I grew up along the oceanside tracs in Del Mar, CA in the 70s. Loud EMDs, the 4449 on the Freedom Train, A crashed Santa Fe steamer at the bottom of the bluff... My uncle worked in Barstow for the SF. Motorhome trips through the desert along the Sunset route... I took these thigs for granted though... I never saw the SD&AE, even though it was at myback door. Can only find a few pictures of the blue & white gp9s. I ride dirt bikes with my son out there a lot,and have found old cab units and alco swichers returning to the earth. We ride a lot out by the USG 3 foot gauge operation and feel lucky to see the DL535e Bombadier (ALCO) locos pulling 75 year old hoppers in the open desert. Even the retired INPR geep 40s sitting forlorn and full of bees and broken glass just south of the plaster city operation hold a great intrest to me. Is there anyone in my area that has an interest in off roading to these relics and/or to the carrizo gorge goat canyon trestle? Modern railroading has taken a back seat for me to the grimy days of regulation and undermaintained dirty gritty equipment that cannot be seen in any sanitized city operation, and I would like to share what we have with like minded people before it is gone forever.... Is there any interest?
Well, welcome to the forum!
It sounds like you are a bit younger than this old geezer, but I remember well the 1970’s.
It sounds like, too, that you’ve ridden ATC’s or whatever in Carrizo Gorge. Now, THAT sounds fun! But I can’t do anything like that as an old geezer with paralysis. Oh, well.
Nostalgia runs high when I see today’s light rail.
The above Foothill Extension line photo is from the Monrovia-Duarte (CA) area, and I think of all the Santa Fe Warbonnet Super Chiefs that once rode through here.
With “IMISS2STROKES,” does that have inference to EMD going from two-stroke prime movers to four stoke, or two-stroke motorcycles, like Yamaha? Or, maybe something else!
OK, back to you …
Best,
K.P.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- K.P.’s absolute “theorem” from early, early childhood that he has seen over and over and over again: Those that CAUSE a problem in the first place will act the most violently if questioned or exposed.
Interesting... when I read the title my mind conjured up images of coal smoke belching from a 4-8-4 Steam Locomotive pulling a general freight up a hill in the '50's!
Ah yes, the remberances of our youth! I can understand the love of Steam, but I have a really hard time paying Dismals even a passing notice... if they are belching smoke they oughta be melted down and rolled into a boiler shell... make that smoke count for something!
Semper Vaporo
Pkgs.
I don't pay dismals a passing notice either; Diesels, on the other hand, are pretty darn interesting. "old cab units and alco swichers" I wonder if those Alcos have been stripped of pistons, shafts, traction motors and other usable equipment. Also suprized that the small rebuilders haven't come sniffing around for the frames & trucks of those locos for GenSets and other rebuild projects. The cab units, I dunno, sounds like they'd be better off being scrapped.
I had to set down my milk and cookie to ask this: What is a dismal? I Googled it and got Dismal River....
She who has no signature! cinscocom-tmw
That's the nice part about running ALCO's - they're "honorary steam locomotives...."
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
Semper Vaporo"Dismal" is a disparaging moniker given to Diseasels to express a Steam Locomotive aficionado's disgust with Rudolph's invention supplanting said Beasts. Now you are going to ask what a Diseasel is. Just swap the two words in the above paragraph and it still means the same thing.
That's quite amusing. I tend to feel the same way about steam locomotives. I have minimal memories of steam locomotives in real everyday service and grew up with diesels, some electrics and MU cars visible from my back yard. I would like to have seen an EJ&E Baldwin centercab (any version) preserved but unfortunately it never happened.
CSSHEGEWISCH Semper Vaporo "Dismal" is a disparaging moniker given to Diseasels to express a Steam Locomotive aficionado's disgust with Rudolph's invention supplanting said Beasts. Now you are going to ask what a Diseasel is. Just swap the two words in the above paragraph and it still means the same thing. That's quite amusing. I tend to feel the same way about steam locomotives. I have minimal memories of steam locomotives in real everyday service and grew up with diesels, some electrics and MU cars visible from my back yard. I would like to have seen an EJ&E Baldwin centercab (any version) preserved but unfortunately it never happened.
Semper Vaporo "Dismal" is a disparaging moniker given to Diseasels to express a Steam Locomotive aficionado's disgust with Rudolph's invention supplanting said Beasts. Now you are going to ask what a Diseasel is. Just swap the two words in the above paragraph and it still means the same thing.
I liked them all: the old CNW E class 4-6-2s pulling scoots; CB&Q excursion steam; F units on CNW and CGW; E units on the IC with the Iowa trains; CA&E expresses to the Loop; and even the old IC electric MUs.
C&NW, CA&E, MILW, CGW and IC fan
Environmentalists are gonna hate me for saying this, but I think this country was a LOT better off when we had smoky stuff all over the place. Steam engines, both locomotive and stationary, steel mills and other assorted factorys, you get the picture.
I remember talking to a lot of old-timers who lived through the cataclysm of the Great Depression and they all said the sight of factory chimneys belching smoke was a gorgeous thing to see after all those years of being idle.
Certainly things are a helluva lot cleaner now, both air and water and landscape, than they were years ago, and if you don't think so you haven't been on this planet as long as I have, but sometimes I do have to wonder.
First, I am a fan of steam, so I may be cherry-picking.
I remember reading somewhere that while many steam engines tended to produce a lot of visible smoke, it was less harmful to the environment than the nitrous oxide produced by diesels.
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"A stranger's just a friend you ain't met yet." --- Dave Gardner
Paul of Covington First, I am a fan of steam, so I may be cherry-picking. I remember reading somewhere that while many steam engines tended to produce a lot of visible smoke, it was less harmful to the environment than the nitrous oxide produced by diesels.
Tell it to the EPA and the coal fired power plants.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
I suppose you could say that steam locomotives are at least honest about their output...
Particulates are a problem - perhaps as much as nitrous oxide and the like. Most updated coal-fired plants filter the largest portion of that out, so all that goes out the stack is "clean," or at least appears so.
BaltACD Paul of Covington First, I am a fan of steam, so I may be cherry-picking. I remember reading somewhere that while many steam engines tended to produce a lot of visible smoke, it was less harmful to the environment than the nitrous oxide produced by diesels. Tell it to the EPA and the coal fired power plants.
I can't help but think it's the latest dragon they have to slay. When they've killed this one, they'll go looking for another one. And then another one. And another one after that. Until EVERYTHING'S illegal!
All for our own good, mind you.
Paul of Covingtonwhile many steam engines tended to produce a lot of visible smoke, it was less harmful to the environment than the nitrous oxide produced by diesels.
Nitrous oxide is not bad for you (at least, not according to Professor Benjamin Silliman, Jr. of Yale!). You mean the regular oxides like nitric oxide or nitrogen dioxide ... the things we mean by NOx.
And the dangerous nanoparticulates produced by diesel combustion have no counterpart either in pulverized-coal combustion or steam locomotive soot - they are an artifact of rapid quench of an atomized hydrocarbon charge many times per second.
There are plenty of harmful chemicals in coal soot and smoke, but those two types are not the ones to worry about.
The reference was to both.... I love the chant of the EMD 2 stroke cycle engine, it is unmistakable. I also, however am among the few who still ride 2 stroke dirt bikes. In both cases the 4 stroke technology has caught up and achieved a similar weight to power ratio, along with lower fuel consumption, and lower emissions, which of course is better for everyone, but the nostalgia of the sounds and the smells of the old world keeps hanging on to me. In doing some research, I also found a recent video of a covered wagon shoving a flatcar the entire desert line from plaster city through carrizo gorge, so they're doing something out there, guess we'll have to wait and see if this pacific imperial railroad can revive the line, albeit most likely not with F units....
Most of the 2.5 micron PM problem in Beijing and other Chinese cities is from coal.
Nitrous oxide (laughing gas) released into air quickly turns to nitric oxide.
Some disconnection here. "Loud, smoky trains" conjured steam in my mind. So did that crashed Santa Fe steamer at the bottom of tha bluff (details, please?). But the O.P. says he grew up in the 1970's, which is about the time I was losing interest in modern railroading, simply because we were losing the loud & smoky element. I'm also kind of amused by the fascination with Alcos. Yes, they were dirty when they were old & in bad repair. Not so much when they were new. IMO, the most striking sound came from a Baldwin, and F-M was second. An engineer friend had an interesting observation regarding operation of old Alcos by shortlines and preservation groups: Question: What's worse than operating an old Alco? Answer: Operating two old Alcos.
Tom
"Loud" is still with us although "smoky" is gone.. replaced by MASSIVE. The show remains awe inspiring.
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