Military Locomotives WWII to present

[Jones]

Cundupa, Flyingvan911 is right. We'd see the NS power in Roseville occasionally and the long hoods were the leading end. They were SD-45s if I remember but unlike our SP power, both the long and short ends were high hood-- maybe for a steam generator?.
If I remember correctly; some were even dual control... engineer's control stand on both sides of the cab.

Roseville was a great yard to work and we had motive power from all over through the shops. Alcos (I date back to the era of the PAs). When I made my date, our yard switchers were the old turbo-charged 6-cylinder Baldwins. Took the turbos about 20 car lengths on a hard pull to wind up but when they did You knew you were sitting on some power.
Had a fleet of EMD SWs in "cow and calf" configurations for hump engines.
The commuter fleet off the peninsula ran Fairbanks-Morse Trainmasters, running big inlines with 2 pistons and two crankshafts per cylinder. The pistons met in the middle of the cylinder bore and each was the other's cylinder head.
We tried the Krauss-Maffei (sp?) diesel-hydraulics (both first and second generation) and burnt the transmissions out of all of them since they didn't like slow, heavy trains and that's what the SP was fond of running. Our last one had the nose compartment modified into a camera platform and was pushed around, filming track footage to be used in the locomotive simulator.
Had all three Alco diesel-hydraulics which spent most of their time on the ground... too heavy and rigid for our light (60 and 75 pound rail in some places), poorly maintained yard tracks.
Some (I think they were Alcos) had air start systems that fired a charge of compressed air into the first cylinders on each bank. Always took you by surprise 'cause they sounded like a howitzer with a silencer.
Then there were the first-generation radio-control locomotives...
There did we use them? --as helper power on the mountain.
What's wrong with R/C helpers? --these were pretty much line-of-sight comm. links.
What does the mountain have? --lots of curves, dips and rises, and, oh yeah... tunnels and snow sheds.
As a result; our let's-cut-off-crews-and-save-a-bunch-of-money remote operation, radio-control locomotives all had their very own engineer who's job it was to hit the override button whenever the helper locomotves didn't pick up a command and kept shoving when the head-end was trying to stop, or kept braking when the head-end was trying to get the train started up the next incline.

We tried both slugs and "B-units".
Our long trains (we tried 2+ miles long but couldn't get the brakes to release-- too much leakage) brought on the need for enough air to keep the brakes working so the company tried "repeater cars". These were modified boxcars that had 3-71 Detroits turning big three cylinder Worthington air compressors to keep the trainline charged.

I think the CMO in The City (#1 Market Street, San Francisco) figured we were a test bed for locomotives 'cause we sure had some odd ones.
With the mountain (Donner Summit to the east), a long straight run to LA via Fresno and Bakersfield to the south, The bay area to the west and a combination of flat and mountain territory to the north; we had all kinds of railroad to throw at them.

 

[Bighurt]

Norfolk & Western and Southern Railway ran long hood forward. Norfolk Southern still runs some locomotives that way. The "F" for "front" is on the long hood end by the step well. Mostly 4 axle locos used for yard and branch line switching. Not much is going to move that 60,000 pound prime mover off the frame. You're pretty safe behind it.

I heard NS wanted their C44's set up with controls facing backward. GE said no. I got that second hand so it may or may not be accurate. I got to ride in the second locomotive from Roanoke, VA to Birmingham, AL as part of my job. Lots of fun.

I've heard that before as well, that next gen manuactures won't setup the ca to run long hood forward.

NS does it as a safety issue. However with current regulations it's pretty hard to justify the blocked crossvision of a long hood in the way. Especially with the massive radiator of the SD-70AcE, and -9.

Just give it a bigger anti-climber...she'll be all good.

 

[MyothersanM1]

MMMMM ALCOOOOO AHHHHHH

Can you say..."TURBO LAG"

I have had the opportunity to run both an ALCo RS-2 and an RS-3 up at Nevada Northern Ry. Museum in Ely, NV. What a hoot. On my second trip out the engineer remembered me. He let me screw around a bit with the engine (RS-3). At one point I came to a full stop on a moderate grade, throttled to 1 Run , released the independent brake then throttled up to about 6 or 7 Run. Well, needless to say, that ole turbo had a little catchin' up to do. When it finally spooled up, it belched out a black plume of smoke that would of given any tree-hugger a coronary. My brother who was video-ing all this accidentally erased the darn tape. Oh, well, it was fun while it lasted.

 

[MyothersanM1]

OERM1956, the green and orange road switcher, is a 1941 ALCo RS(D)-1 former USA(rmy)8009

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkYYcgEj3zA&
feature=player_embedded[/media]


Orange Empire Railway Museum

 

[oldMan99]

During the early part of the 1900s, the military/government used just about one of everytype built.
---- Snip for length-----

Does this count as a current listed MV for sale link?
Steam Locomotive #612

I read the ad and it does not say how much it weighs. Soni is going to need to know when he goes to pick it up..... And it is ONLY $80,000 (Translated into SS value, that is about 26 Deuces...)

On another topic... That video about how to wreck a train is really impressive! I would have thought it would have wrecked much easier, looks like they did too...!

Thanks for posting that!

 

[Bighurt]

Does this count as a current listed MV for sale link?
Steam Locomotive #612

Great...that's just what my wife needs to catch me looking at...railroad equipment for sale...

I can feel her hand across the back of m head already...

 

[Motorcar]

On the first page, the dual gauge locomotives were designated MRS-1 and built by ALCO and EMD, (MRS-1 = Military Road Switcher 1) designed as Standard gauge at 56 1/2" and 5 foot gauge for soviet railways. There is cold war thinking for you. PSRMA in Campo (just outside San Diego, Ca.) has operational models by both manufacturers as well as several smaller former military locomotives. I ran my first 45 ton centercab US Army loco at age 11 owned by them.