IC would have been a natural for a duplex, perhaps, and was one of the railroads that would actually have run them regularly in the speed range required. But they went to diesels instead -- I don't think Baldwin even approached them seriously.
I have heard rumors of CP using a duplex drive, but can't substantiate them in any way. I'm not sure CP needed anything very large and very fast at the same time (there was no counterpart to the MILW F7 Hudson that would represent an incremental increase on the high-speed Jubilees for Montreal-Toronto, and it seems unlikely to me that single-train weight would increase so much as to require a 'double Jubilee' to make the time...
I'll spot you one: New Haven (instead of what became the I-5) in January 1936 -- nominally rejected because of the long rigid wheelbase.
What about CP or IC?
Ah, but ATSF DID consider a duplex, and a cab-forward oil-fired one at that! (Diesels were better for them...)
I'd have to say no to the CNW, as their E-4s never even made it to their planned assignments before being replaced by diesels.
Rock Island?
So, so far, we have only B&O and ACL other than Pennsy. AT&SF relied on Ripley, and probably would not consider a duplex, happy with dieselizaton and its 4-8-4's and Hudsons. Possibly C&NW or Milwaukee? I don't know of any IC 4-8-4's, and they kept steam on freigiht long after dieselizing main-line passenger, so they would be very logical for a proposal from Baldwin about the same time as the T-1. CP may have thought of complimenting their 4-4-4's for light fast trains with a 4-4-4-4 for heavier fast trains, with the Selkirks in the mountains, and the 4-4-4-4's for the plains. IC and CP seem logical.
wanswheel Did Pennsy coax L&N and ACL to consider a duplex-drive Chicago-Miami train?
Did Pennsy coax L&N and ACL to consider a duplex-drive Chicago-Miami train?
Interesting thought; I'd been considering the NY-to-Florida trains to be the ones deserving duplex-drives in the South. L&N did not even get 4-8-4s before dieselizing (hence the M-1 'Big Emmas').
But Baldwin (not PRR at that stage, to my knowledge) was courting ACL, probably in part to make up for the R1 debacle, and for one brief shining moment in 1946 it was under consideration. I don't particularly like the streamlining treatment (to me it looks like a Hooters girl crammed into a one-size-too-small version of Kuhler's Tennessean scheme) but there is little question that it would go, and go hard, right where ACL ran fast....
The Southern Railway 'duplexes' don't count for our purposes; they were tender booster freight locomotives. (There is a picture of a duplex in an Otto Kuhler scheme very close to that used for Southern... but a closer perusal reveals a different roadname!)
N&W had no particular use for duplexes on their passenger service, and they already had 'better' solutions for their freight in the A and Y classes. Note that they did see some ways in which the T1 duplex could have been improved... but they certainly didn't bite, even with cheap 'insider' pricing...
I don't recall having seen an actual C&O duplex proposal. They bought very different locomotives for their Chessie train -- very big Hudsons and positively enormous turbines.
Keep going; I haven't abandoned this question, just opening up the field for others to ask, too...
Overmod, don't abandon your question unanswered. We got C&O, N&W, SR and ?
Looks as if these silly questions have killed the quiz threads.
Anyone with a legitimate and interesting question, post it in either thread.
That one, of course, being B&O. (Note that I'm leaving the French conjugated locomotive out of this discussion as it wasn't a high-speed passenger engine!)
If you have access to the Trains collection, look at the Duplex article in 1959...
One other railroad had a sample builtl and used it. Other than that, I await the full answer, and since I don't have easy access to any diagrams, I'll just wait it out and hopefully learn something.
Name at least five railroads (other than PRR) that actively considered duplex-drive locomotives for high-speed service. (Be prepared to back up with at least a diagram...)
Good job. The building is beautifully restored, although the walls have been replaced (something about hurricane storm surges). However, the floor is original, with the grooves worn into the marble where the doors to the trains (now a parking lot) are.
Overmod, your question.
That's a cinch -- the Gulf, Mobile, and Ohio terminal in Mobile (an astounding building, built 1907, over 30 years before the merger between M&O and GM&N) but after the Southern bought efective control.
I would note this terminal also served a wide range of ships to various Gulf points... which is my understanding of why the word is in the terminal's name.
Overmod, I'm in agreement. I think the GT-1 transmission was derived directly from the RDC transmission.
Next question: This terminal in Alabama, built in the Mission Revival style, is named after a railroad that did not exist when it was constructed. Name the terminal and why.
I did have the suspicion that Grumman being on the Island had something to do with at least one of the gas turbines.
Part of the allure of the turbine (if you remember Kneiling's espousal of the things for integral train sets) was its light weight and small package compared to an equivalent power in either diesel or diesel-electric drive. ISTR that the original car -- the Pioneer one -- had a modified hydraulic torque-converter drive. Acceleration using turbine with such a thing ought to have been spectacular... if inherently fuel-wasting compared to compression-ignition piston engines. There is also the sex factor of the 'jet engine'...
The other half of the equation (and where the Grumman connection might come back in) is that maintenance on the turbines was supposed to be gotten to low levels, with the engine units being changed out in a short time to keep availability high. I'd guess the contemporary LIRR balked at the idea of stocking a few (expensive first cost) engines to make this work; in any case, the other predictable problems of a cash-starved, politically-tied organization running a car with that kind of powertrain then began to twinkle.
I never found out enough about the GTEL pair to comment accurately -- they came and went while I was still an active student in 'other disciplines' and I wasn't watching either the railfan or the trade press -- for which I have kicked myself frequently in ensuing years. I think the idea was to shoehorn self-power into a typical e-MU design... and a diesel of any suitable power was NOT going to go in there without more redesign expense than could possibly be justified. Again, please note the parallel transmission: the gas turbine is essentially a big genset, and during acceleration could be presumed to ramp up to best efficient speed quickly and maintain that speed over the full acceleration range... and subsequently go to BCC for whatever trip between stations might be involved. If I were doing one of these, I would size the engine accordingly... and put in some hybrid technology that would let me operate something like a small Capstone ceramic turbine at essentially constant rpm, or with a nice long NOx-friendly transition between speeds...
Then there is the potential issue of HEP lighting and AC, for which the turbine could be kept spooled up with its alternator field weakened ... that would at least save the wear and tear of idling the turbines at each and every station stop, I do suspect the fuel burn and operating issues connected with frequent station stops was the issue that killed these things.
Be interesting to see how a turboelectric package would stack up with current generations (no pun intended) of AC transmission.
Northwest did get it right, and can ask the next question. The cars were not successful because of high maintenance and fuel costs. Before they were removed from service completely, the ERA had a fan trip with the pair, but stuck to electrified lines using only electric power. Even with that limiation, there was an unscheduled stop and some time spent in correcting some glich.
efftenxrfeNorthwest, I hope the bite Of LIRR GT's didn't produce heartburn....
No, they were a bit crunchy, though...
efftenxrfeI think mgmt. knew GT's had no justification, except at continuous full load operation. How far-out is this guess? LIRR stations are close together...dwell time for em- and debarking gotta be added. Publicity grab..The RR says "we're trying everything to get our customer's the best ride to work."
I also suspect that it had political motivations, but I suspect that it had to do more with the fact that the M1s were being delivered, and those on the nonelectrified branches said "Hey! They get new cars, and I don't!". So, LIRR had to do something to show they were working on upgrading these lines, and the failure of the turbines was an excuse to delay it.
Northwest, I hope the bite Of LIRR GT's didn't produce heartburn.....By investing my 2-cents, I'll show you how lacking in courage I'm.
I read about it: the testing.
And the posted question, why?, I wanted an answer to but never tried hard to get one.
I think mgmt. knew GT's had no justification, except at continuous full load operation. How far-out is this guess? LIRR stations are close together...dwell time for em- and debarking gotta be added.
Publicity grab.The RR says "we're trying everything to get our customer's the best ride to work."
On the left coast, I didn't follow the tests, but I felt frustration when trying to guess why, in the primary instant, they initiated the testing.........
Publicity...maybe....technical stupidity...hoping GT's will work...hope not!
Since no one has written on this yet, I'll bite.
daveklepperWho can relate the unusual LIRR flirtation with gas turbines?
Long Island wanted to operate fast MU trains without needing to extend the electrification.
LIRR first tested one prototype, essentially a gas turbine version of the Pioneer III (actually a Budd demonstrator?) named the GT-1, later rebuilt to the GT-2.
The next cars, known as GTELs, were built in M1 bodies, but were doomed by high fuel usage.
Both the GTELs and the GT-2 had third rail shoes for Penn Station.
Not necessarily a matter of interest, but perhaps access to the necessarily-detailed research sources.
I, for one, find the questions and answers quite intersting and enlightening, even though I have neither the time nor the resources to research an answer.
You, Dave, are simply the master in this area!
This has been hanging on too long, and i suspect the interest to think through the information I have provided already is just not there. As mentioned in several places earlier, when the Eastern Mass quite running streetcars into downtown Boston because the Chelsie Avenue bridge was rebuilt without tracks, two Boston El. later MTA, streetcar lines still ran into the subway at North Station, used the inner tracks at Haymarket which had been shared with the E.ass cars, and looped at the Brattle St. Loop. These two lines were Brattle - Sulivan Square via Main St. and B - SS via Bunker Hill Street. Even thought the tracks remained as a service connectin, the Main St. run, lightly patronized with the el overhad, long headways, and Bunker Hil St. not far away with frequent servie, was cut around 1946 pr 1947. These lnes were always considered local fare lines, not like the Lechmere - subway service and the much longer lines entering from the south and west. The Eastern Mass buses all terminated at Hayhmarket Sq., and their passengers then had to pay an additonal fare to go south to Scolley Square where their streetcars had terminated at the Brattle Loop. The MTA wanted to do the same thiing with the Bunker Hill Street buses, but the protests forced them to run the shuttle to take this bus line's passengers to the Brattle Street Loop without extra fare. When a flat fare of 25 cents with no extra for transfer was instituted, the reason for the shuttle was ended. We all know about gas turbine operation on the UP, the CN and PC Turbotains, the Amrak Tuboliners.
Who can relate the unusual LIRR flirtation with gas turbines?
Enough information has been given for the obvious answer,, so after another day, I'll give the answer and ask a ndw question.
You are on your way to a solution. I'll try to help you by asking two questions: (1) do you mean by discontiniued that it was converted to bus? (2) If it was converted to bus, did the end points for the bus operation remain the same as for the streetcar operation?
There was no passenger carrying regular streetcar line close to the Navy Yard or the Bunker Hill Monument during the time the specific shuttle ran. The elevated was within walking distance (I think the Thompson Sq. station was the closest one). The Main Street tracks under the elevated were, of coursse, equally close, and used for passengers only on the put-in and pull-out trips I described for the shuttle, otherwise, they tied the system together trolleywise and connected the tracks at North Station with the tracks from Sullivan Square to Everett Shops. There had been a Main Street Sullivan Square - Brattle Street trolley line, but it quit about 1947 or 1948 without bus replacement and with the tracks remaining, although they may have run a bus for a while just between Sullivan Square and Thompson Square, wihtout crossing the Charles River to North Station and to Haymarket and Brattle St..
The route you mention goes by, or at least within sight of, both the Bunker Hill monument and the Charlestown Navy Yard, which was still actively in use at the time. There was another routing between the same endpoints that got closer to Bunker Hill that was discontinued in 1949 or so.
I'll have to leave the question of extra nickels to the Kingston Trio.
need more time or not interested?
At the time this service, with one Type 5 car, operated, it was the only passenger service using the inside tracks at Haymarket and on the incline, and the Brattle St. Loop. After it stopped running in 1952, the Brattle Loop was only used for mid-day car storage. I don't think it exists with the track plan of today, but maybe a loop facing in the other direction has replaced it. At one time quite a number of services used the Brattle Loop and the inside tracks, including about five Eastern Mass routes, that were cut and then discontinued, some replaced by buses and others part of sale to the Boston Elevated and rerouted to Maverick to connect with the E. Boston Tunnel, now the Blue Line. Only two Boston El routes continued to use the inner tracks and the Brattle Loop thru WWII. Plus an extended Owl service.
Hint No. 3, on the inbound trips, nearly all passengers boarded at Haymarket and handed the operator a "continuing trip ticket" or transfer and left at the Brattle Loop withing Scolley Sq. Sta. At that point some, very few, paid an extra nickle to ride the East Boston Tunnel, now the Blue Line. But nobody paid an extra nickle at that point to board what is now the Grreen Line since they could have done so at Haymarket, without the continuing trip ticket.
Hint: If you look at Boston Elevated-MTA WWII-era route maps and one for 1949 or 1950, the reason for the route may be apparent.
Hint No. 2: There is a connection with the American War of Independence.
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