Whilst perusing the www I ran across this photo .... It's about 5 years old but still interesting.

Full article: The Canterbury Earthquake: Images of the distorted railway line

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That would slow you down some.

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It's all some Cranks fault... ;)

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The T1 Trust, PRR T1 Class 4-4-4-4 #5550, 1 of America's First HST's

OK time for a quick update!!

Starting with this colourful pair at Chesterton today.



Kansas City Southern 4154 and 4143 a pair of SD70 Ace's make a pleasant change from the parade of NS black!!

I know I have said this before but... As as you know I come from the UK where all passenger services are " double ended" that is a cab at both ends and the trains never need to be "turned"

So while I can understand the need to turn a train that has a loco at just one end, I cannot for the life of me think why Amtrak turn a train with a P42 at one end and an NPCU (cabbage) at the other.

Now you could say that the train needs to face in a certain direction, or the P42 need to be at one particular end. Fine except yesterday the Pere Marquette turned on the wye.



Note the very clean 90229 is on the "east" end.

Today it turned again



And 90229 is now facing the other way! Anyone have any ideas why Amtrak are wasting time and money turning a train with a cab at both ends every time??

OK now they say a every picture tells a story.



BNSF 2003 towing P42 #18. It appears that the California Zephyr 6 on Saturday had a problem and 18 was left somewhere in the wilds, the train was towed in by BNSF 5135

Unfortunately it was so late that I gave up and went to bed and didn't get a shot of it!!

A little later 2003 returned (partially obscured) with 5135 in tow



It got very noisy at Chicago today and this slowly crept into view.



Whilst it was difficult to see anything through the dirt and grime, I do believe it was a rail grinder, in fact in this pic you can see the sparks



Finally Amtrak #102 was the P42 involved in the Vermonter derailment last week and from the pictures of it being hauled away still on it's side I doubt I will be seeing it again. It was one of the few P42's I have only seen once, on the 5th of April on The Lake Shore 49

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How was your trip chasing the 261 David, I miss being in the midwest.

(I lived in Plainfield for 8 Years before moving to Maryland, I would visit IRM twice a monthe until I moved)

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261 is the sister to 265 at IRM?

How was your trip chasing the 261 David, I miss being in the midwest.

(I lived in Plainfield for 8 Years before moving to Maryland, I would visit IRM twice a monthe until I moved)

I really want to hear what you have to say about chasing the 261

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Whilst perusing the www I ran across this photo .... It's about 5 years old but still interesting.

Full article: The Canterbury Earthquake: Images of the distorted railway line

Wow! Never seen a multiple heat kink before. That's what happens when Continuous Welded Rail gets really hot until it just HAS to expand. It's why railroads have speed restrictions in hot weather. The flip side is rail getting brittle and contracting until it breaks in cold weather.

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David
Sitting on my butt while others boldly go,
Waiting for a message from a small furry creature from Alpha Centauri.

Whilst perusing the www I ran across this photo .... It's about 5 years old but still interesting.

Full article: The Canterbury Earthquake: Images of the distorted railway line

Wow! Never seen a multiple heat kink before. That's what happens when Continuous Welded Rail gets really hot until it just HAS to expand. It's why railroads have speed restrictions in hot weather. The flip side is rail getting brittle and contracting until it breaks in cold weather.

Actually, having read the article, this was related to shifting after the earthquake. That would be one helluva heat kink:)

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I know I have said this before but... As as you know I come from the UK where all passenger services are " double ended" that is a cab at both ends and the trains never need to be "turned"

So while I can understand the need to turn a train that has a loco at just one end, I cannot for the life of me think why Amtrak turn a train with a P42 at one end and an NPCU (cabbage) at the other.

Now you could say that the train needs to face in a certain direction, or the P42 need to be at one particular end. Fine except yesterday the Pere Marquette turned on the wye.

Today it turned again

And 90229 is now facing the other way! Anyone have any ideas why Amtrak are wasting time and money turning a train with a cab at both ends every time??

And I have said before, I don't know either but I'd sure like to.

It got very noisy at Chicago today and this slowly crept into view.



Whilst it was difficult to see anything through the dirt and grime, I do believe it was a rail grinder, in fact in this pic you can see the sparks

Yup, that's a rail grinder. They're really cool to watch at night.

Finally Amtrak #102 was the P42 involved in the Vermonter derailment last week and from the pictures of it being hauled away still on it's side I doubt I will be seeing it again.

I've seen pictures of it on its side on a flatbed trailer and being uprighted to be placed on a flat car for movement to Beech Grove "for evaluation."

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David
Sitting on my butt while others boldly go,
Waiting for a message from a small furry creature from Alpha Centauri.

Whilst perusing the www I ran across this photo .... It's about 5 years old but still interesting.

Full article: The Canterbury Earthquake: Images of the distorted railway line

Wow! Never seen a multiple heat kink before. That's what happens when Continuous Welded Rail gets really hot until it just HAS to expand. It's why railroads have speed restrictions in hot weather. The flip side is rail getting brittle and contracting until it breaks in cold weather.

Actually, having read the article, this was related to shifting after the earthquake. That would be one helluva heat kink:)

Ah. I didn't even notice the link.

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David
Sitting on my butt while others boldly go,
Waiting for a message from a small furry creature from Alpha Centauri.

261 is the sister to 265 at IRM?

Yes. Parts were borrowed from 265 to use as patterns for new parts in 261's restoration.

How was your trip chasing the 261 David, I miss being in the midwest.

(I lived in Plainfield for 8 Years before moving to Maryland, I would visit IRM twice a monthe until I moved)

I really want to hear what you have to say about chasing the 261

It was very good.

We took our time driving up on Friday. Saw a few trains, but nothing worth digging out the camera.

Saturday, we figured that if we went to see it departing from the shop, we'd never catch up with it in city traffic, so we headed north a ways and waited for it. We then paced it when the road was alongside the track, or got ahead and waited when it wasn't. The fastest I clocked it at was about 47 MPH, and it had to stop a few times for servicing or to throw the odd switch left against it by another train. We went all the way to the wye at Boylston, WI, where high clouds rolled in. We shot it a couple more times on the way back to Hinckley, then let it go and went in search of the St. Croix Valley RR. They have a pair of SD45s (internally now SD40-3s) painted in the old Northern Pacific scheme. We found one parked behind some trees a few miles out of town, and the other at their office and enginehouse in Rush City. After that, we went to see SPUD, St. Paul Union Depot, beautifully renovated and reinstated as a passenger station, which it hasn't been since Amtrak started in 1971.

By the time we woke up and got out of the hotel on Sunday, the train had already left. We headed out after it, but it reached our target location while we were still 20 miles away, so we gave up. We headed back to the city, then picked a track and started following it south. This turned out well; we found the shop of Progress Rail(?) on the former Minneapolis Northfield & Southern. We continued south until this line met the former Rock Island and Milwaukee Road, which paralleled each other for many more miles south. The MILW is now CP and is out of service. The Rock is now UP and goes all the way to Des Moines and Kansas City. Saw only one train on that all the way to Manly, Iowa, where I showed Mike the Iowa Northern Ry. (RI to Cedar Rapids), which I had ridden on an excursion in 2012. Then we continued to Mason City, where we lucked out and found all three locomotives of the Iowa Traction. We also stumbled upon the Iowa Trolley Park, which is the group building the replica of Virginia & Truckee "Lyon". The main guy was there, working, so he showed us around a bit. Then we headed for home. I got in around 12:15 a.m. I still haven't caught up on my sleep.

Pictures and maybe some video when I have a chance.

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David
Sitting on my butt while others boldly go,
Waiting for a message from a small furry creature from Alpha Centauri.

Well I was out last night but left my "automated" recorder to deal with the arriving and departing California Zephyr and Southwest chief 5,6 3 and 4 at Chicago

Reviewing the footage this morning I seemed to be missing the California Zephyr 6.

Here is the reason

Amtrak train hits semi in Somonauk IL

So that puts P42 #16 out for a while though it the damage doesn't look terminal and luckily there were no serious injuries.

PS Just come across this pic of the damage to #102 in the Vermonter derailment and that does look serious.

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=549888

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I know two posts in a row!!

Starting today with just a simple pic of a "Heritage" Amtrak unit #184



Which is in "Phase IV" styling, I have to say the P42 seems to suite this as well, looks very business like.

On the 11th the California Zephyr brought in the NXTRACK track geometry coach



Which leads onto this little set of pics.

Yesterday this pair crept across the picture.



BNSF 3178 (GP50) still wearing the "Santa Fe" livery

Followed by



BNSF 1795 (SD40-2) in Burlington Northern Green and Black, I wonder if whoever put them together did so on purpose, BN-SF

Now as well as being and odd pair it is also quite rare for light engines to come down the wye, so I wondered what it was about.

All was revealed several hours later,(and darker) when they returned.



They had come to collect the NXTRACK coach



Finally something a little strange.

I use the Amtrak website for "Track a Train" and any useful updates, recently the track a train has not been working 100%.

Now I usually use Google Chrome as my browser, but I tried out Firefox to see if it was any better, imagine my surprise whwn I was presented with a different website!!

Chrome on the left Firefox on the right



Yes I have refreshed the cache tried everything but Chrome refuses to update, in fact every other browser I have tried works fine and shows the same page as Firefox.

Very odd.

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Well I was out last night but left my "automated" recorder to deal with the arriving and departing California Zephyr and Southwest chief 5,6 3 and 4 at Chicago

Reviewing the footage this morning I seemed to be missing the California Zephyr 6.

Here is the reason

Amtrak train hits semi in Somonauk IL

So that puts P42 #16 out for a while though it the damage doesn't look terminal and luckily there were no serious injuries.

Damage was minor enough that it continued to Chicago after BNSF did a bit of work on it.

PS Just come across this pic of the damage to #102 in the Vermonter derailment and that does look serious.

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=549888

Ouch. That's worse than I thought. Still, whether it gets fixed will probably depend on the condition of its frame.

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David
Sitting on my butt while others boldly go,
Waiting for a message from a small furry creature from Alpha Centauri.

I know two posts in a row!!

Starting today with just a simple pic of a "Heritage" Amtrak unit #184



Which is in "Phase IV" styling, I have to say the P42 seems to suite this as well, looks very business like.

It certainly got back here fast. It was the unit Amtrak assigned to supply HEP to 261's train over the weekend.

Yesterday this pair crept across the picture.

BNSF 3178 (GP50) still wearing the "Santa Fe" livery

Followed by



BNSF 1795 (SD40-2) in Burlington Northern Green and Black, I wonder if whoever put them together did so on purpose, BN-SF

Now as well as being and odd pair it is also quite rare for light engines to come down the wye, so I wondered what it was about.

A bit sad, actually. A couple of grand old (not so old) mainline workhorses now reduced to yard switcher status, probably at Cicero.

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David
Sitting on my butt while others boldly go,
Waiting for a message from a small furry creature from Alpha Centauri.

All right, all you Brit train spotters: what is this and where was I when I took the photo?

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All right, all you Brit train spotters: what is this and where was I when I took the photo?

Can an American tell you it is a replica built in the late 1980's by GKN Sankey apprentices.

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Just a quick one, The Cardinal has brought the weekly "odd items" from Beech Grove and amongst them was this:



NPCU 90208 in Veterans Livery

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...Richard Tevithick's 1804 loco, probably the first self propelled steam loco.
As Gary says the photo is of a modern reproduction, which actually does move under its own steam.

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Bob Smith
Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society)
Somewhere in the (un)known Universe?

Just a quick one, The Cardinal has brought the weekly "odd items" from Beech Grove and amongst them was this:



NPCU 90208 in Veterans Livery

How the heck did I not hear about that from any of the local sources???

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David
Sitting on my butt while others boldly go,
Waiting for a message from a small furry creature from Alpha Centauri.