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How do you know if your train might too long? (more added)

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  • Member since
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  • From: Colorado Springs, CO
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Posted by Dave Vollmer on Friday, October 5, 2007 7:29 PM
Your train is too long if there's a five-second time delay between when the rear-end brakeman swings his lantern and the engineer sees the light from it.

Modeling the Rio Grande Southern First District circa 1938-1946 in HOn3.

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Posted by Don Gibson on Friday, October 5, 2007 7:13 PM

 Chip Mouse:

Marvelous!. This thread may have set a record.

(My favorite) - "If the engineer can mistake his own FRED for a stop signal, your train might be too long". - C.E.

(Most discombobulated) - " At this point, we can invoke Hawking's virtual particle annihilation equations using the measured gamma radiation data and equivocably state that your train is probably too long. - M.Z.J.

Say Wha?

MY observation (non humorous): Trains are not too long, it's most LAYOUTS that are too small.

Chip - I think this topic deserves forwarding to MODEL RAILROADER for publication. Much of which dererves reprinting and seeing the light of day.

CHEERS,

 

 

 

Don Gibson .............. ________ _______ I I__()____||__| ||||| I / I ((|__|----------| | |||||||||| I ______ I // o--O O O O-----o o OO-------OO ###########################
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Posted by arkansasrailfan on Friday, October 5, 2007 4:13 PM

Your train is too long when it start to haul itself.Whistling [:-^]

your train is too long when it takes all the ships in Starfleet(Star Trek) to pull your train, and they still can't pull it.

When the slack ran out and they measured it, it was the circumference of the sunAlien [alien]Shock [:O]

-Michael It's baaaacccckkkk!!!!!! www.youtube.com/user/wyomingrailfan
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Posted by R. T. POTEET on Friday, October 5, 2007 2:08 AM

This topic has been floating around for more than a month now!

Your train might be too long if . . . . .

. . . . . your caboose crew goes to beans on the front platform of the leading SD40-2! . . . . .

 . . . . . your locomotive has already spotted itself under the water plug at the next division point before the caboose has cleared yard limits at the last one! . . . . .

From the far, far reaches of the wild, wild west I am: rtpoteet

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Posted by loathar on Friday, October 5, 2007 1:15 AM

If your MUing 25 Big Boys together.Whistling [:-^]

 

 

12-3...GO TRIBE!!!

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Posted by CNW 6000 on Thursday, October 4, 2007 10:50 PM

If your CN train is in Montreal, Chicago, St. Louis, and New Orleans at the same time...your train may be too long.

If your Athearn BB engine sounds like it's in run 8 and not moving...your train may be too long.

If you filled a train with victims of Chuck Norris it'd be forever long!

Dan

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Posted by NeO6874 on Thursday, October 4, 2007 10:29 PM
 GraniteRailroader wrote:

go yankees

 

Evil [}:)]

After their lackluster performance tonight...

 

Anyway, if you finish the benchwork on your FIFTH layout, and you still haven't seen the caboose (or the FRED for you modern guys) from that first layout you built back in 'xx the train might be too long. 

-Dan

Builder of Bowser steam! Railimages Site

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Posted by steemtrayn on Thursday, October 4, 2007 9:55 PM

If Magnus doesn't have enough BigBoys to pull it, your train might be too long.

http://www.trains.com/trccs/forums/1232526/ShowPost.aspx

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Posted by nscaler711 on Tuesday, September 25, 2007 8:43 AM

 

 HAHAHHA aint that the truth !!!

 wm3798 wrote:

If you model in Hugely Oversize scale, you're train is too long no matter what, your industrial buildings too small, and your mountains are but mole hills!!

If you're running Nice scale Life Like FA's in a trio, your train CANT be too long! 

Lee 

Army National Guard E3
MOS 91B

I have multiple scales now
Z, N, HO, O, and G.  

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Posted by GraniteRailroader on Saturday, September 22, 2007 9:22 AM

Amen!

 

 

 

 

 

 

go yankees

This space reserved for SpaceMouse's future presidential candidacy advertisements

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Posted by MisterBeasley on Saturday, September 22, 2007 9:08 AM
If those Red Sox win another World Series before the train passes, your train might be too long!

It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse. 

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Posted by tomikawaTT on Saturday, September 22, 2007 12:26 AM

If, operating on the staff-and-ticket system, the ticket has been delivered to the agent at the destination station and your brake van still hasn't passed the start signal at your station of origin, either your train is too long or the distance between stations is too short.

Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - staff-and-ticket on the Tomikawa Tani Tetsudo)

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Posted by BRJN on Saturday, September 22, 2007 12:04 AM

If your main line is completely occupied, you have a continuous chain of cars from the train table to the carpet, and the locomotive is moving through the aisle, you train may be too long.

If the little plastic guys waiting at the crossing get hungry, order pizza, it is delivered, and the delivery guy eats it himself because it was getting cold while he figures out how to get to the customers on the other side of the tracks, your train is too long.

If somebody waiting at the crossing gets out of his car, crosses over the pedestrian bridge, and walks to work, your train is too long.

If all your customers are complaining that they have no more cars on-site and nobody can promise them new ones anytime soon, your train is too long.

If you are gaining seniority faster than the train is moving away from the depot, your train is too long.

If the fishermen by the pond have enough time to catch a fish, cook it, and tell their friends about the one that got away, and the train is STILL going by, your train may be too long.

If the engineer saw the coin toss for a football game, and the conductor was too late for the last whistle being blown, your train may be too long.

If EVERY other railroad is calling your management to complain about the blocked grade crossings, your train may be too long.

Modeling 1900 (more or less)
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Posted by wm3798 on Friday, September 21, 2007 9:56 PM

If you model in Hugely Oversize scale, you're train is too long no matter what, your industrial buildings too small, and your mountains are but mole hills!!

If you're running Nice scale Life Like FA's in a trio, your train CANT be too long! 

Lee 

Route of the Alpha Jets  www.wmrywesternlines.net

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Posted by Walter Clot on Friday, September 21, 2007 9:53 PM
If the kid on a bicycle waiting for the train to pass is drawing Social Security before the caboose passes, your train is really really too looooooooooong!Dead [xx(]
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Posted by arkansasrailfan on Friday, September 21, 2007 8:18 PM
Your train must be very long, because the neighbors called the police, and reported a gunshot, and find you shot in the leg, and they ask, "who did it?" you point and say, That's who did it, my 80-ft SSW hi cube boxcar, and then they realize you got shot with a kadee no.5.

Your train is too long when you find cars from other countries on the tail, then you realize why all these Customs and media called.

Your train is too long when you realize that the new helix you added is your train running on top of itself.

your train is too long when the lead power is from the earliest known railroads to when the rear power is from the 30th century
-Michael It's baaaacccckkkk!!!!!! www.youtube.com/user/wyomingrailfan
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Posted by tomikawaTT on Saturday, September 15, 2007 4:20 PM

 nscaler711 wrote:
it might be too long if you cant tell the back from the front or the front from the back

I have several trains that meet that specification - DMU and EMU sets.  The longest runs with five (or six when I add the diner) cars...Whistling [:-^]

And none of them are too long for the high platforms at Tomikawa...Approve [^]

Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)

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Posted by PA&ERR on Saturday, September 15, 2007 3:40 PM

If it is as long as the Elliots' Trackside Diner thread... your train might be too long!

George

 

 

"And the sons of Pullman porters and the sons of engineers ride their father's magic carpet made of steel..."

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Posted by IRONHORSE77 on Saturday, September 15, 2007 3:26 PM

If your lead engine is 4 time zones ahead of the mid train helpers.

CHUCK

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Posted by nscaler711 on Saturday, September 15, 2007 2:53 PM
it might be too long if you cant tell the back from the front or the front from the back

Army National Guard E3
MOS 91B

I have multiple scales now
Z, N, HO, O, and G.  

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Posted by CTValleyRR on Tuesday, September 11, 2007 8:56 PM
 Beyer-Garratt 6040 wrote:

When you stall going up a grade and the weight of your train drags you back to the start of the grade, then your train might be too long.

Nope.  BTDT.  You have a piece of ballast stuck in the running gear of your 2-6-2 Prairie on a 2.5% grade.

Connecticut Valley Railroad A Branch of the New York, New Haven, and Hartford

"If you think you can do a thing or think you can't do a thing, you're right." -- Henry Ford

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Posted by MisterBeasley on Monday, September 10, 2007 9:50 AM

If a Kadee #5 snaps, your train might be too long.

If your consist requires more engines than your DCC system can support, your train might be too long.

It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse. 

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Posted by Anonymous on Monday, September 10, 2007 9:34 AM

It might be time for Digitrax to market 100 foot wind turbines and call it "Uberfan Model Power Supply" or solar panels for your roof.

After repeated problems with power; running these long trains.

Another hint that your train is too long is when you contort and bend at wild angles to get inside your helix and start pulling every peice of it out to find the locomotive.

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Posted by twhite on Sunday, September 9, 2007 9:17 PM

If doubleheaded M-4 2-8-8-4 Yellowstones and a mid-train helper of a Rio Grande L-131 2-8-8-2 just whine and spin their drivers, then your train is not only TOO long, but your layout just collapsed!

Tom

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Posted by nscaler711 on Sunday, September 9, 2007 9:13 PM
Your train might be to long if your model SD50 catches fire.

Army National Guard E3
MOS 91B

I have multiple scales now
Z, N, HO, O, and G.  

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Posted by dinwitty on Sunday, September 9, 2007 8:34 PM

If your running your train in the basement but the layout is on the 2nd floor, your train is too long.

 

Your train is too long when you have to rethink your railroad name Mississippi Short Line.

 Your train may be too long when the dispatcher clears the main from Chicago to New York.

      `

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Posted by steemtrayn on Sunday, September 9, 2007 6:34 PM
If an emergency brake application causes the Earth's axis to shift, then your train just might be a leeeetle to long.
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Posted by Semper Vaporo on Sunday, September 9, 2007 5:25 PM

If you have to dual gauge your z-scale model train layout with real standard gauge so the real UP 3985 can pull your train, then your train might be just about long enough.

 

Semper Vaporo

Pkgs.

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Posted by ArtOfRuin on Sunday, September 9, 2007 4:35 PM

-If one of your layout's admirers hands you a business card from the Guiness Book of World Records, your train might be too long.

-If the lead locomotive is the one Richard Trevithick built in 1804 and the current mid-helper is a GE ES44AC, then your train might be too long.

-If you're sending out helper calls to local subway systems, commuter rails, train museums, tourist railroads, and railroad scrapyards, your train may be too long.

-If old locomotives are being restored just to help your train, your train may be too long. 

-If the tension in the couplers is so great that when one breaks the lead locomotives catapult forward like a fighter jet launching from an aircraft carrier, your train may be too long.

-If the US Air Force starts adding HiRailer wheels to their C-5 Galaxy fleet, your train might be too long.
-Jonathan Then it comes to be that the soothing light at the end of your tunnel, Is just a freight train coming your way - "No Leaf Clover," Metallica
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Posted by Anonymous on Sunday, September 9, 2007 3:16 PM
Your train might be too long if the zebra stripes on the ends of your diesel hood units go from"V's" to "^'s" when they are coupled to the train...

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