HAND OFF

[Anonymous]

I believe in the past, when a train was crossing the country,before the "fallen flag days," a diffrent crew and engine of the connecting railroad,would take over to continue the train on it's journey. I live near Dalton ga.,where the principle carrier is csx, norfolk southern & conrail. Yesterday I saw a BNSF,three engines,running a coal drag through town. Do railroads nowadays clear other carriers to run their loads though to their final destinations???? Thanks Easter

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

The motive power may run through with the rest of the train, but the crews still change at the usual interchange or division points.

[tree68]

Motive power is so standardized today that virtually any engineer can run any power. The paint job doesn't matter. Add in the myriad power-sharing schemes and things get real interesting. Those BNSF engines might have been paying back hours owed.

In the days of steam engines an engineer might "own" his engine (not literally, but it was the one he always used and he was proud of it). No way he was handing it off to another engineer.

Consider, too, the labor and time required to change out the engines. I'm no expert, but I have to believe that leaving the power on a 100 car train cuts down significantly from the time needed to physically swap the engines, then perform whatever tests become necessary since the air was disconnected.

[kenneo]

Swapping power can easily eat up 30 minutes. The fastest I have ever seen it done is 15 minutes; the usual is about 30 minutes or more when picking up a unit and putting it into multiple - unhook a motor, reach over and get the new motor(s), couple the hoses and the jumper, sander test, dynamic test, continuity test, air test (independent), back over to the train, couple more hoses, another jumper, another set of tests, send the Conductor to the rear of the train to do a "blow and go", Conductor walks back to the engine. And that is when things are going really well.