PALS App info changed completely

[Blanked]

I'm so confused... So for over a month PALS showed:

Now it shows:

 

[TheSteelRider]

I'm so confused... So for over a month PALS showed:

Now it shows:

Note those are two separate freight bill numbers. All cars are going from Mexico to Kansas City, and then being distributed from there.

 

[TheVirtualTim]

There is no single rail-road to distribute cars nationwide.

As described, the train from the factory goes only to Kansas City ... all cars are off-loaded there.

The cars then go to different distribution points ... such as other rail-depots (for different railroads) in Kansas City. This means they load the car onto a car-carrier in one yard and drop it off at another yard ... not too many miles away.

Cars going west are primarily sent to a Union Pacific rail-yard (Muncie).
Cars going east are primarily sent to a Norfolk Southern rail-yard (Voltz).

Some cars simply go onto a car carrier and are taken all the way to the destination dealer and don't go via a second train. This seems to be mostly for cars destination to locations that aren't too terribly far from Kansas City (e.g. within a days drive). But even if your dealer IS within a days drive... there's no guarantee what method will be used. I'm on the west side of Detroit and my car is going by train, but there are others with cars headed to dealers NORTH Of Detroit and those cars went all the way by car-carrier. This tells me they are just shipping by whatever method has space available.

I'm sure there are exceptions.

Your car was dropped off at the Norfolk Southern yard yesterday. My car was dropped off at the *same* Norfolk Southern yard on Monday. It sat there for two days ... and on Wednesday it was loaded onto a rail-car (I do not know if that train is still being loaded ... because a single train might have ... say 80 rail-cars on it (give or take) and they don't like to send trains until they are full.

Once your car is loaded to a rail-car, your dealer will get an update to their Vehicle Visibility report ... but that report lags behind by about a day (I think it only updates overnight). So while my car loaded to a rail-car on Weds, my dealer did not actually know that until Thursday.

 

[Blanked]

There is no single rail-road to distribute cars nationwide.

As described, the train from the factory goes only to Kansas City ... all cars are off-loaded there.

The cars then go to different distribution points ... such as other rail-depots (for different railroads) in Kansas City. This means they load the car onto a car-carrier in one yard and drop it off at another yard ... not too many miles away.

Cars going west are primarily sent to a Union Pacific rail-yard (Muncie).
Cars going east are primarily sent to a Norfolk Southern rail-yard (Voltz).

Some cars simply go onto a car carrier and are taken all the way to the destination dealer and don't go via a second train. This seems to be mostly for cars destination to locations that aren't too terribly far from Kansas City (e.g. within a days drive). But even if your dealer IS within a days drive... there's no guarantee what method will be used. I'm on the west side of Detroit and my car is going by train, but there are others with cars headed to dealers NORTH Of Detroit and those cars went all the way by car-carrier. This tells me they are just shipping by whatever method has space available.

I'm sure there are exceptions.

Your car was dropped off at the Norfolk Southern yard yesterday. My car was dropped off at the *same* Norfolk Southern yard on Monday. It sat there for two days ... and on Wednesday it was loaded onto a rail-car (I do not know if that train is still being loaded ... because a single train might have ... say 80 rail-cars on it (give or take) and they don't like to send trains until they are full.

Once your car is loaded to a rail-car, your dealer will get an update to their Vehicle Visibility report ... but that report lags behind by about a day (I think it only updates overnight). So while my car loaded to a rail-car on Weds, my dealer did not actually know that until Thursday.

Did Pals APP show you the New Rail segment? Or did you get all this via the Dealer update?

 

[Blanked]

There is no single rail-road to distribute cars nationwide.

As described, the train from the factory goes only to Kansas City ... all cars are off-loaded there.

The cars then go to different distribution points ... such as other rail-depots (for different railroads) in Kansas City. This means they load the car onto a car-carrier in one yard and drop it off at another yard ... not too many miles away.

Cars going west are primarily sent to a Union Pacific rail-yard (Muncie).
Cars going east are primarily sent to a Norfolk Southern rail-yard (Voltz).

Some cars simply go onto a car carrier and are taken all the way to the destination dealer and don't go via a second train. This seems to be mostly for cars destination to locations that aren't too terribly far from Kansas City (e.g. within a days drive). But even if your dealer IS within a days drive... there's no guarantee what method will be used. I'm on the west side of Detroit and my car is going by train, but there are others with cars headed to dealers NORTH Of Detroit and those cars went all the way by car-carrier. This tells me they are just shipping by whatever method has space available.

I'm sure there are exceptions.

Your car was dropped off at the Norfolk Southern yard yesterday. My car was dropped off at the *same* Norfolk Southern yard on Monday. It sat there for two days ... and on Wednesday it was loaded onto a rail-car (I do not know if that train is still being loaded ... because a single train might have ... say 80 rail-cars on it (give or take) and they don't like to send trains until they are full.

Once your car is loaded to a rail-car, your dealer will get an update to their Vehicle Visibility report ... but that report lags behind by about a day (I think it only updates overnight). So while my car loaded to a rail-car on Weds, my dealer did not actually know that until Thursday.

But the Freight Bill, Origin and Destinations also changed.... maybe they were only placeholders for the VIN? or it will show up again as a second Train/Shipment Segment? That's the main confusing part. to me at least. I did have another shipment site working that showed the pickup in MX... but that has now been disabled.

 

[Blanked]

If I seach Pals App via the old Freight BIll it still shows the original information and pending... If I search via VIN.. it only provides the new Freight BIll that confused me. I guess I need to do both from this point forward.

 

[TheVirtualTim]

Did Pals APP show you the New Rail segment? Or did you get all this via the Dealer update?

Palsapp only tracks the car carrier -- not trains.

When my car originally arrived in KC, it showed the car delivered over to the Speedway (where they did the QC check because my car is one of the early cars). Two weeks later Palsapp showed a new entry where they picked up the car from Speedway and took it to Norfolk Southern. Your car went straight from the Mexico railway to the Norfolk Southern rail-yard ... bypassing the Speedway (you saved 1-2 weeks by skipping that step).

To see any info after that, I had to call the dealer. The dealer's VV report updated yesterday with a rail car number. It also provides an ETA end-date (but that just matches the ETA end-date that I see on the other trackers).

I cannot track the car within the Norfolk Southern system.

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