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Steve Lee of the UP steam program said on a videotape that Big Boy was capable of starting a 5 1/2 mile long freight train. He didn't say it ever had started one. In other words, its starting tractive effort of 135,375 pounds was enough to start a 5 1/2 mile train. As far as pulling it 65 MPH - - - well, my friend, go figure out how many cars would be in a 5 1/2 mile train, and figure the tonnage of such a train. Then get your horsepower formulas out and see how much drawbar pull it would take to haul such tonnage 65 MPH on level track. I don't have the material in front of me right now - I've got it in my library - but I'm betting that it would take probably 4 Big Boys quadruple-headed to get 5 1/2 miles of train up to 65 MPH and hold it there. And Daniel, what makes you think that the Allegheny wouldn't run as fast as Big Boy without damaging itself or the track? There was only one inch difference in the driving wheel diameter, and in spite of what you might hear the four-wheel lead truck wasn't of any extra benefit until speeds of, oh, say, 80 MPH were reached, which were beyond the requirements of either locomotive. And traintownofcowee, what makes you think that our American butts would have been whooped without the "bigboy" (sic)? Do you have any factual evidence upon which to base such a statement? If the Santa Fe hadn't had EMD FTs, we'd have been in more trouble than we would have with UP without Big Boys, but we'd still have won in the end. Old Timer
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