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Speno Rail Grinder

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  • Member since
    September 2017
  • 1 posts
Speno Rail Grinder
Posted by simulatortrain on Tuesday, October 3, 2017 6:58 AM

I'm looking for pictures of the older, roughly 50' Speno grinders used in the 60s and 70s, in particular those numbered in the 200 series.  I have what I need for the power and crew cars, but am looking for the grinders themselves.  Do you possibly have any slides you could share?

  • Member since
    September 2013
  • 6,199 posts
Posted by Miningman on Tuesday, October 3, 2017 6:32 PM

This from '83 but nice shot of the grinders in action... last pic, scroll down.

Created new gallery for Speno rail grinding trains.

  • Member since
    April 2001
  • From: Roanoke, VA
  • 2,015 posts
Posted by BigJim on Wednesday, October 4, 2017 7:47 AM

My first paid trip on the RR was on a work train handling the Speno rail grinders. Back then they didn't have their own "head end" power. We pulled them along. There were two sets of grinders in our train. Each set had its own dining car. At lunch time the engineer and I were informed that we had to eat on one car and the conductor and rear brakeman ate on the other. A MoW crew had to follow along to help put out fires that the grinders may have started. Other than it being dirty as all get out, that's about all I remember of it. I didn't have a camera at the time to take any pictures of the equipment, but, rail grinders weren't exactly at the top of my list of photo subjects.

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  • Member since
    September 2013
  • 6,199 posts
Posted by Miningman on Thursday, November 30, 2017 10:49 PM

Some older Speno pictures.

Speno ballast cleaner. Similar one below. 

 

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