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Classic Train Questions Part Deux (50 Years or Older)

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Posted by rcdrye on Saturday, January 30, 2021 7:33 PM

Are we talking 1930s?

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Posted by Overmod on Saturday, January 30, 2021 6:22 PM

rcdrye
I think you're looking for the Mark Twain Zephyr 9903, which is undergoing restoration at Wisconsin Great Northern.  9903 had a GE GT-534 main generator and a pair of GE 716 traction motors.

No; you're right about the Westinghouse.  And the class of locomotive is far more famous.  

The railroad name is essential -- as it is to why being in recent news is important.

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Posted by daveklepper on Saturday, January 30, 2021 12:55 PM

Correction made, East of Gettys Square, not west!

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Posted by rcdrye on Friday, January 29, 2021 5:46 PM

Zephyr cab units (except the General Pershing Zephyr) and EA-E2s had GE or Westinghouse electricals, according to customer preference (I haven't found a list of which had which...) Not a big jump from using GE parts for doodlebugs.  The first EMCs with EMC traction motors were Soo(WC) NW1A's 2100-2102 in late 1938 (still with GE generators), after which all EMCs/EMDs used EMC/EMD electrical equipment.

I think you're looking for the Mark Twain Zephyr 9903, which is undergoing restoration at Wisconsin Great Northern.  9903 had a GE GT-534 main generator and a pair of GE 716 traction motors.

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Posted by Overmod on Friday, January 29, 2021 2:06 PM

You have just about everything needed except the answer to the question.  There's a specific famous locomotive type involved... more famous than switchers.  (And in the news recently...)

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Posted by Overmod on Friday, January 29, 2021 2:05 PM

You have just about everything needed except the answer to the question.  There's a specific famous locomotive type involved... more famous than switchers.

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Posted by rcdrye on Friday, January 29, 2021 1:56 PM

Some early EMC NW and NC switchers were equipped with Westingouse electricals, others with GE.  EMC started using its own electrical equipment in 1938. The first NW switchers (with Westinghouse gear) went to the Santa Fe.

Balwin experimental 62000, built for the Santa Fe, was the first VO-engined Baldwin, with Allis-Chalmers electrical equipment. Baldwin took it back from Santa Fe.

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Posted by Overmod on Thursday, January 28, 2021 1:20 PM

In the meantime I have one, which is 95% derived from a rcdrye question:

In the "classic" early diesel era, many locomotives were built by classical running gear/electric partnerships, Alco/GE and Baldwin/Westinghouse.  In the case of the initial examples of a very famous type of locomotive, all of the original locomotives were built by one company not typically involved in a 'partnership' but equipped by an atypical (for them) electrical firm.  Railroad and builder/electrical provider, please.

 

Extra points if you know why the class concerned is recently in the news...

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Posted by daveklepper on Thursday, January 28, 2021 3:56 AM

I'll let you be the winner, but I did not include the Putnam steam trains, too far away, east of Gettys Square and not actually in Yonkers.

Third Avenue Railways System streetcars had two routes connecting to two different subway lines.  Lines 1, 2, 3, 3 not really independent, but a Getttys Square short-turn of both the 1 -Warburton Avenue from Hastings Line, and the 2 Park Avenue from Roberts Avenue, directly south on Souith Broadway, Yonkers, and North Broadway, The Bronx, to the 242nd St. Broadway terminal of the IRT Broadway-7th Avenue line, today the "1.'

Line 4 also left Gettys Square on South Broadway, but turned left after approximately a mile on Mclean Avenue to Jerome Avenue and Woodlawn Road and the terminal of the IRT Lexington Avenue - Jerome Avenue line, today the "4."   During rush hours one could also connect directly to 6th Avenue Elevated trains, and at all times transfer to 9th Avenue Elevated trains at 167th Street from the subway trains..

Gettys Square Branch NYCentral MUs ran only to The Bronx's Sedgewick Avenue, where one boarded 9th Avenue Elevated trains, plus Sixth Avenue during rush hours, and cross the Putnam Bridge to Manhattan.  Or one could transfer to Grand Central Terminal Hudson Division trains at High Bridge station.

Continuing to Manhattan via streetcar was possible on the 1, 2, and 3.  To avoid an extra fare,  one would disembark at 262nd street, City Line, and board a “C,” with a free transfer to a conduit “K” at 225th Street  The “K” would take you as far as 125th Street and 3rd Avenue.  If headed as a pull-out to the 65th Street Car-house, probably let you ride without an extra fare. for a total of $0.15 from Gettys Square.
 
For comparison, total fare from New Rochelle to Manhattan, 129th Street and 3rd Avenue or  anywhere on 125th street, would be $0.20, $0.15 from Pelham or Mt. Vernon.    One would leave the “A” or “B” at East 263rd Street for a “W” Webster Avenue car, with multiple transfer choices to reach Manhattan, including transfers at 149th Street, the Hub, to a Willis Avenue to any point on 125th Street or the Harlem River Shuttle to 129th Street and 3rd Avenue.

 Curious that the same destination sign, “Subway” was used on the 1, 2, and 3, as well as the A. to two different Bronx destinations and different subway lines.

 4s were signed “Woodlawn,” not “Subway”  Streetcar service south of Wodlawn Road n Jerome Avenue ended before WWI.

 

 

 

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Posted by rcdrye on Wednesday, January 27, 2021 3:07 PM

So... You had the main line on the Hudson, the Getty Square branch (electrified), the Putnam Division (steam, change at High Bridge) and Third Avenue Railway streetcars.  Except for TARS, all New York Central System.

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Posted by daveklepper on Wednesday, January 27, 2021 11:41 AM

Probably capacity on the four tracks  Harmon - GCT.     A rush-hour 3-car  MU usur-ping a slot used by a 10-car MU.

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Posted by Overmod on Wednesday, January 27, 2021 11:33 AM

Isn't it just 'Getty Square'?

After all these years, I still haven't figured out why that electrification wasn't used to run all the way into GCT...

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Posted by daveklepper on Tuesday, January 26, 2021 2:02 PM

Ok, Instead of New Rochelle, I am now in Downtown Yonkers in 1928, within walking distance of both the Hudson Riover and Gettys Square.  There are four rail routes to NYCity, three requiring changwe of equipment to get to Mabnhattan.

Name and desribe all four.

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Posted by Overmod on Tuesday, January 26, 2021 1:06 PM

And I still have nothing, and now I get the second dose of vaccine tomorrow, after recovering from which my schedule is going to get truly crazy.  Someone should fill in to keep the thread 'alive' while I'm thinking of something.

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Posted by Overmod on Thursday, January 21, 2021 9:18 AM

I'm still figuring out a good one.

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Posted by daveklepper on Thursday, January 21, 2021 7:49 AM

Still waitling for Overmod's question.

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Posted by daveklepper on Saturday, January 16, 2021 3:55 PM

You got the right answer and I hope you will ask the next question.

From Wall Street, easier to bopard an H&M-PRR train to Newark and board the Broadway there.  In fact, possibly a m ajority of those board ing at Newark on a weekday evening used that connection.  They may have had to put a dime in the Hudson Terminal turnstyle. but their PRR ticket was honored from Journal Sq. to Newark.

Exchange Place in Jersey City was an intersting case.  There was the stub-end PRR station upstairs and the H&M, now PATH, downstairs.  After buying a PRR long-disyance ticket upstairs, one sould ride any othe PRR trains or the H&M-PRR trains to Newark.  The PRR trains did not stop at Journal Square, if I remember corerectly.

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Posted by Overmod on Friday, January 15, 2021 2:07 PM

Has to be Hudson Terminal -- which I don't remember seeing in the flesh.  It was certainly on a scale that would have included the amenities indicated!

Presumably someone obtaining tickets there would be able to proceed up to 33rd St, just a hop, skip, and jump from Penn Station.  Had the H&M been able to realize its plans for GCT, however, it might have been interesting to see if the Central would establish their own satellite agency -- it might then have been even easier to head for the Century than skulk through the Gimbels passageway...

 

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Posted by daveklepper on Friday, January 15, 2021 6:23 AM

You are close, and correct with regard to both Harrison and Journal Square, Harfrison being then a PRR station and Journal Square being joint PRR-H&M. so you should  easily be able to name the one Manhattan station.

A Wall Street executive headed might even have chosen the Broadway over the Century for this convenience.

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Posted by Overmod on Monday, January 11, 2021 12:57 PM

It'll be one of the H&M stations on the Jersey side, but I don't have the time to research it before one of you gets it.

EDIT: Oh wait, did he originally say the word "Manhattan" in the question?  That would make the answer pretty obvious, at least before the late '50s, including the years extensive PRR and affiliate service ran out of Exchange Place, and the H&M ran to Newark and even Manhattan Transfer...

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Posted by daveklepper on Monday, January 11, 2021 12:33 PM

 

 

name a Manhattan rapid transit station, served only by third-rail multiple-unuit-cae trains, where one cpuld make long-distant-train reservations and puchase tickets to any passenger railroad destination that one could at Pennsylvania Station.

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Posted by rcdrye on Monday, January 11, 2021 6:48 AM

The Soo bought 4 RSC-2s and 3 RSC-3s for grain lines west of Bismarck ND.  The WC's RS-3 was purchased to deal with light rail on Milwaukee Road's line to Manitowac to connect with the Ann Arbor car ferries.  Milwaukee also owned RSC-2s.

Two of the Soo RSC-2s were traded to Alco for a pair of RS-27s.  The other two and all four RSC-3s got retrucked with trucks from Baldwin DRS-4-4-1500s or AS-16s, which kept their Westinghouse motors.

In planning the trade with Alco, the two engines to be traded turned out to have been recently overhauled.  Local shop crews did some quick paint work and sent the unrebuilt pair instead.

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Posted by daveklepper on Monday, January 11, 2021 3:20 AM

The-RSD3s for the SOO, with the single unit on the Wisconsin Central.  The Seabord was the only other USA user.

The units in Iran were builtd as RS1s for the Rock and converted to RSD-1s by Alco for Iran use by USA military railroaders.

 

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Posted by Overmod on Sunday, January 10, 2021 11:59 PM

daveklepper
is it the Alco RS-something that three-axle, center idler, trucjs for the normal B - B arrangement?

Were these the Canadian A-1-As that were later converted to "B" trucks by taking out the center axles and using the world's longest drop equalizers?

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Posted by daveklepper on Sunday, January 10, 2021 10:24 PM

I'm still blocking on the name of the  specific RR.  One thing I d remember is that some, but not all, were requisitioned mby the Government and used in Iran during WWII.

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Posted by rcdrye on Saturday, January 9, 2021 1:03 PM

Close enough.  The company bouught 4 RSC-2s and three RSC-3s for the grain lines.  The other unit (RSC-3) was bought for operation over another railroad's line - the other railroad also owned RSCs.

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Posted by daveklepper on Saturday, January 9, 2021 12:12 PM

In that case, is it the Alco RS-something that three-axle, center idker, trucjs for the normal B - B arrangement?

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Posted by rcdrye on Friday, January 8, 2021 8:06 AM

I'll go further - one of the major builder's road switchers. 

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Posted by daveklepper on Friday, January 8, 2021 6:47 AM

Hw about a hint:   One of the major diesel builders?

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Posted by rcdrye on Saturday, January 2, 2021 6:51 PM

In the 1940s and 1950s many railroads had to deal with very light rail - often too light for standard diesel types.  There were several approaches used to deal with the problem, from retaining small steam locomotives just for particular branches to special lightweight models of otherwise standard units. 

This railroad bought seven lightweight models used on a group of light branches.  After this group settled in, the company's subsidiary bought one more, not because of its own light rail, but because it ran over the light rail of another railroad that used similar models. All of the units were either traded in or modified as the branch lines were upgraded.  The remaining units were assigned together, lasting until the early 1970s.

If it helps, the larger group were bought for grain lines, the single unit for general freight intended for a specific interchange.

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