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ironken, what grade are you near where so many truckers are smoking? I recall back in the days before jakebrakes were bought by companies willing to invest in safety I would smoke em now and again... but there should not be that many smokers. You are correct about the emergency stop on the cars. I was dramatizing a bit to make a point. Stand on summit by the interstate and look down cajon's twisting and winding path and it seems like LA is "right there" but I think about 15 miles or more away but not sure. Owner operaters will buy 500+ horses for rigs. The majority of the trucks such as JB Hunt or Swift *COUGH KAFF COUGH** excuse me.. they usually run detroits or cummins rated between 320-470 at the most. 350-430 is about the best HP versus fuel consumption and about as much money fleet managers want to pay for units. I recall the old mack 280's that you could wind out all day at 90+ mph and it did not matter what horses you had back then. No siree.. 50 ton is too heavy. 40 is the limit. A Cummins M11 rated at 320 HP moving 40 ton is not that great. It's the "pull" on hills like Cajon that gives us the speed. If that rig was able to run cajon at about 18 mph and I had a Detroit 470 HP and run that same load at about 32 mph and perhaps slightly better fuel usage. Railroads simply add units until they have enough to meet the tonnage and then pray that none of the units go down. We drivers just want to be rolling with enough horses to make a difference. Nothing is worse than a engine governed at 58 mph where in the top gear is just at or below max torque and downshifting to gain horsepower to the next lower gear only drops you to about 53 mph and no room at the governer to be worth a damn. Now If I wanted to get some what simpler with autos I had a 3700 pound car with a 350 HP v8 a friend of mine had a 3200 pound car with a supercharged v6 his numbers are very close to mine. Ultimately there is nothing that matches the top dogs. My little bitty car got blown away by a huge hogging Buick Lesabre 4 door with the 500 ci V8 with so much S**T that is just glided away from me no matter what I did. It is my understanding that railroads are very "tight fisted" with horsepower as a means to get the tonnage over the pass or division and hope that none of the units go down. If it was me I would give the engineer twice as much HP and let him have at it. Then again my railroad will be broke and out of business by the end of the year.
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