unusual cars or locomotives

[Anonymous]

what is the most unusual or specialized car or locomotive you have seen or have pics of ,looking for odd , strange and ???? . real converation starter for my layout thx

[DSchmitt]

Not exactly a car or loco: A hi-rail weed sprayer. It consisted of a conventional tractor pulling a trailer that had a cabover type cab built into it. I say it going through Marysville CA on the SP. By considince I had seen it parked (without the hi-rail wheels) in its owners storage yard (Washburn Agricultural Service, Davis CA) about 3 months previously.

I also saw an SP owned (not contractor) rail grinding train several times It looked "home built" and was nothing like the contractor owned equipment I have seem.

[dano99a]

http://www.crtraincrew.com/gallery/wes.html

3 photos of a ballast cleaning train in Marion Ohio

[ndbprr]

Anything not painted PRR. :-)!

[Jetrock]

On the way home from Chicago I saw a really weird hi-rail vehicle: a yellow & black school bus with hi-rail wheels and some sort of catwalk mounted on the roof! Not sure if it was still used as a school bus...maybe they're reintroducing the "school train!"

[ndbprr]

probably the weirdest are the wire trains used to work on catenary. They vary from old passenger cars through modern flats but they have a platform that is raised hydraulically so the workers are at the proepr level and most have a pantograph contacting the wire to insure it is grounded. Every one I have ever seen (PRR, South Shore, Metra) looked like a Rube Goldberg invention.

[michealfarley]

I have four USAX/DODX tank cars used to carry Aviation Fuel. I am simulating movements from Amoco Oil in Mandan, ND to Minot AIr Force Base in Minot, ND. When a federal government car shows up on your layout, you pay a little more attention to it's handling.

[Anonymous]

Track inspection car that gauges the height and distance to obsticles such as overhangs and sides of tunnels and bridges. After arriving at the obsticle the train would stop and inspectors would have to push out inspection rods and take readings inscribed on the rods as to how high or far the sides of the tunnel were from about 40 or so points on the car. Todays inspection cars are all electronic and measurements sre done with radar, without stopping.

see:
http://pages.prodigy.net/bote/rail/images/mow_tunnel.jpg
and
http://www.jreast.co.jp/development/english/activities/cost_effective/tunnel_lining.html

[lonewoof]

I just dug out some photos I took, late '60s: Evidently Southern Ry. was just getting into the wood chip business, and needed hoppers. They took some old 40' boxcars, cut out the top & extended the sides about 18", put drop doors in the floor operated by chains and ratchets mounted on the car sides. They have a slope sheet welded inside, and a 2' x 3' hole cut in one end to access the brake gear that had to be relocated inside. I don't know how many they made (I have pix of 2 or 3), or how long they lasted.

[Anonymous]

I have photos of an Allis Chalmers car, ACMX 400, that resembles a hump-backed flat car. with the center cut out. Lionel made a model of this car. I'm told by sources here and other places that they (4 cars (400-403?)) were used for hauling pre-fab condensers for nuclear plants.

An example of the car is still sitting at 68th & Washington in West Allis, WI, right outside Avalon Rail. It still has journal bearings, so I believe it's not used any longer. According to the builder's plate, they were built in 1957 by Thrall.

[SP4449]

Several years ago, while driving through Sidney, Nebraska, I spotted a strange car on a siding, in a train. It consisted of 5 or 6 sections of hopper, each about the length of an ore jenny with the ends cut out. The adjoining sections were supported on a single truck (articulated) and then a normal truck and coupler was at each end of the string. It was black with a large BN on each side and the reporting marks along with several logos from sponsoring companies. Also on each side was the wording "TroughTrain". Between each section was a piece of steel that closed the gap and prevented the load from falling out as the car went around curves. I took several pictures of this oddity while in Sidney and then later when I spotted it at the BN car shops in Lincoln, NE.

[?] I haven't seen it since and I wonder if any on the forum can say where the car(s) are now, are they still in use? [?]

[Anonymous]

Santa Fe 3751 in Barstow. It is the biggest locomotive I ever saw![:O]