Also in Friesland: The small town IJlst has a windmill for sawing wood. To transport the finished lumber to the water or to the street, they used narrow gauge cars moved by hand. Today, the windmill is a touristic attraction run by a professional and many volunteers. This weekend, there was a special 'national mill day', so this mill also was in use to show the visitors how it worked in the old days.
Nice photos of the old trains. :shade: What is most impressive is the quality of the finished planks from the old sawmill. Any possibility of you getting photos of the sawmill inside the windmill? OK, so they would not be strictly photos of railroad activity, but if you include some rail or the end of a car in each picture, what can the TB Photo Police possibly say? mg: :angel:
I have many pictures from the inside of the mill, and also one of the sawing itself. When I am home (now I am at work), I will upload him.
I have found pictures on the website of the windmill (it is called 'De Rat', yes, that little animal). Here you see the saw: And the windmill: You can look at http://www.molensinbedrijf.nl/ag-molenderat.htm and http://www.zwfriesland.nl/derat/ for more pictures. The text is only in Dutch, I'm afraid.
Reading Dutch Text Thanks Thieu, those web sites are interesting, at least the photos. :shade: I am suprised to see a reciprocating saw blade with the second web site. Did windmills ever use circular saw blades? Perhaps that is a circular saw blade in your photo, it is hard to determine? I should have learned Dutch when younger since my mother was of Dutch ancestry (my Christian names are "Henry Ten Eyck"). :embarassed: Sadly I studied French instead of Dutch.
The saw goes up and down. There are several saw blades, so they can cut up a complete tree. And there are several sawes next to each other, so they can cut more trees at the same time. The trees come out of the water in front of the mill, and are being pulled into the mill by wind energy too. I know three windmills that are used for sawing wood (one in the city I live in), and two have this system (the third I didn't visit, but I think that that one also uses this kind of sawes). Yes, you should have studied Dutch ))) Do you know from what part of the country your family comes?
Coenradt ten Eyck emigrated to Nieuw Amsterdam (New York) in 1651 from either Amstelveen, Netherlands or Moers, Germany. He was married in Amstelveen, but lived in Moers after marriage, so I am not sure where the ten Eyck family originated. Thank you for the information on how the windmill saws operated.
New pictures form the Railway Museum Since we have a museumcard for free entrance in most Dutch museums, we can visit the Dutch Railway Museum as many times as we want to. So last week we made our kids happy and went on our bikes to the museum. The NS 3737, a steamer build in the Netherlands by Werkspoor. Sometimes this engine can be seen on the mainlines, but at the moment it needs a new boiler. This is a very popular switcher, build in the 40's and 50's. Called 'Sik', this little engine was used not only as switcher, but also as road unit on branch lines and as MOW engine. Hence the crane on the back.
The museum made a replica of a coal bunker and water tower. This locomotive comes from the 50's and has been built by the French Alsthom. Its paint scheme is one of the older ones of the Dutch Railways (NS).
Tramway Today me and my family went to the museum tramway line in Amsterdam. They have an old railroad track that they use for their trams. A trip takes about half an hour. This is an old tram from Amsterdam: 'the Amsterdam Blue Tram'. Built in the 20's, and its last revenue trip was in the 60's. My mother used to ride it, I heard today from her. This carriage was placed behind trams as extra room for passengers: This tram comes from The Hague:
Nice photos, Thieu, thank you. The Amsterdam tram looks as if it were designed for very narrow streets.
Railway Museum: again! Yep, today we went to the museum, again. The children had no school today, my mother-in-law was staying for a few days, the sun was shining, so we went to the museum. First, an old diesel from the 50's. These engines were in service till 2 years ago, and maybe some of them are still working for the French (we sold some of them to France). I've posted this electric engine before, but this time it was a sunny day and I could find a good spot to take the picture. Inside the museum, this is the first engine you see.
The rear shape of the blue and yellow diesel looks very much like an old GE U-25. Do you know who the manufacturer was?
I saw some of these several years ago which had been bought by Belgian Railways. They were at Antwerpen. Don't think they are still in use, though as they have purchased many new diesels of this size.
I can't remember that the NMBS bought these engines (I thought it were the French...), but I have found on the internet that they used them for building their high speed line to France. The history of these engines: in the fifties, the Dutch Railways (NS) wanted to buy diesels because they wanted to scrap the last steam engines. They followed a design of Baldwin and ordered 150 engines: 100 at the Allan works in Rotterdam, 50 at Schneider in France. The technical insides of the units werd made in Holland. The first engine rode the rails in 1955. More pictures: http://www.nicospilt.com/Diesel_2200.htm
Almost a year later, I continue this thread. I have taken some new pictures of Dutch locomotives. This engine is a Baldwin design of the 50's for de Nederlandse Spoorwegen (Dutch Railways). Dutch manufacturers built the units, but part of it comes form Baldwin-Westinghouse. The builders plate also mentions Baldwin-Westinghouse. These days, a freight operator uses these engines.
