Big Boy Operations Sherman Hill 1949 - First Hand Account

[Jones1945]

I love everything related to railroading during WWII! Thank you for posting the article here, Flying Scotsman!  

[Flintlock76]

Thank you for that "Flying Scotsman," that was quite interesting, and I for one don't mind a little "British English" prose every once in a while, it's refreshing.  

And  aboard!

[Miningman]

Good stuff from TheFlyingScotsman. Thanks for this. 

Welcome to the Classic Forum and hope you stick with us here. 

[TheFlyingScotsman]

That's going to be too difficult. I realise you need to be signed in for thet so here are links I am hoping will allow you to view:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ITrrJsTbOKfBj4Py4aUmTAidXz15amto/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1a6MFjHM8kpPppdpOu_pBP5D8XCClrtp4/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GZxU3BoZ9gB7k3vqLualSuI7giIx9Rwp/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ctW1mlIupCSOwxiY45KjU_EBE3Ycq9SG/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1o5beqybckHNbFJ9ZJwQfEYtrOLikRRHv/view?usp=sharing

 

[TheFlyingScotsman]

This article from a long defunct 1970s UK magazine I thought you guys may well be intrested in. Like many of you here I've been reading and researching otherwise these locomotives for more than 30 years. In the late 80's my girlfriend somehow came across this magazine in a secondhand bookshop and although I haven't read it for goodness knows how long it's always been in the back of my mind and I have never seen this method of restarting these trains described anywhere else. You will probably find his language very British and old fashioned. It is! All the minutia of timing things to the part minute was part of the enthusiast scene in the UK all those years ago and didn't seem as pedantic at the time as it does now but it accurately records how the locomotive was operated and is quite an eye-opener.

The guy that has penned the artice and taken some of the pics - Lord Garnnock - was very well connected socially and within the railway community. He owned his own locomotive which still runs in the UK to this day called The Great Marquess. What he was doing rolling around that part of the world in 1948 I have no idea, although I am assuming he must have known someone on the UP to get the ride.

Somewhere in the mists of time I read a less truncated version of this which described what happened to the train which had its pilot engine cut off to push the newly watered train from Otto. It was then handled by a single Big Boy and the cutting off of the front engine was timed so that the train would just make it and no more to the tower where its lead engine would rejoin after however long it shoved the train. 

Anyway I have included the full article but the operation is in the last one. 

Hope you get something out of it.

Oh I have had to add this link as I can't seem to work out how to attach the pdfs. Hope it works

https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/looking-for-the-title-of-an-old-magazine-series.182507/#post-4007725