Seems it's time for a reprise of Guthrie's song......eh?

You mean Goodman's song.

---

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

Seems it's time for a reprise of Guthrie's song......eh?

You mean Goodman's song.

A great version, indeed.
The Guthrie version was the one I cut my teeth on. That's why I always remember it.
There are many songs that along the tracks have gone astray from their writer's stations.

Thanks for the link and reminder, buddy.

---

"Freedom is just Chaos, with better lighting." Alan Dean Foster

Why do American locos always have every piece of pipework on the outside? Makes them look really ungainly.

Actually, there is quite a bit hidden under the jacketing. Beyond that, I suppose it's mostly a matter a financial matter. More covering costs more money. More importantly, it gets in the way of maintenance. There was a move in the 1920s and 30s to streamline everything in sight, but to me this made steam engines uglier and uglier (and those are my two favorite railroads of that era). By the 40s, streamlining had been refined and was being incorporated into the design of the engine, rather than being an ungainly add-on shroud.

---

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

Seems it's time for a reprise of Guthrie's song......eh?

You mean Goodman's song.

A great version, indeed.
The Guthrie version was the one I cut my teeth on. That's why I always remember it.
There are many songs that along the tracks have gone astray from their writer's stations.

Thanks for the link and reminder, buddy.

It was Guthrie that made it a hit, but Goodman wrote it. I listened to both while trying to get to sleep my first night on the train last Friday.

---

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

I don't think that most trains move quite fast enough to make aerodynamics much of a factor........
At least in the terms of traditional trains being spoken of here.

Tons of metal moving at speeds less than 100 mph don't gain much by having more than a simple cowcatcher at the front.

---

"Freedom is just Chaos, with better lighting." Alan Dean Foster

I don't think that most trains move quite fast enough to make aerodynamics much of a factor........
At least in the terms of traditional trains being spoken of here.

Tons of metal moving at speeds less than 100 mph don't gain much by having more than a simple cowcatcher at the front.

True. Streamlining was more of an aesthetic thing than operational, although in that era passenger trains routinely went upwards of 110 mph.

That said, though, the original 1934 movie "Silver Streak" makes the point that its streamlining helped hold it down on the track (which I don't quite buy). And in the 1980s, EMD built a set of demonstrator engines with the corners of its cab rounded to reduce wind resistance and thus save fuel. It was found that the difference was so negligible as to be far outweighed by the added cost of building them that way.

However, wind resistance is a major factor on freight trains. When you see double-stacked containers, each of them catches a bit of wind; the greater the distance from one container to the next, the more wind resistance (this is why over the road truckers have wind deflectors on their cab roofs). It can also take nearly as much horsepower to move an empty coal train at maximum speed as a fully loaded train, due to the wind catching in the empty hoppers. Some railroads even insist that empty box cars have their doors closed before a train leaves the yard. This is the same effect as opening the window on your car causing more drag than using the air conditioner.

---

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

I don't think that most trains move quite fast enough to make aerodynamics much of a factor........
At least in the terms of traditional trains being spoken of here.

Tons of metal moving at speeds less than 100 mph don't gain much by having more than a simple cowcatcher at the front.

True. Streamlining was more of an aesthetic thing than operational, although in that era passenger trains routinely went upwards of 110 mph.

That said, though, the original 1934 movie "Silver Streak" makes the point that its streamlining helped hold it down on the track (which I don't quite buy). And in the 1980s, EMD built a set of demonstrator engines with the corners of its cab rounded to reduce wind resistance and thus save fuel. It was found that the difference was so negligible as to be far outweighed by the added cost of building them that way.

However, wind resistance is a major factor on freight trains. When you see double-stacked containers, each of them catches a bit of wind; the greater the distance from one container to the next, the more wind resistance (this is why over the road truckers have wind deflectors on their cab roofs). It can also take nearly as much horsepower to move an empty coal train at maximum speed as a fully loaded train, due to the wind catching in the empty hoppers. Some railroads even insist that empty box cars have their doors closed before a train leaves the yard. This is the same effect as opening the window on your car causing more drag than using the air conditioner.

The same claim has been made about pickup trucks.........tailgate up or tailgate down.

I'll look for the link, but there were some studies done that said that you might as well leave the tailgate up.
Wind tunnel studies show that there is actually more wind turbulence when the tailgate is down.

I think this is the link........

---

"Freedom is just Chaos, with better lighting." Alan Dean Foster

Seems it's time for a reprise of Guthrie's song......eh?

You mean Goodman's song.

A great version, indeed.
The Guthrie version was the one I cut my teeth on. That's why I always remember it.
There are many songs that along the tracks have gone astray from their writer's stations.

Thanks for the link and reminder, buddy.

It was Guthrie that made it a hit, but Goodman wrote it. I listened to both while trying to get to sleep my first night on the train last Friday.

I still prefer the version sung by Willie Nelson...

---

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

I still prefer the version sung by Willie Nelson...

Nice......who did that wonderful harp part?

I suppose I should supply the link.

Willie's version......

I need the harmonica player's name on this session. I think I knew him.

Meow.

---

"Freedom is just Chaos, with better lighting." Alan Dean Foster

Harmonicas........not too distantly related from trains.
Hope you do not mind the free association of thoughts.


Anyway.......

I knew Magic Dick from Detroit personally.

He did a wonderful series of instructive vids on How he did this........

---

"Freedom is just Chaos, with better lighting." Alan Dean Foster

Here's not very much information about Amtrak's new electric locomotives being tested for safety and performance, and not much more about them being built.

---

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

I still prefer the version sung by Willie Nelson...

Nice......who did that wonderful harp part?

I suppose I should supply the link.

Willie's version......

I need the harmonica player's name on this session. I think I knew him.

Meow.

I think that's Mickey Raphael, He's known to work for Willie Nelson.

---

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

Harmonicas........not too distantly related from trains.
Hope you do not mind the free association of thoughts

Totally lost me ....

Both make noise with air or at least appear too.

---

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

Harmonicas........not too distantly related from trains.
Hope you do not mind the free association of thoughts

Totally lost me ....

Lotta good songs about trains have harmonica parts in them.....

---

Donald
Infernal Optimist / Submariner, retired

BTW, several days ago in one of these train threads, there was mention of panel track, premade sections of track like full size pieces of the track that comes in model train sets.

Panel track is mainly used to quickly repair track after a derailment or other incident tears it out, and there would be a speed restriction on it until the rails could either be welded together or replaced with longer rails, which would be welded. The exception to this is switches; when a switch needs to be replaced, to speed up the process and minimize downtime for the railroad, they prebuild the new switch offsite. At the designated time, they remove the old one and drop the new one into place. Since there usually needs to be electrical insulation at each end of a switch, it won't get welded in, but there will be a speed restriction until the ballast has been thoroughly tamped and had time to settle. They also do this with diamond crossings where two tracks cross each other at grade.

You can see here where a diamond was no longer needed, so it was just dragged as a whole off into the weeds and left there. (The diagonal track that's severed was once the mighty Pennsylvania Railroad's 2-track mainline from New York to Chicago. Amtrak operated on the one remaining track into the 1980s. Now it's completely out of service northwest of this spot in Gary, IN, to where the PRR came parallel with the New York Central a few miles away; east of here, it's the Chicago Fort Wayne & Eastern (leased from CSX) as far as Crestline, OH, where ownership switches to Norfolk Southern.) (I could further elaborate on this line's history, if anyone's interested.)

---

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

BTW, several days ago in one of these train threads, there was mention of panel track, premade sections of track like full size pieces of the track that comes in model train sets.

Panel track is mainly used to quickly repair track after a derailment or other incident tears it out, and there would be a speed restriction on it until the rails could either be welded together or replaced with longer rails, which would be welded. The exception to this is switches; when a switch needs to be replaced, to speed up the process and minimize downtime for the railroad, they prebuild the new switch offsite. At the designated time, they remove the old one and drop the new one into place. Since there usually needs to be electrical insulation at each end of a switch, it won't get welded in, but there will be a speed restriction until the ballast has been thoroughly tamped and had time to settle. They also do this with diamond crossings where two tracks cross each other at grade.

You can see here where a diamond was no longer needed, so it was just dragged as a whole off into the weeds and left there. (The diagonal track that's severed was once the mighty Pennsylvania Railroad's 2-track mainline from New York to Chicago. Amtrak operated on the one remaining track into the 1980s. Now it's completely out of service northwest of this spot in Gary, IN, to where the PRR came parallel with the New York Central a few miles away; east of here, it's the Chicago Fort Wayne & Eastern (leased from CSX) as far as Crestline, OH, where ownership switches to Norfolk Southern.) (I could further elaborate on this line's history, if anyone's interested.)

That mention was by Me, most model railroads use flex track and except where block gaps are needed, solder the rail ends together, I dropped out of that hobby since I don't have the room or the needed income anymore, PCs, a cat and fish will be as much as I can presently manage, the fish though are on hold as that's a big aquarium for Me to setup and in a mobile home with particle board flooring I have to move the tank out from the wall by 6.5", but I digress, Most of My knowledge on trains is from Model Railroading, at one time I specialized in HO scale rolling stock and track, I also did some free work adding to the Xtrak Cad library before It went public, I'd added some curved turnouts(switches) and such to the library so that people could use the program with what was available to design a model railroad layout(a type of table for scale model trains).

---

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

That mention was by Me, most model railroads use flex track and except where block gaps are needed, solder the rail ends together, I dropped out of that hobby since I don't have the room or the needed income anymore, PCs, a cat and fish will be as much as I can presently manage, the fish though are on hold as that's a big aquarium for Me to setup and in a mobile home with particle board flooring I have to move the tank out from the wall by 6.5", but I digress, Most of My knowledge on trains is from Model Railroading, at one time I specialized in HO scale rolling stock and track, I also did some free work adding to the Xtrak Cad library before It went public, I'd added some curved turnouts(switches) and such to the library so that people could use the program with what was available to design a model railroad layout(a type of table for scale model trains).

Most beginners, as well as parents and grandparents looking for a quick birthday or Christmas gift, will buy a train set with engine, cars, snap track, and a cheap power supply. Anyone who doesn't get frustrated with the crappy quality of the set and gets the modeling bug will quickly switch to flex track.

I'm in HO, but I can't afford to buy much. I'm trying to talk myself into a couple of NS Heritage units (but which ones?). A friend of mine bought all 10 of the ES44ACs and is planning to buy all 10 of the SD70ACes when Athearn finally releases them, but MSRP on those is $200 apiece.

---

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

That mention was by Me, most model railroads use flex track and except where block gaps are needed, solder the rail ends together, I dropped out of that hobby since I don't have the room or the needed income anymore, PCs, a cat and fish will be as much as I can presently manage, the fish though are on hold as that's a big aquarium for Me to setup and in a mobile home with particle board flooring I have to move the tank out from the wall by 6.5", but I digress, Most of My knowledge on trains is from Model Railroading, at one time I specialized in HO scale rolling stock and track, I also did some free work adding to the Xtrak Cad library before It went public, I'd added some curved turnouts(switches) and such to the library so that people could use the program with what was available to design a model railroad layout(a type of table for scale model trains).

Most beginners, as well as parents and grandparents looking for a quick birthday or Christmas gift, will buy a train set with engine, cars, snap track, and a cheap power supply. Anyone who doesn't get frustrated with the crappy quality of the set and gets the modeling bug will quickly switch to flex track.

I'm in HO, but I can't afford to buy much. I'm trying to talk myself into a couple of NS Heritage units (but which ones?). A friend of mine bought all 10 of the ES44ACs and is planning to buy all 10 of the SD70ACes when Athearn finally releases them, but MSRP on those is $200 apiece.

Prices sure have gone up on Athearn stuff, I used to add kadee couplers, add weight to cars as needed to bring them up to NMRA standard scale weight, I did own a painted brass loco or two at one time, all of that is long gone now.

---

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

I tend to doubt this steam engine bell was stolen by common thieves. I think it's more likely warped foamers.

---

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

The Ringling Brothers Red Train was reported in Irvine, CA, 15 minutes ago. Supposed to be going to San Diego.

---

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