Mike's Railroad Crossing Forum

Its always remained a big mystery to me, i always think, when the bell gets damaged, or starts sounding faulty. They take the bell down, place a mechanical bell there. And once they find a replacement the mechanical bells are taken down, and new E-Bells are fitted.

Here is a video of this crossing from The Netherlands showing a crossing with two EBA E-Bells, The signals bell on the right is dead and the Advance Warning arrow has a low tone bell.

June 2014: The E-Bell on the right is dead, and the advance warning arrow (Can't be seen from camera angle) has a pretty low pitch on the bell.

February 2015: A minor change has happened, The signal where the crossing was recorded back in June was destroyed when a passenger train slammed into a truck which caused the trailer to rip the signal out from its base. The Advance Warning arrow bell now has a strange tone.

March 2015: Both E-Bells are replaced by mechanical bells for a short time while Prorail finds replacement E-Bells. Note: The video was uploaded a month after the crossing was recorded.

June 2015: New EBA E-Bells are in service.

The WCH mechanical bell at Arnold Street in Cullman, AL replaced the General Signals Type 1 e-bell there because one of the signal maintainers for the line wanted to install an older bell at the crossing due to it being right next to the depot. I believe it's also the only mechanical bell here in the US to have a gold-painted gong, though the rest of the bell is black which is rather reminiscent of how the L&N used to paint their bells along the line. The e-bell was re-installed at Phelan Road just down the line.