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I'll be the first to admit... I don't know a damn thing about trains. There's a fair number of you "bi's" here. So.. sell me on trains. Why do love them so much? What makes them so interesting? I'm curious.

I snapped this the other day here in Santa Fe... what kind of engine (is that the right word) is this? Any idea on how long it's been working? What are some of the notable facts of this type? How does it compare to it's contemporaries?

Thanks guys.

BCAInfoSys wrote:
I snapped this the other day here in Santa Fe... what kind of engine (is that the right word) is this? Any idea on how long it's been working? What are some of the notable facts of this type? How does it compare to it's contemporaries?

It's an ElectroMotive Division (a GM subsidiary) GP16. Built around 1980 from the chassis of an older locomotive from the early 1960's. 1600 hp 2-stroke EMD 645 engine.

The GP16 originally came from the Seaboard Coast Lines railroad. It's a real lightweight compared to modern 4400 hp locomotives.

It carries a lot of the same attraction that plane spotting has since the equipment gets around to different parts of the country and there's the obvious Aspie attractions of mechanical hardware and their many variations.

Nice job on the ID, Mark.

Sounds kind of weird, but I'm excited that Union Pacific is laying continuous welded rail through my little hamlet. They're ripping up the jointed "clickity-clack" 39-foot-long rails that've been in place for years. Only a railfan would give a shit.

Lengths of 1/4-mile-long rail is laid and then welded together to make a single joint-free, smooth section of rail.

Mark wrote:Sounds kind of weird, but I'm excited that Union Pacific is laying continuous welded rail through my little hamlet. They're ripping up the jointed "clickity-clack" 39-foot-long rails that've been in place for years. Only a railfan would give a shit.

I take it these rails are the winglets of the railway world, then?

Mark wrote:Sounds kind of weird, but I'm excited that Union Pacific is laying continuous welded rail through my little hamlet. They're ripping up the jointed "clickity-clack" 39-foot-long rails that've been in place for years. Only a railfan would give a shit.

Lengths of 1/4-mile-long rail is laid and then welded together to make a single joint-free, smooth section of rail.

I thought the gaps were there to permit expansion. Is this not needed anymore?

2-stroke engine, Mark?

Airfoilsguy wrote:
I thought the gaps were there to permit expansion. Is this not needed anymore?

Not so much for expansion, but that is one benefit of jointed rail. Continuous welded rail (CWR) is slightly more susceptable to heat kinks, but my dad (who's retired from 40 years of RR work) says he's seen more than his share of kinks on jointed rail, too. I know CWR is supposed to be laid at a certain temperature for best heat and cold expansion without breaking or kinking.

AndesSMF wrote:2-stroke engine, Mark?

Yep. EMD uses 2-stroke engines. GE uses 4-stroke engines.

Aren't 2-stroke lawnmower engines?

Can someone give me an explanation as if I were a 6 year old?

AndesSMF wrote:Aren't 2-stroke lawnmower engines?

Can someone give me an explanation as if I were a 6 year old?

http://auto.howstuffworks.com/diesel-two-stroke2.htm

Grew up on a little railroad in Alaska.

Gramps was an engineer.

Pop was the VP of Rail Ops when he retired from railroading.

I've been back to that little town, Skagway, a few times since . . .

Back in the late 1950s, the White Pass ordered special built locomotives from GE. Each had between 890 and 990 horsepower. Very light by any standards, but this is a narrow gauge operation. http://www.whitepassrailroad.com

Gramps wrecked the 98 (and the rest of a train) in the 1960s.











I saw the 98 in 2003 when I was in Skagway with my daughter.



And recently, it was essentially rebuilt from the rails up in Tacoma. New 1400hp engine, new dynamic brake system, AC traction motors and new Moose Lights. She's back on the rails in Alaska.

Here's something I was going to get up early to do last Saturday morning. Southern Pacific 4449, based in Portland, made its way to big steam show in Owosso, Michigan over the past two weeks. It left St. Paul (below) and crossed the Mississippi River into the nice little town of Prescott, WI, about 25 miles south of me. I decided against it; I heard the crowds of railfans were going to be huge.

The Amtrak locomotive provided power for lights and air conditioning to the coaches; it was in neutral during the trip.

Can someone post that pic of the steam engine hauling like a hundred modern rail cars? That pis is awesome.

Airfoilsguy wrote:Can someone post that pic of the steam engine hauling like a hundred modern rail cars? That pis is awesome.

Back in the days when nobody was worried about CO2 and all the other nonsense.

The biggest steamloc ever built.

What's that?

I'm drawn to the modern express trains, like the Pendolino here in the UK:



Germany's ICE3 is captivating - and ever since I boarded one in Munich and found that you can see straight ahead out the driver's window, I've wanted to go on one:



But still, nothing beats the raw power of a big steam loco. They're living, fire-breathing monsters. And the whistle of a steam express at full tilt, echoing through the night, has to be one of the most evocative sounds there is.

AndesSMF wrote:What's that?

Al Gore's worst nightmare.

AndesSMF wrote:What's that?

Union Pacific 4-8-8-4 "Big Boy".

A MONSTER!!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_Pacific_Big_Boy

AndesSMF wrote:What's that?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_Pacific_Big_Boy

Hey Pep, are those real pics of your Grandad? Awesome pics. Are they scanned?

davestan_ksan wrote:Hey Pep, are those real pics of your Grandad? Awesome pics. Are they scanned?

Yuppo . . . gramps, the one and only.

Scanned yes. I've got more, but these pertained to the "98".

His favorite locomotive was a Baldwin 2-6-0, the "73". It's still running . . . . Gramps aint as he passed twenty years ago. But the 73 still hauls tourist trains. Refurbs many years ago.

One quick - or maybe two - stories about Gramps.

Picture a frozen Whitehorse Yukon circa 1950. Christmas Eve. Gramps arrived from Skagway with the northbound behind the 73. he's lonely, and eventually, as in the bunkhouse in Whitehorse generally, tanked. He wants a Christmas tree. So he grabs the 73 - left fired all night because it's winter in the Yukon - we do that up here. He BACKS it out of town, no lights, no horn, no nothing . . . . grabs a Christmas tree he likes, and runs it back in to town.

Busted of course . . .


And then the time the Railroad Union pukes were on strike in 1969. He's picketing outside my Dad's office window. He's a hoghead and Dad is the VP of rail ops. Pop is walking around doing VP shit, and Gramps is freezing his ass off on the picket line.

Dad sees Gramps. Hoists up his steaming hot cup of coffee (with a chaser I'm sure). Gramps replies with the one finger salute.

True, every word.

Yup, those are scanned pics of Gramps running the 98.


EDITL Re the wreck above.

Just south of Whitehorse.

Gramps is the hoghead on the 98, with two 90s in trail and a train. Fifteen containers and six parlor cars.

He sees a washout. Bridge is gone over a small creek. He tosses the 98 (and the other two locos) into the 8th notch and speeds up . . .as fast as he can go. Needless to say, he don't make it.

When my dad arrives, as he did for every wreck, he asked "Emil (that's Gramps name), what the hell were you thinkin'". Gramps replied, simply, "I thought I could get across with the lead engine". So my dad's followon question, "Well what the hell did you plan to do with the rest of the train"?

Hmm. Never heard of the welded rail thing Mark.

I visited my grandma in Villa Park, IL last month. Her house is right next to tracks and when i was a kiddie we always used to fall asleep to the clikety clack all night long.

This time, i noticed that it no longer makes the same noise and is actually relatively quiet. I miss the clikety clak though.

Fumanchewd wrote:I miss the clikety clak though.

I recently took a day trip up to the Ffestiniog Railway and was pleasantly surprised to hear that sound on the train up there. You just don't hear it any more; it makes it sound like a "real train". And stopping at the signal-box to get the token for the top end of the line turns it into a real adventure.

Weird to pull into Blaenau Ffestiniog (not least because the name's unpronounceable) and see the little narrow-gauge track right next to the big train that brought you up there.