude of a previous application of the brakes, a correction value is selected from the look up table having a magnitude to compensate for transient errors in the system. The correction value is then diminished by fixed decrements at fixed intervals. Upon a subsequent application of the brakes, the diminished correction value is used to adjust the pressure communicated to braking mechanisms located on the train cars.

Abstract: An adaptive brake control system monitors a plurality of brake pipe/air line parameters, such as fluid path volume and air flow rate, and controllably modifies action taken by the engineman or performs emergency control of the brakes, in order to continuously enable the brake system to adapt itself to dynamic operating conditions and anomalies in the integrity of the fluid path. In accordance with a pressure reduction modification mechanism, the application of a pressure reduction to the equalizing reservoir is precisely controlled by taking into account the actual state of the brake pipe, so as to ensure that the requested brake application is effected as intended. The control mechanism also monitors the integrity of the fluid flow path of the brake pipe/train air line, so that the engineman may be alerted and a prescribed train safety measure may be effected in the event of a potentially hazardous anomaly in the link.

Abstract: An adaptive brake control system monitors a plurality of brake pipe/air line parameters, such as fluid path volume and air flow rate, and controllably modifies action taken by the engineman or performs emergency control of the brakes, in order to continuously enable the braking system to adapt itself to dynamic operating conditions and anomalies in the integrity of the fluid path. In accordance with a pressure reduction modification mechanism, the application of a pressure reduction to the equalizing reservoir is precisely controlled by taking into account the actual state of the brakepipe, so as to ensure that the requested brake application is effected as intended. The control mechanism also monitors the integrity of the fluid flow path of the brake pipe/train air line, so that the engineman may be alerted and a prescribed train safety measure may be effected in the event of a potentially hazardous anomaly in the link.

Abstract: An inshot valve device for use with railway brake apparatus of the type employing a brake cylinder in which the chambers formed on opposite sides of the brake cylinder piston serve as storage reservoirs. Braking force is obtained by the venting of air from the storage reservoir chamber on one side of the brake cylinder piston following movement of the piston to brake application position, so that the storage reservoir chamber from which air is vented is reduced to a minimum to conserve air. During an emergency brake application, the air from this storage reservoir chamber is vented via the inshot valve device, which controls the emergency buildup of brake forces in accordance with a predetermined brake force profile. The inshot valve device controls the emergency brake force buildup to follow this predetermined profile irrespective of different brake pipe charges or different service brake applications that may exist at the time of the emergency.