Show off your insulators

BNSF FAN Mar 30, 2020

  1. BNSF FAN

    BNSF FAN TrainBoard Supporter

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    Thought it might be fun to see everyone's collection of insulators. Here are mine. I have a total of 8.
    12_insulators1.JPG

    This one is my favorite. I like that it has just a slight blue tint to the glass.
    13_insulators2.JPG

    So, what about anyone else? :)
     
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  2. HemiAdda2d

    HemiAdda2d Staff Member TrainBoard Supporter

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    OOH! I can play too (when I get home, that is). I have some old MILW insulators from near Soudan, MT. I have a few others of forgotten origin. Not that I can remember which are which! :eek:
     
  3. r_i_straw

    r_i_straw Mostly N Scale Staff Member

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    I know I have more but I can't find where they are. Probably in some box in the back of the attic where I don't want to go right now. Did find a brake hose "glad hand" that I did not know that I had. The threaded wood peg came out of one of the insulators.
    IMG_3045.jpg
     
  4. r_i_straw

    r_i_straw Mostly N Scale Staff Member

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    OK, I found two more. The one on the right is made of plastic. I call it Darth Vader.
    IMG_3046.jpg
     
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  5. BNSF FAN

    BNSF FAN TrainBoard Supporter

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    That's cool Russell. Haven't seen one of those Darth Vader plastic insulators before.
     
  6. Mo-Pac

    Mo-Pac TrainBoard Member

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    I had a BIG collection back in the day. I climbed up most of the wireless poles and the ones that were knocked over. I still have some I put in storage at my parents place before I departed fo France. Though there are a couple here that I would LOVE to bring back to the states with me. But they are in hard to reach places. I was a member of National Insulator Association years ago. I did sell some of my best finds on Flea Bay for a pretty penny also. Only one I never came across were the infamous Red ones and threadless.
    Here's there website to identify any of y'all's finds.

    https://www.nia.org
     
    Last edited: Apr 1, 2020
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  7. Mo-Pac

    Mo-Pac TrainBoard Member

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    Here's a photo of the ones down the road. One I don't have a high enough ladder for these and second I am not going to test those wires due to the voltage that flows here in France. Plus I am still not allowed to just go anywhere with this virus still around.
    Unknown.jpeg
     
    Last edited: Apr 1, 2020
  8. r_i_straw

    r_i_straw Mostly N Scale Staff Member

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  9. Mo-Pac

    Mo-Pac TrainBoard Member

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    Great! Thing is if you cannot find the one like yours the people over the NIA will help you identify them.
     
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  10. HemiAdda2d

    HemiAdda2d Staff Member TrainBoard Supporter

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    Here's my modest collection. The blue ones I think were MILW, the other two, I have no recollection of where I found them.

    [​IMG]
     
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  11. r_i_straw

    r_i_straw Mostly N Scale Staff Member

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    Back in 2008, when BNSF hired a contractor to remove all the telegraph lines along the Galveston Subdivision, one of the poles they cut down with a chain saw fell on our fence at the Rosenberg Railroad Museum. They paid to have the fence repaired, let us have the offending pole and gave us a wheel barrow full of insulators. I guess they are stored somewhere at the museum but I have not seen them recently. Here is the pole before we dug a hole and planted it on the inside of the fence.
    IMG_2645.jpg
     
  12. BNSF FAN

    BNSF FAN TrainBoard Supporter

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    Hemi, I've seen that style of blue ones before but have never run across one in the wild before.
     
  13. BoxcabE50

    BoxcabE50 HOn30 & N Scales Staff Member TrainBoard Supporter

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    I used to have a large box full. Sold them all except this one. This was the type of insulator the Milwaukee Road used for their electrification, which most will recall being at the end of all the arms, (and more), which extended from the trolley poles. The messenger wire which supported it all was seated in the groove atop these:

    [​IMG][​IMG]

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]
     
  14. Mo-Pac

    Mo-Pac TrainBoard Member

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    I really like the beehive insulators. the blue & green are very common. I found some that were anywhere from dark blue to an dark olive green swirls in the blue glass. the ones that have mixed colors sold better for me than the solid blue and green color ones.
     
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  15. r_i_straw

    r_i_straw Mostly N Scale Staff Member

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    Now if I could just get these birds to pass a few insulators down to me.............
    And why are those insulators on the end the eye bolts use sometimes. Is that where a line terminates and is then routed down to ground level. There were a lot of lines coming down from there.
    IMG_3309.jpg
     
  16. Hardcoaler

    Hardcoaler TrainBoard Member

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    Looks like an N&W pole line Russell? The N&W used that bent vertical arm atop their pole lines and I've never seen such elsewhere, though I could be wrong.

    My collection is modest, with four commonly found glass types and three porcelain types. Here are the porcelain ones. Like a lot of railfan lifers, I have too much junk and need to thin things out. I never knew there was a market for insulators.

    2020-04-03 Insulators - for upload.jpg
     
  17. r_i_straw

    r_i_straw Mostly N Scale Staff Member

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    Yup, it was near the old abandoned Virginian depot in Roanoke before it was restored. I figured those arms held up a ground wire to help mitigate lightning strikes. But that is just a guess.
    [​IMG]
     
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  18. Kurt Moose

    Kurt Moose TrainBoard Member

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    Wow, this was restored?!? Kudos to the group that pulled it off!(y)(y)(y)
     
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  19. r_i_straw

    r_i_straw Mostly N Scale Staff Member

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    virginian.jpg
     
  20. hoyden

    hoyden TrainBoard Supporter

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    Insulators! Do I have insulators...probably about 400 mostly in boxes. Here is a pic from my place in Woodbridge, VA where I was working for 6 years. Earlier I had discovered I could buy them on ebay. As a kid I got interested when my older brother started collecting them.
    P1010696.JPG P1010709.JPG
     

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