Railroad Thread

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J
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Railroad Thread

Postby J » Fri Feb 15, 2008 10:07 pm

Why not another train thread. We had some good discussion in our temporary home. To get things started, here is video of a freight train at Wasserbillig crossing the German / Luxembourg border. The video is by a Mr. Kilroy...

http://www.rail-videos.net/video/view.php?id=1896

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Sparky
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby Sparky » Fri Feb 15, 2008 10:28 pm

I live near Portland Or, where we are fortunate that the City was donated a few steam powered locomotives.
We are even more fortunate to have skilled volunteers to keep them running despite the city's efforts to neglect them.

Every year on weekends in December, they make hourly excursions along the Willamette River in downtown Portland.

This particular one, the Southern Pacific (ex) #4449, pulled the Bicentennial Freedom Train around the country back in `76. For many years prior to that, it sat on static display at Oak's Amusement Park in Portland, until being restored in time for the Freedom Train.

It has also pulled the Amtrak Art Train a few years ago, and does many excursions.

The 4449 pulls up at Oaks Park in Portland December 8 2007 after a run:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W10lkdP4hpQ

I have others that should be linked from that vid.

Sparky :mrgreen:

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J
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby J » Sat Feb 16, 2008 1:45 pm

The 4449 may look a little "dolled up" or peculiar if you are not familiar with its history. It is a Southern Pacific class GS-4 ("Golden State") built in 1941. The model was designed during the troubled 1930's to try and stimulate passenger traffic between Los Angeles and San Francisco. The railroad had designed a new train called "Daylight" to operate along this scenic route and was seeking a dramatic design to capture the public's imagine. The colors of the train matched the locomotive's red orange and black and made quite a sight rolling through the beautiful towns along the way (Santa Barbara, etc.) and along the Pacific coast. The locomotive was retired after 16 years of service and donated to the city of Portland Oregon where it sat outside for another 18 years before being restored as part of the country's 1976 bicentennial celebration. I was working as a dispatcher one night when this locomotive was being opeated back home to Portland and asked the engineer to hold his microphone out the cab window while blowing the whistle. It was quite a ghostly sound that sounded like my radio channel had suddenly switched back 40 years in time. In a way, I guess it had.

A man who has been instrumental in the preservation of the 4449 is Doyle McCormick, a retired locomotive engineer. He has a couple of other interesting projects including the restoration of an ALCO PA1 diesel locomotive not much newer than 4449. He saved two "hulks" that had been retired in Mexico and brought them back to the US. One is being fully restored to operation as "NKP 190." The New York, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad (known as the "Nickel Plate") operated several of these - the highest-numbered being #189. The other locomotive will be restored to its original appearance as a Santa Fe unit.
Here are a couple of pictures that give you a sense of the amout of work needed followed by a link to an interesting website. Look through the gallery of photographs to see the source of the diesel and other major parts used in this restoration.

http://www.nkp190.com/
~max0029.jpg
Being Loaded up in Mexico
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190pa015.jpg
In Oregon with Friends
190pa015.jpg (104.37 KiB) Viewed 24974 times

http://www.nkp190.com/index.shtml

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GerryW
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby GerryW » Sat Feb 16, 2008 2:01 pm

Thank you J for starting a new railroad thread.

But it's funny that you started with a video, posted by CK and filmed in Luxembourg. And this even last month. Would I have known, I would have told him...

As a kid, we played at the local raiway station area and were always watching trains. There is a bridge (metal construction) and a path passing under it. When there was a train standing on it, we went under it, so we could see the thing from down under, but the noise wasn't so cool. Another bridge was close to the railroad station too, but passing over the rails, there we waited for the trains to pass under it. So we could see the fans and the exhaust stacks. At that time CFL used the 1600 and later on the 1800. Mainly there were the Diesel Locs 850 and 900 series pushing waggons around. These was the place where kids were always around...

Here are still some other links for Luxembourgish former and newer material:

Restauration of Z105

Restauration Westwaggon 208/218

Restauration Deutz 455

Restauration 3608

these are real interesting pictures.

Here is a link about railways in and around Luxembourg

And the rolling stock now and then

Our national Railway CFL had for some years Autorail Diesel, very beautiful design, and interior was nice too, but unfortunately so much problems with the reliability that they decided to get rid of them quickly

Autorail " Dildo" (funny nickname :mrgreen: )

Image

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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby Sparky » Sat Feb 16, 2008 9:36 pm

Great stuff fellers!

This morning, we had some fun up here with our local commuter rail, The Max.
Seems a tipsy driver preferred the train tunnel over the nearby highway...
080216car_max_track_320.jpg
080216car_max_track_320.jpg (61.29 KiB) Viewed 24886 times
http://www.katu.com/news/15699912.html
PORTLAND, Ore. - A suspected drunk driver is to blame for blocking MAX lines in Southwest Portland Saturday morning.

TriMet officials say the driver drove into the Washington Park Tunnel and stopped just short of the MAX platform about 4:30 a.m. Crews are working to remove the car and see if there's any damage to the signal system.

The car is blocking westbound tracks and buses are shuttling passengers around the station.

TriMet says it will likely take a few hours to restore service.
I had just rode that route a few hours earlier...to avoid being the cause of just such an event! :lol:

Sparky :mrgreen:

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ZeroAltitude
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby ZeroAltitude » Sun Feb 17, 2008 12:07 pm

The light at the end of the tunnel might turn out to be the headlights of the onrushing train :mrgreen:

Anybody remember that scene in "Bird On A Wire" where Mel Gibson and Goldie Hawn drive into the railroad tunnel with their BMW convertible?
They see the headlights of a train coming at them, slam the car in reverse and just as they leave the tunnel, the train is right on top of them. And turns out to be a diminutive service vehicle much smaller than their car.
space intentionally left blank

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GerryW
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby GerryW » Sun Feb 17, 2008 12:50 pm

Great stuff fellers!

This morning, we had some fun up here with our local commuter rail, The Max.
Seems a tipsy driver preferred the train tunnel over the nearby highway...
080216car_max_track_320.jpg
http://www.katu.com/news/15699912.html
PORTLAND, Ore. - A suspected drunk driver is to blame for blocking MAX lines in Southwest Portland Saturday morning.

TriMet officials say the driver drove into the Washington Park Tunnel and stopped just short of the MAX platform about 4:30 a.m. Crews are working to remove the car and see if there's any damage to the signal system.

The car is blocking westbound tracks and buses are shuttling passengers around the station.

TriMet says it will likely take a few hours to restore service.
I had just rode that route a few hours earlier...to avoid being the cause of just such an event! :lol:

Sparky :mrgreen:
Something like this happens very often here in Luxembourg. It seems to me that Luxembourgish drivers are really extremely stupid drivers.

A few weeks ago, during night (fortunately after midnight there is almost no traffic until early morning on the rails) a man, very drunk, went over a level pass, thought he passed it already drove to the right until he was stuck. He left the car and went home. Other people, coming home from the same bal, saw the car standing on the rails. They saw that it wasn't locked so they pushed it of the rails (I don't remember if the keys were still in or not) But just in the right time, before the first train came. Not much time would have been left.

Another story is a more funny one. It was around New Years day this year, when a train hit a car which stood on the rails. In the beginning it wasn't clear how the car got there, because there was now way it would have been driven there. They noticed that it was a totally new car, still not registered. Then they got a message that from a Auto transport wagon a car was missing. So it was a brandnew car which fell of a train and then got hit by a second train...

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J
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby J » Mon Feb 18, 2008 7:21 pm

Gerry, thanks for the links. Pretty interesting stuff - I especially enjoyed seeing the TEE trainset, having memories of that equipment when it was newly-introduced.
What the heck is that strange power unit on temporary wheelsets?

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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby einesellesenie » Mon Feb 18, 2008 8:05 pm

On my way to Dubuque, a westbound UP train waits.
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From listening comes wisdom, and from speaking repentance... and f*** lossy compression

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GerryW
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby GerryW » Mon Feb 18, 2008 8:21 pm

Gerry, thanks for the links. Pretty interesting stuff - I especially enjoyed seeing the TEE trainset, having memories of that equipment when it was newly-introduced.
What the heck is that strange power unit on temporary wheelsets?

Hehe! It's the 'hood' of this one here, when they brought it to the hangar for restaurations.

Image

Image

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GerryW
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby GerryW » Mon Feb 18, 2008 8:22 pm

On my way to Dubuque, a westbound UP train waits.
Nice picture!!!

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Sir Gallivant
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby Sir Gallivant » Mon Feb 18, 2008 9:43 pm

I really should get going on my pics from the depot, here is (again, I think) a link to a page where I try to write and post pics.

One of the pics is, of course this one:Image
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby einesellesenie » Wed Feb 20, 2008 7:31 am

On my way to Dubuque, a westbound UP train waits.
Nice picture!!!
Thanks!

One from Clinton, Iowa...
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J
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby J » Wed Feb 20, 2008 12:54 pm

Here's a nice video from last weekend showing a chartered freight train up in Michigan. The photographer wanted to record the sounds of the accelerating locomotive but choose to keep the camera steady so the first half is simply a shot of an old elevator building. The locomotive approaches from the right of the screen over tracks covered by snow.

http://www.rail-videos.net/video/view.php?id=1939

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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby el » Wed Feb 20, 2008 1:30 pm

An odd Italian one, the Setebello...
settebello.JPG
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby Peter_K » Wed Feb 20, 2008 2:59 pm

Armoured train, diesel powered
Image

High speed steam locomotive
Image

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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby Peter_K » Wed Feb 20, 2008 3:31 pm

And a visit to a cemetary
Image
Image

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GerryW
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby GerryW » Wed Feb 20, 2008 5:57 pm

An odd Italian one, the Setebello...
settebello.JPG

Did you take this picture?

Looks very interesting!

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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby GerryW » Wed Feb 20, 2008 5:59 pm


And a visit to a cemetary
Cool children's playground!

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el
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby el » Wed Feb 20, 2008 6:49 pm


Did you take this picture?

Looks very interesting!
No, I didn't. I was actually looking for some TEE pics when I stumbled across this one.

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J
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby J » Wed Feb 20, 2008 9:59 pm

Seeng that Settebello brought back memories. I remember the curtains that covered the tops of the first class compartment windows at the front (the driver rode in the turret at the top - not unlike an airlline pilot). Would ITS feel comfortable up there? I surfed around and found the following link that discusses how the Settebello design influenced, of all things, the german designers of the Disneyland monorails.

http://www.alweg.com/disneyalweg.html

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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby Sir Gallivant » Thu Feb 21, 2008 1:42 pm

Found this panorama made from, Ithink, 5 pictures taken at the open doors day in August 2007. RIght, it was 11 pictures stitched together.
Link to fullsize picture, too wide to post here
Image
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J
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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby J » Fri Feb 22, 2008 1:20 am

That's a nice photograph of the locomotive shed, or what we'd call a roundhouse.

Want to take a spin in the conductor's seat of a freight train heading north out of St. Louis? This 9-minute trip will take you out of the city into a rainstorm and you'll end your trip in the dark after rolling along at up to 60 miles per hour. The locomotive number is not listed but it is a SD70M like this:
EMDSD70M.jpg
EMDSD70M.jpg (86.59 KiB) Viewed 24402 times
Video:
http://www.rail-videos.net/video/view.php?id=1046

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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby Peter_K » Fri Feb 22, 2008 12:30 pm

Here in a curiosity category is a picture of flameless steam engine. This type of locomotives were used around factories to push carts between ramps, specially in the high explosive risk areas, such as oil refineries. The well insulated tank at the front was about half filled with hot water and toped off with high pressure steam. As the steam was used up, the water evaporated making up the loss. Of course eventually both had to be refilled from a stationary boiler in the same manners that cars are filled up with fuel at gas station. The endurance was not bad, the thing could work for several hours between feel ups.
Image

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Re: Railroad Thread

Postby Sir Gallivant » Fri Feb 22, 2008 1:01 pm

What is the connection between Danmark, Italy and Poland in this thread?
Seeing the Settebello I couldn't help thinking of the express train-set series MA:
DSB_MA460_2006.jpg
DSB_MA460_2006.jpg (207.04 KiB) Viewed 24364 times
These trains ran from 1963, originally red, painted silver around '84. DSB (Danish State Railways) tried to sell the trains but ended up giving them away to a private Polish company, Lubuska Kolej Regionalna, they ran from May 93 until February 94 when they were finally decomissioned and scrapped.

I will see if I can find pictures from their time in Poland, don't know if they were repainted.

One set, the MA460, is running as a museum-piece here in Denmark.
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