Railroad images fading into history

[Vaughn MacKenzie]

Notice anything unusual in this photo? I'm not talking about the long line of locomotives. This picture of a train splitting the Semaphores was shot just a couple months ago but it may as well have been 1971:



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Those classic railroad signals have been around for about 100 years, but are disappearing fast from the railroad scene. They have long been replaced on major mainlines, starting in the 1930s, but a few still survive in working order on some of the lesser-traveled lines. There have been quite a few removed in Central Oregon the last couple of years, many that were installed in *1912* and maintained in working order until 1999 and 2000.



Another little railroad novelty fading fast is the Wig-Wag signal at crossings. I know little about them but these peculair devices are a swinging pendulum with a flashing red light. There are pictures if you click the link below.



I enjoy trains and railroading, partly because in some ways it is living history and some aspects of railroading last an incredibly long time. There is a locomotive here in the Pasco yard that does local runs almost daily. It is 51 years old and is running with just one major rebuild. And they don't go easy on it at all. As some of the longstanding railroad symbols are close to vanishing, it's worth enjoying a bit of history while we still have it.





Another interesting note in this newsline. . .



Greyhound is the 2nd largest consumer of diesel fuel in the US! They use moree fuel than the Union Pacific or Burlington Northern RR (the only 2 that made the top 5 list). Certainly trains are an efficient way to move stuff, but if I had to guess, I would have figured all those railroads moving many billions of tons of freght would use more fuel than moving a couple hundred thousand people around the country.



http://www.northwestrails.com/news94/nwnewspage94.htm



OK that's my bit of railroad musings for today



Vaughn

 

[KatDiesel]

Originally posted by Vaughn MacKenzie

Greyhound is the 2nd largest consumer of diesel fuel in the US! They use moree fuel than the Union Pacific or Burlington Northern RR (the only 2 that made the top 5 list). Certainly trains are an efficient way to move stuff, but if I had to guess, I would have figured all those railroads moving many billions of tons of freght would use more fuel than moving a couple hundred thousand people around the country.

Um Vaughn might want to reread that. Union Pacific is the number one comsumer of diesel fuel. Passed the U. S. Navy in 2000. The list is in no certain order. We used like 1. 3 billion gallons of diesel in 2000. If you look at the bottom of the list it states that UP passed the Navy. I think it was like 20million gallons a day we use? I know they are pushing fuel conservation from time to time because of the costs associated with it. Luckly the "territory" I work is exempt from that so I can have trains fire up another AC or something if they are dragging up the hill.



To move a 16,000ton coal train (115 cars of coal) takes six AC locomotives each with 4000hp from Grand Junction, CO or Phippsburg, CO to Denver, CO (through the Rockies). The "big hill" for east bounds is Granby, CO to the Moffat Tunnel (WinterPark is on the west end). Westbound from Leyden (10 miles or so west of Denver) all the way to the moffat tunnel is a basic 2% grade which is roughly 52 miles or so.

 

[EMDDIESEL]

Correct on UP being the biggest fuel user. Up untill recently, it was the US Navy (followed by US railroads as a whole) but thanks to more and more Gas Turbines (Which dont use Diesel) and Nuclear propulsion, railroads have beaten the US Navy.

EMD's SD40-2, which is the best selling locomotive to date burns 187 gallons an hour in Notch 8 (Full throttle). I work for CSX, not UP so i am not familiar with all of UP's operations but it is safe to say that at any given time, (and this is a LOW estimate) UP has 500 of these SD40-2's at work. While newer Locomotives are more fuel effiecient when operating the way they are supposed to, they are still using over 150GPH. I know on my railroad, they are really big on fuel conservation now. We are spending over 1 million dollars a DAY on fuel. Just idleing burns about 12-14 gallons an hour.

 

[Vaughn MacKenzie]

Oops

Hey Kat, thanks for the clarification. It did seem totally unrealistic that Greyhound could slurp it down faster than the Union Pacific Railroad!



Vaughn

 

[vc]

Hey guys,



can you tell me if I'm thinking correct in how a locomotive works these days. I think they have a very large diesel engine that runs a very large electric motor via a generator of some sort. Is this half way close to how it works?



Thanks.



vc

 

[dieselworld]

Very cool sinage. Those wig wags have been long gone from this area. Too bad because they are really neat.



How much do you think they would sell the ones they are taking down?

 

[Evan A. Beck]

VC,



The diesel locomotive's basic design has not changed much in it's entire lifetime. It still uses a prime mover, which is the main diesel engine. This drives a generator, which in turn drives up to 6 motors, and they drive each axle. Up until about 10 years ago, the motors were predominantly powered by DC current, but the trend now is AC current.



Vaughn, interested in taking a trip up to Stampede Pass one of these days?

 

[Vaughn MacKenzie]

Stampede Line

VWTDI, I have no idea what Wig Wags would go for but I doubt they're cheap. There were 3 or 4 crossings near here that used to have them, as well as several semaphores, but BN took them out in '96 when they upgraded the line.



Evan, I could have ridden a steam train over Stampede Pass over Memorial Day weekend. I just couldn't bring myself to spend $500 on a ticket though. It was the Southern Pacific 4449 Daylight, and the train looked sweet running without any diesel power. They ran a trip from Portland, through the gorge to Pasco, then overnighted in Yakima. The next day it went thru Ellensburg and Cle Elum, over Stampede, through Auburn then back to Portland. Hopefully they will run this again next year, because I'm going no matter how spendy!



Here's a shot of it whipping along at 80mph along the Washington side of the Columbia River:



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Vaughn

 

[JSchooley]

Suprisingly the newer cruize ships are diesel electric using AC synchronous motors driven by inverters. When you look at the HP and Watts it is incredible.



Nice pictures and nice posts. Loco's old and new are incredible muscle machines. I'm always fascinated with the engineering that went in to the propulsion and escpecially the controls.

 

[KatDiesel]

I still can't believe the BNSF repainted that locomotive. Granted it did wear those colors back in the war years but the Daylight needs to be the proper colors. Even more insulting is the BNSF but their road symbol on it.



I wish UP would restore a BigBoy and run it... ... least they got #3895 running which is a Challenger the biggest operational steam locomotive in the world today.



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[EMDDIESEL]

Hey Kat, last i heard, some big movie company is restoring a Big Boy for use in some movie and when they are done with it, i heard they are giving it back to UP fully operational. You would probably hear more about that then me since you work there. Have you heard anything?

 

[Andy Perreault]

That's a great picture, Kat. EMD, I heard the same thing.

Andy

 

[KatDiesel]

Oldie but a goodie.....

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Here ya go Andy... . I have slightly bigger versions of these if ya want them for wallpaper or anything. This is an old picture but looks good!



And the movie thing, I think I did hear something bout that. I'll have to look into it.

 

[Vaughn MacKenzie]

Here's a display of Power

I followed the movie news closely about restoring a Big Boy, but unfortunately it died by the wayside. The no-name brand film company didn't seem to have much $$, also it couldn't be agreed on where to park the locomotive to refurbish it. There used to be a website for the restoration of engine #4018 but it has disappeared.



Kat, excellent shot of the Challenger! I have ridden on 2 trains pulled by that locomotive, what a piece of machinery.



If you want to talk horsepower, the Challenger, amazingly, is not considered the most powerful locomotive in operation today. I think the honors go to the DDX40 (or whatever UP's twin-prime mover 8-axle diesel is called). The DDX40 is rated at 6600hp I think, the Challenger around 6000. However, once the Challenger gets its freight rolling along, I think the Challenger can blow the socks of the DDX40 above 30mph



Case in point. . . in August 1990 the Challenger had just been converted from a coal to an oil burning locomotive. They wanted to give it a good run. So they assigned it to a revenue freight between Cheyenne WY and North Platte, Neb (about 275 miles??). With the Challenger as the sole locomotive on the train, they hooked up 143 cars stretching out 8900 feet (about 1. 7 miles . It was not an extraordinarily heavy freight at 7800 tons, but the Challenger, once it got rolling, had no trouble maintaining the 65mph track speed. It even reached track speed by the time it topped Archer Hill coming out of Cheyenne (I don't know how much of a grade that is, Kat may know. . . )



Does anyone know how well 6000hp worth of diesel locomotive(s) can whisk a 7800-ton freight along??



Vaughn

 

[Power Wagon]

Any idea how much $$$ it would cost?



If it could burn coal (read, MAKE BIG SMOKE) we might be able get some hotshot like Limbaugh to pay for it. I'm assuming costs in the millions... ???

 

[Vaughn MacKenzie]

Actually, since the engine was in great shape when they retired it, it will not be super expensive to return it to operation. That is, if they plan to burn coal like it originally did. Which creates a problem of keeping it fueled anytime it travels anywhere. The Challenger just tows an extra tender which makes it convenient.



Another problem with a Big Boy is its sheer mass. They are quite limited on where they can run it, since it weights over 1. 2 million pounds. As it is there are places they cannot run the Challenger. In '95 they were going to run it from Pasco to Spokane but decided the track was not in good enough shape to take the weight.



But bringing a Big Boy back would be awesome



Vaughn

 

[Power Wagon]

Originally posted by Vaughn MacKenzie

Actually, since the engine was in great shape when they retired it, it will not be super expensive to return it to operation. That is, if they plan to burn coal like it originally did. Which creates a problem of keeping it fueled anytime it travels anywhere. The Challenger just tows an extra tender which makes it convenient.



Another problem with a Big Boy is its sheer mass. They are quite limited on where they can run it, since it weights over 1. 2 million pounds. As it is there are places they cannot run the Challenger. In '95 they were going to run it from Pasco to Spokane but decided the track was not in good enough shape to take the weight.



But bringing a Big Boy back would be awesome



Vaughn

Hmmm... . Yer right, the railroad has recently reduced the number of available places to refill the coal and water... . water's not too bad, but where on earth do you find coal?







I guess it would be cool even if it did burn oil... I'd drive a long ways to see it, too.

 

[Archive]

My dad worked on the railroad for 40 years... . I got to ride in and drive lots of different engines, motorcars, etc. I remember each one fondly!

 

[Evan A. Beck]

I was just going through some of the old photo albums of mine, and found this picture. My dad and I used to take a lot of railroad photographs, we probably have 1,500+ photos of just about everything. Lots of rare items, and many things that don't exist anymore. This one is from March '92, and is of the BN's "Executive" F9's. Both the A and B unit are former Northern Pacific units, so they are right at home here in WA. Too bad they are based in Kansas City.



They were both refurbished in the late 80's-early 90's, and no longer have the old 16-567C 1,750 HP prime movers in them. They have been outfitted with the running gear and the 2,000 HP 16-645E 16-cylinder engine, identical to the GP38-2. That's why cometimes these F9's are referred to as F9-2's. They are basically dressed-up GP38-2's. Think of it as putting an ISB in a first-gen truck!

 

[wxman]

Originally posted by Evan A. Beck

... They have been outfitted with the running gear and the 2,000 HP 16-645E 16-cylinder turbocharged engine, identical to the GP38-2.

Are you sure it's turbocharged? The 16-645E engine used in the GP38-2 was non-turbocharged, I think. The 16-645E3 was the turbocharged version and had 3000 hp. It's the engine that was used in the SD40-2.



I love the sound of the non-turbocharged EMD two-cycle engines!