Mike's Railroad Crossing Forum

7" because:
1. I grew up with them
2. They are very hard to find anymore.

4".

- Due to LED technology, you no longer need a large gate light for a brighter light.
- They are easy on large gates.
- They are probably also easier to handle, being only four inches, instead of seven.
- I think seven looks way to big for some applications.
- Probably require less harnessing to hold them to the gate.

Cheers,
Joshua

4", for some of the reasons as listed above, plus that's all I've seen around here...

4", but by a close margin. I like 7" because they're rare, but otherwise they look too big sometimes.

TommyBNSF wrote:4", but by a close margin. I like 7" because they're rare, but otherwise they look too big sometimes.

exactly
TOO BIG all in hopes that the idiot will see it and not hit the damn gate

I like 4" because it looks like most crossings in america use those, but I like the 4" lights if they're incandescent.

Four inch gate lights are everywhere and I grew up around hundreds of them. Seven inch gate lights are pretty cool too.

Definitely 4"

You won't see many 7" gate lights around, because they just don't make good sense. First, a gate light is not a primary light. You are not supposed to put a big, bright light right in a motorists line of sight, right in their eyes, as they sit there waiting on a train to go by. Sure you get maintainers without much experience, and foamers trying to say they are needed for whatever reason, but thats simply not true at all. If your mast lights and rear facing lights on the opposite side of the roadway are functioning properly, that will gain plenty of attention, and the striped red and white gate descending in front of you shouldn't be surprising, and shouldn't need much more help to get noticed other than the standard 4" marker lights on it. Also, they are very awkward looking, it is impossible to make a crossing look professional with those clown lights on them. Not to mention they also put too much of a strain on the gates themselves, adding additional wind drag and excessive weight that a 4" low profile set wouldn't.

Only thing 7" gate lights are good for is to go inside a wig-wag banner.

I know we won't use 7" gate lights. There was a set on a couple of gates a maintainer installed years ago, but they didn't last long.