Orders for durable goods rose 2.5% in March, the third straight month of increases, led by higher demand for transportation equipment, computers, and defense-related products.Durable goods orders for February were originally reported as a 0.6% decrease, but were revised to an increase of 0.7% in the Commerce Department’s monthly report.Economists had actually expected a rise of 3%.Factoring out the volatile transportation sector, orders rose at a slower pace of 1.3%.Shipments of core capital equipment goods, used to help the government calculate GDP, rose 2.2% in March, after small gain of 0.4% in February and a 2.5% decline in January.