Jon Gwinnett Posted November 10, 2011 Share Posted November 10, 2011 Having been stuck at home all week with what turns out to be pneumonia, this is the first day I've been well enough to sit in front of the computer. Â I thought I should share these two images from Wisconsin - for very different reasons. Â First, a bandit - I know how many Soo fans there are out there! Â http://railpictures....d=378785&nseq=5 Â And then second, a pretty unremarkable shot, expect to comment how much like the UK the scenery looks: Â http://railpictures....d=379747&nseq=4 Â Take away the yellow road markings and that could be over here! (I wish) Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold Oldddudders Posted November 10, 2011 RMweb Gold Share Posted November 10, 2011 Condolences on the pneumonia. I had it at age 52 after flu, found the drugs cleared it v effectively, have never been troubled since - hope your recovery is as complete. Â The Soo line loco shows an unusual numbering - most roads would have numbered their shiny new 3000 hp loco in the 3000 series, while 2000 would be home for a GP38 (or -2). No doubt they had their reasons! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Talltim Posted November 10, 2011 Share Posted November 10, 2011 Having been stuck at home all week with what turns out to be pneumonia, this is the first day I've been well enough to sit in front of the computer. Â I thought I should share these two images from Wisconsin - for very different reasons. Â First, a bandit - I know how many Soo fans there are out there! Â http://railpictures....d=378785&nseq=5 Â And then second, a pretty unremarkable shot, expect to comment how much like the UK the scenery looks: Â http://railpictures....d=379747&nseq=4 Â Take away the yellow road markings and that could be over here! (I wish) I do love a bandit. You forget tho, if that was in the UK now there would be an eight foot spiked metal fence Get well soon Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glorious NSE Posted November 10, 2011 Share Posted November 10, 2011 Get well soon Jon! Â And then second, a pretty unremarkable shot, expect to comment how much like the UK the scenery looks: Take away the yellow road markings and that could be over here! (I wish) Â <cynic> Nah, needs more palisade fencing </cynic> Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
trisonic Posted November 10, 2011 Share Posted November 10, 2011 Get better soon, bro'! What they said - if in the UK towering fortifications required - we know you need them over there........... Â All the best, Pete. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
modelmaker87 Posted November 10, 2011 Share Posted November 10, 2011 Jon, Â Hate it that you have pneumonia, hope it clears up fast and you're back to notch 8 soon. Â Cheers, Tony Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon Gwinnett Posted November 10, 2011 Author Share Posted November 10, 2011 Thanks guys. I'm on the mend so no worries there. Â I did think about the fencing, but I thought it was too cynical of me to point it out. You all did it for me anyway! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrian Wintle Posted November 10, 2011 Share Posted November 10, 2011 The other thing about the second photo is how much of North America could have that scenery. Certainly it could be anywhere from Minnesota east and from the Carolinas/Tennessee north. It would be much more common north of the Mason-Dixon line (south border of Pennsylvania), though. Â Adrian Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
dave1905 Posted November 10, 2011 Share Posted November 10, 2011 The Soo line loco shows an unusual numbering - most roads would have numbered their shiny new 3000 hp loco in the 3000 series, while 2000 would be home for a GP38 (or -2). No doubt they had their reasons! That was how they would have done it 25 or 30 years ago before all the mergers when rosters were small. Now with much more varied and larger rosters the number has little or no direct relevance to the horsepower. SD70M's on the UP are in the 2000 series and C44AC's are in the 6000 series. Â I guess I've been on this list too long, when the comment about looking like the UK came up the first thing I thought about was fencing (followed by couplers and buffers and tie plates and car size, .....) Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
F-UnitMad Posted November 11, 2011 Share Posted November 11, 2011 The Soo line loco shows an unusual numbering - most roads would have numbered their shiny new 3000 hp loco in the 3000 series, while 2000 would be home for a GP38 (or -2). No doubt they had their reasons! Since when did the Soo Line ever do anything according to convention, anyway..?!?! Â I'm not entirely sure if "shiny new 3000hp loco" is a touch of sarcasm but the 'Bandit' #2064 was numbered thus by it's original owners the Milwaukee Road, who from what I've read underwent wholesale fleet re-numbering on several occasions; again logic might not've come into it.... incidentally the Soo White'n'Red loco behind 2064 IS a GP38-2, with that 44xx number - again bearing no relation to horsepower!! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Talltim Posted November 12, 2011 Share Posted November 12, 2011 Did/do any of the US roads useclass numbering? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glorious NSE Posted November 12, 2011 Share Posted November 12, 2011 Some group the numbers by power (SD40s in the 3000s aren't rare for example!) - but as said the really big roads these days don't really have a chance with that as there are too many loco's to fit into only 9999 available numbers! Â Some of the smaller roads had very arcane numbering, I think I read somewhere that the Minneapolis & St Louis numbered their diesel loco's according to the month and year they were put into service! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold Oldddudders Posted November 12, 2011 RMweb Gold Share Posted November 12, 2011 What about Rio Grande F units? Their first was FT #540, a 4-unit diesel of - you guessed it - 5,400 hp. It was some years before splitting the units into individual locos became an accepted practice, when 540 became 5401/2/3/4. DRGW bought quite a lot of F units - and they all ended in 1 or 4 if they were an A unit, and 2 or 3 if they were a B unit, all the way to F9 5774. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
CraigZ Posted November 13, 2011 Share Posted November 13, 2011 Scenery - in winter that could be as far south as central Georgia. We still have leaves on the trees here in central North Carolina but I was in Madison, WI last week and it snowed. Yuck. Â Numbering - nearly all major roads kept diesels by class grouped together somehow. The logic was occasionally tenuous, but it was there. The mega roads like UP and BNSF seem to exert a lot of effort renumbering engines each month to make room on the rosters to keep like models together as they add new power. Â One curiosity was the Richmond, Fredericksburg & Potomac - even numbered engines faced north; odd numbers faced south. The New York, Susquehanna & Western used even numbers only. It was the Detroit & Mackinac that numbered by month of delivery but the M&StL was famous for its RS-1 fleet wearing *NINE* different liveries...as delivered. Bought new. Yeah, weird. Gets cold up there and brains freeze I guess. The Milwaukee Road renumbered stuff every time the seasons changed, it appeared. The Pennsylvania's diesels didn't get renumbered much, but the railroad struggled for years to come up with what they felt was a reasonable classification system. And the PRR's steam? Massively scattershot. There were clusters of engines to be sure (475 2-10-0s in one contiguous batch), but the hundreds of K4s class Pacifics were higgledy-piggledy across the roster. Â Non-enthusiast railroad crews rarely know that they're on a SD40-2. They know they're on a ""8000" which on CSX's is an SD40-2. That fleet (new and rebuilds) were in the 8000s, up into the 8400s. CSX SD50s came in the 8500s. Ex Southern Rwy engineers curse the 3900s (U23Bs) as slow loading poor pulling glumphing junk, but praise the 5000s (GP38-2s) as the opposite. But they don't know they were GP38-2s...or didn't at the time. They know now because we keep asking them questions! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
F-UnitMad Posted November 14, 2011 Share Posted November 14, 2011 One curiosity was the Richmond, Fredericksburg & Potomac - even numbered engines faced north; odd numbers faced south. I'd read that before, but forgotten it! The Milwaukee Road renumbered stuff every time the seasons changed, it appeared..... So what I said in Post#10 above was actually an understatement!! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon Gwinnett Posted November 17, 2011 Author Share Posted November 17, 2011 I don't know how many of you subscribe to Ray Peacock's superb "Heartland Rails" site but for those that don't here's today's superb set of pictures: Â http://www.heartlandrails.com/photos/pbu.asp?Update=11/17/2011 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
F-UnitMad Posted November 17, 2011 Share Posted November 17, 2011 I don't subscribe as such, but thanks for the reminder - it's a superb resource as you say!! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon Gwinnett Posted November 17, 2011 Author Share Posted November 17, 2011 Still unable to work due to the pneumonia.  I've put together an inglenook so i can shunt some cars to keep me amused - its a 3:2:2 format and could even get sceniced eventually.  In the meantime, I posted some links to this on the RS Tower yahoo group, but thought it might merit a wider audience. A very compact grain elevator - sizing in Google maps suggests just 7 feet from switch to switch, and a little selective compression could bring that down. Anyway, without further ado, I give you Williams Grain, Waukesha, Wi:  http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=381069&nseq=3  http://g.co/maps/vh879   http://www.fuzzyworld3.com/fuzzyphpfoto/tc06/za.htm  Nice switcher!  Also, if anyone has an Atlas wide cab GP40-2 here's one doing the business this week:  http://railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=381137&nseq=0 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon Gwinnett Posted November 18, 2011 Author Share Posted November 18, 2011 Here's another one for the SOO fans! Â http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=381403&nseq=41 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glorious NSE Posted November 18, 2011 Share Posted November 18, 2011 I think that really does qualify for the term 'lashup' Â Get well soon Jon! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon Gwinnett Posted November 21, 2011 Author Share Posted November 21, 2011 Cheers, seems to be taking a long time. Â IHB anyone? Â http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=381714&nseq=28 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glorious NSE Posted November 21, 2011 Share Posted November 21, 2011 There's always time for some IHB in my book - Nice clag - not sure you could fit an SW1500 with a suitable smoke unit. Â Here's one from Hammond IN back in 2000. Hammond is a big automotive 'mixing centre' - basically a yard full of autoracks where big blocks or unit trains with one type arrive from the factory and big blocks of more than one type are created to go to a destination. IHB2272 is a 1965 built SW1200 obtained secondhand (ex SP2272 leased from NRE in 1996, then later purchased) - it was retired in June this year and scrapped. The rear unit is an unidentified one of their large fleet of NW2s which dated from between 1947 and 1949 - already over 50 years old in this image and a real diesel dinosaur on a major railroad by that time, the last of those has just left the roster this year after more than 60 years service! Â Some nice detail on the switches and switch position indicator lights (??) - plus note how none of the utility poles is actually vertical! Â Â Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
trisonic Posted November 22, 2011 Share Posted November 22, 2011 Nice photo, Martyn. Most power poles near me are bent in the middle like a er, yes, like a One String Fiddle (a guy use to play one of those, complete with trumpet horn acoustic amplifier, outside Baker Street Station in the '70's). Â Best, Pete. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon Gwinnett Posted November 25, 2011 Author Share Posted November 25, 2011 Some more midwest stuff I like: Â http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=382111&nseq=4 Â http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=%20380521&nseq=0 Â http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=382109&nseq=6 Â http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=382105&nseq=10 Â http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=382085&nseq=30 Â http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=382077&nseq=38 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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