From yesterday at Ridgeway, SC, NS 786 southbound with utility coal to keep our air conditioners humming.
I saw an N&W SD-45 only once in service with a chance trackside stop in Salem, VA in August 1983 and took this backlit grab shot to remember it by. The man trackside was a railroad employee and he was very kind. It was a hot and humid day, and the Engineman threw us both a bottle of water as he passed by.
I wonder, in the SD45 engineering meetings back in the sixties, if anybody ever said, "Not only will these flared radiators provide more efficient and superior cooling, they will make all of raildom, including railfans and modelers alike, sit up and take notice!" Doug
I was careful to qualify the above as "in service" because I did find the 1770, 1776 and others out of service at Radford, VA almost six years later in April 1989. They were amongst dozens of units, including a bunch of Geeps and an Alco C-630 #135 which I think is at the Roanoke Transportation Museum today, renumbered #1135 painted Pelver Blue. She's the fourth unit up in the closest row.
Ooops, that should be Pevler Blue, not Pelver Blue. The color was named after Herman H. Pevler, former President of the Wabash Railroad. He took the helm at the N&W.
From 11/10/2019, a new turbine arrives at the CSX yard in Cayce, SC from GE's upstate plant in Greenville. Happily, the GE plant is served by the Carolina Piedmont Railroad, owned by Genesee & Wyoming.
What was the predecessor name of the Carolina Piedmont? Anything to do with Columbia, Newberry & Laurens?
Last week, I was busy inside the ex Southern Pacific 10212, a Budd built dining car delivered for the Sunset Limited. It went to Amtrak where it served many years. It was totally tubed out and rebuilt in the early 2000s. The new quad-seat banquettes between the tables were bolted to the floor using mild steel hardware. With the wet mop cleaning the bolts did not last long and corroded away during the last few years of Amtrak service. I was only able to extract 7 out of 52 bolts intact. Most were already broken but the rest snapped while trying to unscrew them. After drilling out the rusty remains of the old bolts, I re-tapped the holes and installed stainless steel bolts. Here I am with one banquette rolled over into the aisle to get at the holes in the floor. Here are most of the remains of the old bolts that I collected.
The Carolina Piedmont is former ACL, nee Charleston & Western Carolina. The ACL acquired the line in 1897, but it operated with much independence until 1959 when the ACL took over all aspects of its operations. A significant part of the C&WC exists today, operated by CSX. I've outlined the CDPR's line in orange; several miles on the extreme northern end from Greenville to East Greenville is gone. The map also contains the Columbia, Newberry & Laurens that you mentioned, operating from Laurens (at the C&WCs southern end) southeast through its namesake cities. The C&NL too was acquired by the ACL and independently operated for many years much like the C&WC. From 10/05/2018, this is the CDPR's yard at Laurens, SC. The CSX main is in the foreground. The line handles a healthy volume of traffic.
Are you able to work with air conditioning in the car or at least a huge fan? I'd last three minutes in there without.
No 480V HEP to run the two AC units in the car yet. We are working on getting a trailer mounted Cummins diesel generator working so we can park it along side for power. The generator was never used and sat in a parking lot for many years before one of the guys picked it up real cheap. We got it running but needs a muffler and fuel tank. Then we need to tow it from Houston to Cedar Park. However we did have power enough to run some floor fans. Well sort of power. We tapped into a string of daisy chained extension cords that ASTA has strung along the side of the excursion train for running vacuum cleaners for prepping the cars. There was only about 100 volts due to all the voltage drops in the line. We still sweat a lot and drank copious amounts of water and sports drink. Here is another shot of the ASTA yard from on top of the diner in the early morning when it was still cool. Got to well over 100 degrees by mid afternoon. The excursion train is on the left.
I'm thinking so; it has that ACL air of modernism about it. The passenger depot at Laurens was razed in the '70s (?), the tracks have been moved, bridges dismantled and it's hard to imagine what was once there and why. Here's the depot (not my picture):
Speaking of the ACL, on Sunday I saw this very cool calendar at a local restaurant. Thanks For Using Coast Line.
And this is how you get to the roof. Those notches in the lower grab iron sure make the ladder stable.
Wow, that's a really neat collection of equipment! Brilliant safety detail on that grab iron; I'd have never guessed that.
