Conductor signals

[hf1001]

How do conductors on amtrak trains signal the engineer to stop?

  ,HF1001

[JT22CW]

What kind of stop are you referring to?  Stop at the next station, flag stop, or make an emergency stop out on the road?  They all have different signals.  They use a button to transmit those signals, in the form of buzzer sounds; and I for one will not reveal where that button is.

[RRCharlie]

On the Amtrak trips I have taken, the Conductor is talking via two-way radio with the engineer from the train and tells him when to stop. If the train needs to make two (or more) stops, the conductor stays on the ground and talks the engineer through the rest of the movements.

Mel Hazen

Jacksonville, FL

[robscaboose]

Usally the conductors will give the engineer a car count on when to stop over the radio, followed by "that-Il-do". to stop them.

However many engineers are on the same run & have a spot picked out for a stopping point that gives them a reference point to where they need to stop.

In Chicago where almost all trains have to back into the station, the conductor guides the engineer by radio.   

Rob

Highball

[SFbrkmn]

Two way pakset radios which are assigned to the condr and he is responsible for it. These radios are either Motorola or Kenwood. Motorola is a beter radio but sadly the rrs are going to the cheaper not-as-good Kenwood sets.

[cordon]

If you listen to a scanner while riding AMTRAK or commuter trains, you will hear frequent communications between the conductor and the engineer. 

Motorola used to have the two-way radio world by the tail, but they've slipped in the last ten years.  Be advised that they are letting other manufacturers use their name under license, so not all that carries a Motorola label is really a Motorola, at least in the consumer arena.  I don't know about their professional radios, however.