rdamon Nice Photo of the local on RailPictures .. http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=552002&nseq=100
Nice Photo of the local on RailPictures ..
http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=552002&nseq=100
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
Anyone know when the UP will activate the new signals they have erected and remove the old ones?
Was kind of cool to watch a BNSF roll by in the dark while being silhouetted by a waiting UP's headlights.
switch7frg Would the loss of tractive effort on a single engine 120 car train have any effect on the engines performance?? just courious. switch7frg
Would the loss of tractive effort on a single engine 120 car train have any effect on the engines performance?? just courious.
switch7frg
The loss of tractive effort on a single engine anything - even a light engine move will have at a minimum near catastrophic results ending in lack of movement. If the engine doesn't have the abiltity to move it isn't much good as an engine.
I just clicked onto the Rochelle webcam and a split second later I heard a horn and what did I see coming eastbound but the UP office car special train with one G.E. unit (couldn't tell what model as it is still somewhat dark here) and a whole pile of office cars including at least three or four domes. Such a nice thing to wake up to on a Saturday morning.
Yes, the GM plant was indeed in Tarrytown, NY. I grew up in Yonkers which is about fifteen miles south of Tarrytown. The GM plant was in the shadow of the Tappan Zee bridge on the east bank of the Hudson River and I passed by it many, many times as a kid and young adult.
CatFoodFlambeI think the GM plant was in Tarrytown, NY
ChuckAllen, TX
Y6bs evergreen in my mind
I think the GM plant was in Tarrytown, NY - methinks they made minivans there. Really bad minivans...
Back in the 1980's and early 1990's, a lot of so-called JIT systems were that in name only - in a lot of cases, it was just a matter of using the same old supply chain and forcing your vendors to shoulder all the costs of inventory and supply management. The suppliers eventually learned how to identify the real costs in this process, and today's systems usually drive the overall costs right down to the optimum level, no matter who is paying the bill.
Having been a operations manager for a large less-than-truckload trucking company in terminals that supported major vehicle plants, I can verify that "shutdown shipments" were the bane of our miserable lives. Typically, we'd see 40-50 LTL shipments from as many suppliers arrive at the delivering terminal every day. The phone would start ringing about 4 AM, telling us which particular parts were needed at which dock at what time that day. If all or part of a shipment wasn't needed that day, we were expected hold it until directed for delivery. At times, we could have 40-50 trailerloads of LTL shipments stacked up in the yard - and of course, they never called for them in the order we had loaded them. It wasn't unusual to handle a given shipment 5-6 times before we delivered it. Sometimes we'd have as much as a month of shipments from a particular supplier stacked up, especially for parts that were used only when a plant was producing a certain option package for a few days a month (say, rear spoilers for a "sport model" package). Of couse, we'd get the dreaded 11 am call telling us to pull the all eight pallets of the Wombat Widgets shipment from four days ago, the two pallets of part ABD from their shipment made sixteen days ago, and just 1 pallet of part CED from nine days ago - and have 'em at dock X by 2 pm or we'd have to pay a shutdown penalty.On the long-haul OTR runs to Ohio from the west coast staging forwarders (import parts) and domestic suppliers, at least once a week we'd have to hunt down a linehaul team somewhere out in the wilderness (in the days before cell phones, this wan't easy), have them duck into one of our terminals or a for-hire crossdock faciliy in someplace like Missoula or Tulsa, dig out a few pallets of parts, and arrange to to take said parts to meet a chartered plane to fly the stuff to an assembly plant.
I can only imagine what the corresponding process would be like on the railroad. . And they wonder why we leave...
cefinkjr SushiLover A few years? Try 40+ that I know about. There was a GM assembly plant somewhere along the Hudson River (Poughkeepsie? High Bridge? Yonkers?) that frequently had "shutdown" cars. These were car loads, usually of engines but sometimes other parts, that had to be delivered to the assembly plant "yesterday" or the plant would be shutdown and cost GM millions. There were times, of course, when NYC was at fault but it was more normal that the car had not been released by the engine or other parts plant in time to make the cutoff. I remember many times when a crew would be called and a "train" of one or two cars dispatched from Selkirk to that assembly plant.
SushiLover
A few years? Try 40+ that I know about. There was a GM assembly plant somewhere along the Hudson River (Poughkeepsie? High Bridge? Yonkers?) that frequently had "shutdown" cars. These were car loads, usually of engines but sometimes other parts, that had to be delivered to the assembly plant "yesterday" or the plant would be shutdown and cost GM millions. There were times, of course, when NYC was at fault but it was more normal that the car had not been released by the engine or other parts plant in time to make the cutoff. I remember many times when a crew would be called and a "train" of one or two cars dispatched from Selkirk to that assembly plant.
Worked territory that served two GM Assembly plants. Daily train originating in Michigan would handle 80-120 car loads of parts for the two plants. In the days of cabooses, a cab would be the 'cut car' between the blocks for the two plant's cars.
Upon arrival at each plant's serving yard, cars would be switched as ordered by GM - some from the arriving train and some from the on hand inventory and they would get placed in the plant to support continuing production of the assembly lines. Frequently some of the arriving cars were considered 'shut down' cars by GM. In some cases the shut down cars had been delayed by the railroad (shopped for various reasons); some times they were 'shut down' for reasons known only to GM - whatever the reason, the carrier cooperated with GM to solve the issues. Worst 'shut down' issue I witnessed, GM sent a truck from their plant to meet a specific car as it came off the Main Track to unload 20 or 30 items that were needed to continue that nights production.
Feeding a production line is the epitome of JIT - just in time inventory management and with that being the case, there will always be 'shut down' cars - it is the way the system is designed.
I think a lot of you guys are so used to seeing well powered trains that when you see one that is 'normal' powered you think it's underpowered. Loaded auto trains are not near as heavy as other loaded trains. An empty auto train will do just fine with one unit where there are no substantial grades.
10000 feet and no dynamics? Today is going to be a good day ...
SushiLoverThe auto industry has had problems with rail transport for a few years now due to engine shortages.
BaltACD tree68 traisessive1 My definition would be "not enough power to handle the train at normal/expected speeds." But that's just me. Your expected speeds or the carriers expected speeds with the power assigned to it.
tree68 traisessive1 My definition would be "not enough power to handle the train at normal/expected speeds." But that's just me.
traisessive1
My definition would be "not enough power to handle the train at normal/expected speeds."
But that's just me.
Your expected speeds or the carriers expected speeds with the power assigned to it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fdq_EhQt-QU
Here's a video where a underpowered double stack on Indian Railroads as it just tops the hill.
traisessive1 What is your definition of underpowered? 15000 tons and 2 units is normal operations for CN. .4 or .5 hpt being normal operations.
What is your definition of underpowered?
15000 tons and 2 units is normal operations for CN. .4 or .5 hpt being normal operations.
CBTJust saw a bit underpowerd UP autorack train go by. It seems like all autorack trains now are a bit underpowerd?
That doesn't surprise me. The auto industry has had problems with rail transport for a few years now due to engine shortages. That shortage has increased the overall delivery time for new orders getting to the dealers and has caused a lot of complaints.
BaltACDYour expected speeds or the carriers expected speeds with the power assigned to it.
The carrier, of course.
I would expect that a carrier would expect a given train to be able to maintain a certain speed and would normally assign the appropriate power to achieve that speed. Especially on a busy corridor, having all trains running at their "design" speed would be desirable, otherwise things could get balled up even worse than they can otherwise.
Witness the effect Amtrak or a "high/wide" has on a double track corridor.
Crews are an issue as well - while the CSX St Lawrence Division was a 25 MPH line, it took two crews to get a train from Syracuse to Massena. Now, at 40 MPH, they can again do it with one.
I would opine that an underpowered train would likely occur due to one of a couple possibilities - one, the example I gave where the train was bigger than usual, the other, where the normally required power was not available for some reason (power shortage, unit failed enroute, etc).
Just my observations. Corrections welcome.
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...
traisessive1What is your definition of underpowered?
2 on the head end and 120 loaded auto racks is the norm on my territory.
One up front of 80 loaded autoracks and one in the back isn't unusual across Illinois and Iowa.
Jeff
Might not have been all that underpowered - although I'm not up to speed on HP/T calculations and certainly have no idea what numbers to plug in for that example.
Underpowered was the ICG train I saw back in the 70's in Rantoul. Normal loaded coal trains had around 90 or so cars, and plenty of power.
One night I saw a rather dim headlight coming south, quite slowly.
Two locomotives passed the station, pulling for all they were worth (there's an upgrade coming south into Rantoul), and on a hunch, I started counting cars (easy - they weren't exactly flying by). I don't recall the exact count, but it amounted to about double a normal loaded coal train.
I figure they were short power but needed the empties, so these two locomotives were left to slug their way south with two trains worth of cars. In today's horsepower terms, that was about 1.5 locomotives worth for a ? two mile long train.
1958
EB BNSF one engine three passenger cars. Last car had spot lights shining off to the side.
Overtime at the diamonds tonight, got the spot lights on, with trucks and blinky lights.
Thank you very, very much for this tip, /Mr Lyn, although you make me feel a bit guilty that I had to find out about this problem indirectly. I feel like there's something I should be doing for myself that I'm not; I don't like this feeling of a lack of self reliance ... particularly in my field. Again, thank you very much.
Now, let me tell you my experience with this matter. Maybe it will help others.
First, I followed the Adobe link in your post and found that, apparently after your post, Adobe has developed a fix for this security vulnerability. They recommend updating your system (installing if you followed their earlier advice to uninstall) to version 19,0,0,226. They also provide a link to a page that will tell you what your current release is (again, unless you followed their uninstall advice). Mine, in Windows 8.1, was 19,0,0,185. Clearly, some action was needed.
The Adobe site also had the standard 'apply other Microsoft updates before updating' Adobe Flash. When I checked for outstanding updates, I found 9 (?) including KB3099406 that updates Adobe Flash. Like a good little boy, I applied all of these updates before proceeding.
Back to the Adobe site where I checked the Flash version again. It had changed (apparently via KB3099406) to 19,0,0,207 so I had some more work to do. I clicked on the link to apply updates to Flash and a message appeared immediately telling me that KB3099406 has already been applied to my system!
So here I sit with Flash version 19,0,0,207 installed, Adobe recommending 19,0,0,226, and Adobe refusing to update my system. I am confused and I suspect somebody at Adobe might be, too. I'm doing nothing more with this machine for now. Good luck to everyone trying to deal with this!
Off topic, but for Trains cam managers:
In the news today is yet another serious Adobe Flash vulnerability:
https://bgr.com/2015/10/15/adobe-flash-player-security-vulnerability-warning/
Just one day after Adobe released its monthly security patches for various software including Flash Player, the company confirmed a major security vulnerability that affects all versions of Flash for Windows, Mac and Linux computers. You read that correctly… all versions. Adobe said it has been made aware that this vulnerability is being used by hackers to attack users, though it says the attacks are limited and targeted. Using the exploit, an attacker can crash a target PC or even take complete control of the computer. And now for the fun part: The only way to effectively protect yourself against this serious security hole is to completely uninstall Flash Player from your machine. . .
And now for the fun part: The only way to effectively protect yourself against this serious security hole is to completely uninstall Flash Player from your machine. . .
The Rochelle cam uses Flash. If I delete Flash from my Macs, I will not be able to see it.
Will it be possible for you to switch (as YouTube and many other websites are doing) to HTML5? No reason why we railfans should be living with the constantly insecure Flash just so we can watch the freights rumble through the diamonds at Rochelle.
Thanks,
/Mr Lynn
CBTIm a beginner model railroader and railfanner so I dont know much, Thanks again!
Balderdash! Or something like that. I've been railroading in all scales from 1:160 to 1:1 for 70+ years and I still don't know much. I've often said that when I quit learning, I'm just going to quit [PERIOD]. But so far, my plan to live forever is working just fine.
And if you haven't been welcomed to these pages yet (or even if you have, I claim CRS and don't remember it):
BaltACD CBT Ive always wondered about these locomotives. why is it re lettered but not painted in the UP paint scheme? Is it still owned by Sothern Pacific? Paint is protection for the metal surfaces - no matter what the colors that are being displayed. Union Pacific owns what was at one time the Southern Pacific. Painting locomotives is not a cheap undertaking, I am guessing somewhere in the area of $20K to $30K - maybe more. If the SP paint is adequately protecting the metal, it will continue to do so until UP decides a particular unit is in need of repainting in addition to whatever other upgrades UP wants to apply to the unit.
CBT Ive always wondered about these locomotives. why is it re lettered but not painted in the UP paint scheme? Is it still owned by Sothern Pacific?
Ive always wondered about these locomotives. why is it re lettered but not painted in the UP paint scheme? Is it still owned by Sothern Pacific?
Paint is protection for the metal surfaces - no matter what the colors that are being displayed. Union Pacific owns what was at one time the Southern Pacific. Painting locomotives is not a cheap undertaking, I am guessing somewhere in the area of $20K to $30K - maybe more. If the SP paint is adequately protecting the metal, it will continue to do so until UP decides a particular unit is in need of repainting in addition to whatever other upgrades UP wants to apply to the unit.
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