ALTOONA, Pa. – Preservationist Bennett Levin announced Thursday a new push to restore famed Pennsylvania Railroad K4s steam locomotive No. 1361 to operation after an on-again-off-again state of rebuild and disassembly for more than 20 years. ...
http://trn.trains.com/news/news-wire/2018/05/10-new-effort-will-focus-on-restoration-of-famed-pennsylvania-railroad-k4s-no-1361
Brian Schmidt, Editor, Classic Trains magazine
Here ya go SealBook! Enjoy!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTVjbeRBWWk
I wished them well.
So we have the PRR T1, a pair of RDG T1s, the LIRR G5, the B&M 3717, C&O 1309, and now the 1361 all with hopes of being restored. And the 611 just sitting there pretty much with nowhere to go.
Ok...?
The opinions expressed here represent my own and not those of my employer, any other railroad, company, or person.
And ATSF 2926.
Reading 2102 will be able to run on its railroad - Reading & Northern.
Reading 2100 should be able to run on the Cuuahoga Valley Scenic Railroad.
If 1309 ever makes it, it should be able to run on the Western Maryland ScenIs Railroad.
B&M 3717 should get to run at Steamtown.
LIRR 39 should get to run eventually On the Strasburg Railroad.
NKP 765 seems to have found a niche to run in the Chicago area on Metra trackage.
Pere Marquette has a niche running In lower Michigan on the (Ann Arbor?)
Duluth & Northeastern 28 has thenLake Superior Museum trackage to run on.
ATSF 3415 (another high-steppin' Big-Barreled Baldwin 4-6-2 - would be great to see that one romping on the mainline somewhere) has the Abilene & Smoky Valley to run on.
Southern 4501 and 630 have the Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum trackage to run on.
Great Smoky 1701 has the Great Smoky Mountain Railroad to run on.
As to 261, 4449, 3751, 2926, 611 and the T1, one has to hope they can find some room to run now that Amtrak has shut the door on Amtrak-sponsored excursions.
I am sure I have also missed a few so feel free to append!
Levin said that a survey of the boiler shows that it should be replaced so that it can be reliable once more. He said that boiler manufacturers such as Foster-Wheeler and the shop in Germany that produced a new boiler for a 4-6-2 in England in 2008 will be under consideration.
It will be very important to produce accurate drawings of the boiler if the boiler is to be built in Germany, In Australia an order was placed for a new boiler for a C38 Pacific, which is a bit like a scaled down K4 complete with Belpaire firebox. However, the drawings (in feet and inches) which dated to 1943 were not completely legible. A new design was drawn up in Germany and supposedly checked but when the boiler arrived, it wouldn't fit to the cast steel frame. The actual discrepancy hasn't been disclosed, but the firebox is thought to be too deep.
So it would be a very smart move to produce accurate CAD drawings from the originals before any new boiler is built.
Peter
Well I know this is off-topic but I just spent the evening reading through the 14 page 3801 thread on the Aussie "Railpage" forum, and it is a fascinating story.
Thank you again Peter for all your well-informed posts, on this forum and others.
For those interested in the 3801 story:
http://203.28.90.35/f-t11362992-0-asc-s0.htm
Greetings from Alberta
-an Articulate Malcontent
As for the "nowhere to run" problem....
"(Levin) ... also said he will work for a legislative remedy to alleviate liability insurance problems plague excursion trains. That would mean that excursion operators would no longer need Amtrak’s liability insurance to operate on freight railroad tracks."
This might be harder to do than funding a boiler... but could have a bigger impact.
-Don (Random stuff, mostly about trains - what else? http://blerfblog.blogspot.com/)
Indeed, the liability issue is a tricky one to address. Short-term policies for single events are going to be expensive and I can understand why Amtrak wants to limit its liability exposure.
You're welcome Sealbook! And let me tell you, if Bennett Levin's involved in this it will get done! The man's got his own engineering firm and knows his way around locomotives.
Apparently someone forgot that 611 does have NS to run on, ocassionally at least. As for liability, that should just be locked down to a set amount...somewhere around 250k is good enough...that would drop premiums down to affordability. Oh, and that 250k, that's the max amount payable...no more of this pain and suffering bullshit, maybe medical bills and 250k, but not a penny more in my book, make the medical insurers cover for people that need lifetime care, they can easily afford it out of their pockets without raising premiums on everyone else.
GERALD L MCFARLANE JRApparently someone forgot that 611 does have NS to run on, ocassionally at least.
Someone didn't forget. But a few token trips is all that we can hope for anymore (unless those few lines it runs on are going to be PTC, then it won't even run there).
Mighty 611 running as it did in the 80's and 90's just isn't going to happen anymore. I can live with the few token trips per year, it's certainly better than nothing.
Hey, I'd be happy if it only runs once a year on the NS "racetrack" between Petersburg and Norfolk.
Firelock76 Mighty 611 running as it did in the 80's and 90's just isn't going to happen anymore. I can live with the few token trips per year, it's certainly better than nothing. Hey, I'd be happy if it only runs once a year on the NS "racetrack" between Petersburg and Norfolk.
As we get deeper and deeper into the year, it's looking like all the 611 will be doing is running around the museum at Spencer and maybe a non revenue trip back "home" to Roanoke.
I hope they can figure out something better than this.....
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