wheeltapper

A wheeltapper is a railway worker employed to check the structural integrity of train wheels and that axle boxes are not overheating. Typically employed at large urban railway stations and in goods yards, they tap wheels with a long-handled hammer and listen to the sound made to determine the integrity of the wheel; cracked wheels, like cracked bells, do not sound the same as their intact counterparts (they do not "ring true"). Wheeltappers also check that the axle boxes are not too hot by using the back of their hand. Although wheeltappers still operate in some eastern European countries, in countries with modern planned maintenance procedures and line-side defect detectors, such as hot box detectors, wheeltappers are redundant. The job is mostly associated with the steam age. Wheeltapper...