LOL...
Sounds like a fun time, Dan.
The opinions expressed here represent my own and not those of my employer, any other railroad, company, or person.
hahaha
never mind the rest
Nance-CCABW/LEI
“Even if you are on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.” --Will Rogers
Whether you think you can, or you think you can't, you're right! --unknown
I thought I'd pull this up from the basement. Quiet in here...
Dan
Thanks, Dan! I was thinking that myself. Must be everybody's busy? I am.
I have a few questions rattling around in my head and if/when I get the chance, I'll post them.
Busy here, too...Pat and I biked to our dental appointments this morning, stayed in Elmhurst for lunch, and got haircuts on the way home. Nothing much to report on railroading from there; we caught an eastbound coal train and a westbound auto train as we were leaving for home.
Nance, I hope your particular brand of busy-ness is over quickly!
NS is going to be busy for a while--I got a call from Joe today about the rear-end collision in northern Indiana. Nobody injured, fortunately. From the pictures I've seen, most of the derailed cars had telescoped further back in the train that didn't stop in time. It was a manifest train going into the rear of a ballast train (which, if you'll pardon the expression, probably stopped it dead in its tracks). Edit: I got this wrong--it was the ballast train that ran into the manifest. That makes the telescoped freight cars a little more understandable.
This entire week (and last week as well), I've been burning up cyberspace sending and receiving e-mails about the research a friend is doing cataloguing freight cars of Bethlehem Steel and its successors (that includes most of the unit-train coal cars out there!). I can't contribute too much, because my sightings don't allow me to get information like build dates very readily, but when I've determined prior operators of cars still in service, that's helpful. And I'm learning a lot, too! At least a couple of times we've resolved entire groups of cars from construction right through to current operators. Still a long way to go, though!
And Dan, thanks again!
Carl
Railroader Emeritus (practiced railroading for 46 years--and in 2010 I finally got it right!)
CAACSCOCOM--I don't want to behave improperly, so I just won't behave at all. (SM)
CShaveRR Sorry to hear about CP 2816, Bruce; hope it will be back someday (these things always take longer than expected; I suspect you'll be kissing the entire year goodbye, at least).
Sorry to hear about CP 2816, Bruce; hope it will be back someday (these things always take longer than expected; I suspect you'll be kissing the entire year goodbye, at least).
Well Carl, you called it. I just read on a Canadian forum this morning that the 2816, two of the "F" units, and the passenger cars that travel with the 2816 have been put under cover in the old Ogden Shops car shop building until further notice. I don't really have much more to add.
Bruce
So shovel the coal, let this rattler roll.
"A Train is a Place Going Somewhere" CP Rail Public Timetable
"O. S. Irricana"
. . . __ . ______
CNW 6000 I thought I'd pull this up from the basement. Quiet in here...
It was so nice and dark.. quiet...
I did buy me some new pencils to draw with. Sort of my part-time hobby that hits me every couple of fortnights.
Carl,
I've got one for ya - within the last week or so I've seen a boatload of former CN, CNA and CNIS 3 bay covered hoppers get patch "remark" lettering for NMIX. Any insight?
Thanks!Dan
NMIX is owned by NSC Minerals, Inc.
The cars I'd seen were relettered from CNLX in 2006 (those were cars that had originally been lettered CN and CNIS--the cylindrical type so common on CN at one time). I've also seen some ex-WC covered hoppers relettered NMIX. If yours are fresh, shoot me some numbers if you can!
We have a fabric-shopping errand to run today...Pat's hoping to repair or reproduce an Edwardian-era blouse (early 20th-century) for our local historical society. The errand will take us past the west end of Clearing Yard and through LaGrange (I don't know of any quicker way to go...). Rainy weather expected, but we need a good car trip for a change.
zugmann CNW 6000: I thought I'd pull this up from the basement. Quiet in here... It was so nice and dark.. quiet... I did buy me some new pencils to draw with. Sort of my part-time hobby that hits me every couple of fortnights.
CNW 6000: I thought I'd pull this up from the basement. Quiet in here...
Zug...........Let's see some "pencil drawings"....love drawing too....But have not done any in decades.
Quentin
Are you ready to have your artwork critiqued here?
We had one CRO who somehow found time to make some amazing drawings of steam locomotives in scenic poses. Not necessarily a specific prototype, but he had the good fortune to be a few years older than I, and to actually have memories of GTW steam...
(This is the same CRO who gave up a teaching career to work for the railroad, and had a fair-to-middling career as a banjo player...he'd sometimes put his foot on the speaker pedal and entertain the troops between hump shoves. Jack retired years ago and moved to the wilds of Michigan--wilder than I've visited in a while! Hope he's doing okay.)
Not much came out of our trip today, at least in the railroad department. We did see four Hulcher cats working together along the BNSF "Racetrack" in Hinsdale...no wreck, but they may have been ready to replace a switch. New reporting mark and railroad for me: SCXY (St. Croix Valley), on a former SOO/IMRL/ICE covered hopper.
I don't think I'm ready for prime time just yet.
Carl, we have a driver who is getting pretty good with a banjo as well, he was sittin' next to his truck at our Richfield yard, just pickin' away earlier today. He took it up when he started driving, needed something to pass the time when he was waiting around......
Ran the I-55 corridor last Sunday, looks like all the new rail and ties are in up to Dwight now, and the new Love's truck stop at Dwight is coming along nicely. Love's have been popping up like weeds lately, went past another one going up down by Indy.
Not much else new, so see everyone later.....
Randy Vos
"Ever have one of those days where you couldn't hit the ground with your hat??" - Waylon Jennings
"May the Lord take a liking to you and blow you up, real good" - SCTV
I do a little pickin' and grinnin' every now and then (banjo and guitar). If the neighbors knew I was thinking of picking up a set of bagpipe they'd probably revolt...
One of our student conductors is in a band at "home" (Staten Island).
Just back from three days on the railroad, two in the seat. Today I had a different instructor than usual, one who's run our line for years. If I remember half of what he told me, it'll be a good thing.
Time to empty out the truck and head for bed.
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
Hey, congrats, Larry! It's awesome, isn't it? No better feeling in the world, at least IMHO!! All the best to you in your training!!
Bagpipes. What is it that some people have against bagpipe music? But then, there are certain styles, that can be sounded on many different instruments, which I find execrable.
About twenty years ago, Ricki's older daughter, Katie, decided to learn to play the bagpipe, and she did very well. One summer, we were up at Snowbird, in a unit on the top floor of the Iron Blosam (the name given by a miner to his find). I do not remember where Ricki and I had gone, but Katie stayed in the room and practiced with the full bagpipe (it is possible to practice with just the chanter), drones and all. When she was through with her practice, she stepped out into the hall and into the applause from some of the young workers who had gathered outside the door to listen to her.
And, speaking of Snowbird, Ricki and I spent from Monday afternoon to Friday morning in our own unit (two rooms) last week. It was lovely, being up there again (last year, we went up for an afternoon and evening), even though I was not able to do all that I had become accustomed to doing in the way of exercise. Wednesday, three of her former co-workers brought lunch up and we had a good time together (one of them brought a rhubarb pie she had baked for me, and all, even those who had never before eaten rhubarb pie, enjoyed it).
I told them of my experience with rhubarb pie when I was in college. From time to time, we would have rhubarb pie as supper dessert (my first exposure to it), and after most everybody but the clean-up crew had left, I would go around from table to table, and eat the untouched pie. However, about the middle of my second year, I had to leave early one night when the dessert was rhubarb pie, so I was not able to get my fill. Apparently the dietician realized that night that it was not popular with many--and we never had rhubarb pie again.
Johnny
Glad you two (Larry and Nance) had fun on your respective outings today. Pat and I spent most of the day (after church) with Nora (some of you remember her from the Forum here) and her two young men. We had both lunch and dinner at places along our main line 2Toots, and Two Brothers from Italy (or is that 2Brothers?). The intervening four or five hours were spent at Legoland up in Schaumburg--a totally fascinating place (geared to kids, no doubt, but there were a whole lot of adults acting like kids, and Pat was old enough to be their grandmother, for Pete's sake...).
Not many trains went through Lombard or Glen Ellyn around noon, but by the time we got to Elmhurst the headlights were everywhere! Some actually came through before we all left for home (or hotel).
DeggestyBagpipes. What is it that some people have against bagpipe music?
Nothing like "Amazing Grace" or "Going Home" on the bagpipe to bring a tear to one's eye.
Each year at the "French Festival" in Cape Vincent, NY, there is a parade which invariably includes 4-5 pipe bands. After the parade the bands also put on shows in front of the reviewing stand. Once the pipe bands do individual performances if they so choose, all of the bands gather together and do a "massed" performance, usually involving 30-40 pipers. Since all pipers learn the same basic selections, it's not all that hard to pull off.
When they're on their mark, it's a marvelous sound.
When they aren't, it's the most god-awful caterwauling you could ever imagine...
And who could forget Bugs Bunny "saving" the Scotsman from his bagpipe...
In agreement with you and Johnny, Larry! I suspect that part of what folks may have against bagpipe music is that it's nothing they can relax to.
Don't remember the Bugs Bunny cartoon (I led a deprived childhood in that respect), but was able to witness Anna Russell do her "Wind Instruments I Have Known" routine on the bagpipe live, in which she basically assembled the bagpipes while talking about them (complete with black polka-dot tartan!), then would have proceeded to play them, except for the fact that she had somehow lost the reeds for this performance (instead she had sections of the Orchestra Hall audience imitating the drones by holding their noses and humming a note, while she sang herself off the stage!).
I can't forget the cartoon of the Scotsman talking to his wife, crying baby in the next room: "I dinna know what's the matter wi' the laddie. I been playing him a lullaby for two solid hours!"
Q: Why do bagpipers walk while they're playing ?
A: To get away from the sound . . .
If you have no idea of how bagpipes sound, the sound can be quite frightening the first time.
Indeed, the Scots may have depended upon that experience to demoralize the English in battle. In a movie about the Battle of New Orleans (made about fifty years ago), one of the Americans asked about the bagpipes of the British and was told, perhaps by Andrew Jackson, "Maybe they're trying to frighten us." The rockets may have been more frightening, however, since they seldom went in straight lines; perhaps Mr. Congreve never was able to figure out how to make them so that they ran straight (they could even turn around and come back to the launchers).
When Katie married, a small group of pipers provided the recessional music. At the rehearsal, only one was present; I was standing by him as he began and it startled me, even though I was expecting him to be begin, when he hit the bag what seemed to be a great blow.
Howdy! What causes a flat spot on the rail head? Would it cause problems? Would they change out that section of rail, or? Thanks, as always.
Where in the rail? Joints are subject to pounding.
We've got a couple of spots where it appears locomotive wheels spun, perhaps for a longer period of time than a few revolutions (think of that picture that circulates from time to time where the rail is almost cut in two from the wheels spinning for an extended amount of time).
You can feel in when you roll over the spots I mentioned. since they're in "Rule 98 territory", we're never over them at more than 10 MPH anyhow.
I'd imagine the amount of traffic and the severity of the flat spot in the rail would be the deciding factors.
No, not near a joint.
I figured it was from spinning; that's why they tell us not to!
Wouldn't it take an awful lot of spinning to cause a divot in the rail head?! GEESCH! How long would you keep it up if you weren't moving?! Shouldn't you just back her up a bit and try again or use sand or something?! WOWZERS!!!
The use of sand might have contributed to the mark ("Divot"...I like that!).
I have used the following pic as my wallpaper for a long time. I thought it was Brian's. He says no. Does anyone recognise it?
Another question. In the pic below, it shows the two loco laced up back ends together. Is there a reason for/advantage to this or is it apt to be this is how they were in the yard? Thx!
If you're talking about Bob's wallpaper shot, it just makes sense to have a cab facing in each direction so that nothing has to be turned at the end of the line or elsewhere, If there is a back-up move of any length to be made, an engineer would prefer to do it without having to look over his shoulder (those seats don't swivel like they used to) or down the long hood.
Couple things:
1. felt the earthquake up here in PA land.
2. Learning to play the guitar/banjo is on my bucket list. Never was that into arts or music when i was younger - being pushed for academics instead. Making up for it now, I guess. Some year, maybe.
3. Oh what the heck, I'll share. Keep in mind a few things: I have no training, I am new at drawing people (even cartoons), I am barely above "doodling stage", and I'm not making a career out of this. Just for fun. Lots of room for improvement.
And some may recognize these people from the nick cartoon "Avatar - the Last Airbender". the older I get, the more I enjoy cartoons. This is by far my favorite, so I have the DVDs and a few books to look off of when I draw. So yes, I am a dork...
Zug - Nothing there to be ashamed of!
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