Wanna take a train ride with me?

Well, not me, exactly. But the line I worked in Montana - from Helena to Sandpoint and into Post Falls, Idaho.


The ride from Helena starts at about 55 minutes in.

This is a series of videos spread over 35 years...the reason being, Montana Rail Link has been merged out of existence. The BNSF Railway purchased it, or re-purchased it, sort of. The line was founded in 1987 when the Burlington Northern (predecessor to the BNSF) applied to the ICC to abandon the former Northern Pacific line (a predecessor to the Burlington Northern) from Idaho to Billings. Local construction magnate Dennis Washington (who is white, BTW) made an offer to buy the line, and run it. He got his political cronies involved, and in due course, he had leased the line, and had the rights to run it as a Class II (regional) railroad.

Most of these attempts fail; but the MRL was a great success. Probably because of the well-worded contract in the lease - MRL was basically a "bridge line" that connected with the BN at both ends. Meantime, there were small industries that wanted rail service.

And it was good. Smaller sometimes is better. The personal touch.

The West grew, and the nation's rail system became a bridge for intermodal shipping...Newark to Long Beach or Seattle. The BNSF and Union Pacific have, or had, all they could handle; and were routing trains over MRL, and paying us to run them.

They wanted to increase capacity. The BNSF "High Line" through Kalispell, up through Havre and on to Williston, is triple-tracked now. The old Northern Pacific, single-track with passing sidings. Since Dennis didn't own the track, only leased it, there was no motivation for MRL to lay a second main line - which will involve a LOT of work.

BNSF wanted. For 20 years they'd been pressuring Dennis Washington to sell or re-organize to fold MRL into the BNSF. He's resisted.

Now he's approaching 90 and his kids are...from what I hear, they're like Hunter Biden. So Dennis is giving up. He made a cool couple of billion, in breaking the lease.

So the rail buffs are doing tributes to Montana Rail Link.

As you can see, the scenery is breathtaking. A lot of that old equipment, I was using. SD-40-2 locomotives were still MRL's backbone, although BNSF run-through power was GE Evo stuff. You'll see some SD-7s and SD-9s in there; those are gone; but there were still about four GP-9s dating to 1955.

Those got scrapped last year.

Just thought some folks might like to see the land, if nothing else. And get some idea of how a railroader works, on the road.

Bump.......

14 HOURS on incredible Adria Sleeper train: Split - Budapest​

Join me today on the beautiful and stunning ADRIA sleeper train from Split to Budapest, one of Europe's secret hidden gem sleeper trains. Come for the Hungarian sleeper cars, the gorgeous dining car and the food onboard, and stay to enjoy some of the stunning scenery on this overnight trip from Croatia to Hungary. This train isn’t even that expensive and I’ll tell you how I booked and what it cost in the video - it’s the iconic Adria train, which runs from sunny Split to beautiful Budapest. 17 mins, 54 secs long.


Adria menu: https://www.mavcsoport.hu/sites/defau...

0:00 Intro
0:54 Split railway station
2:20 Our MAV-Start sleeper train
3:58 Surfshark sponsor segment
5:27 Boarding B1205 Split to Budapest train + sleeper room tour
7:19 On Time Departure from Split
8:00 MAV's special ex-Hungarian Governemental train restaurant car
10:23 On the plateau, beautiful scenery
11:31 How I booked my ticket
13:04 Night time on the sleeper
14:35 Day 2 - alongside Lake Balaton (I think?)
16:50 Conclusion, thanks, and please subscribe!

​

Casey Jones said:

Well, not me, exactly. But the line I worked in Montana - from Helena to Sandpoint and into Post Falls, Idaho.


............

Just thought some folks might like to see the land, if nothing else. And get some idea of how a railroader works, on the road.

Click to expand...

Casey, some observations and questions -

A while ago you posted up about how important it was that the train didnt concertina into itself by pushing too hard from behind.
As an engineer I was fascinated at how finely things had to balance within the train. You talked about miles long trains, some going uphill and some going down, causing all sorts of linear stress on the set. You talked about the train moving in opposite directions due to 180 degree bends. And watching the video, ( ok I managed about an hour of it ) I was able to see and feel the stresses you talked about.
So sometimes we would see perhaps eight or more locos on the front end, were they all needed for pulling ? braking ? or were they just being dead hauled to be used elsewhere ? Do all the running locos need an operator or are they managed by one driver, including ones placed part way along the train ?
Why do you sometimes put strings of heavy / full carriages behind empty carriages ? Surely a higher chance of getting the empties to stack under braking ?
Does all the rolling stock have brakes ?
How do you balance the braking, do the brakes work like a trailer 'override' brake, or do they have antilock / ABS ?
In some places it looked like the trackbed was wide enough for dual track but either it never got built or it got removed ?
Whats the story behind those occasional junctions and tunnel headers ?

Thanks for the insight into a world I really know nothing about (-:

rblong2us said:

Casey, some observations and questions -

A while ago you posted up about how important it was that the train didnt concertina into itself by pushing too hard from behind.
As an engineer I was fascinated at how finely things had to balance within the train. You talked about miles long trains, some going uphill and some going down, causing all sorts of linear stress on the set. You talked about the train moving in opposite directions due to 180 degree bends. And watching the video, ( ok I managed about an hour of it ) I was able to see and feel the stresses you talked about.

Click to expand...

Yeah, it was a bit much for a casual viewer.

There's a subspecies of humanity, that we on the railroad call "foamers." So named because, when they see a train, they get so excited they (seemingly) foam at the mouth. Hard-core rail buffs.

Remember, the term "fan" is a derivative of "fanatic." Fanatics are rarely sensible.

But, I thought that climb from Helena on through Mullan Tunnel, gave a good feel for the extreme of the job.

rblong2us said:

So sometimes we would see perhaps eight or more locos on the front end, were they all needed for pulling ? braking ? or were they just being dead hauled to be used elsewhere ? Do all the running locos need an operator or are they managed by one driver, including ones placed part way along the train ?

Click to expand...

No, the power on the head end, is all controlled by one operator. There's a "jumper cable" (what it's called in the field) run between the units - a 98-pin cable that signals to trailing locomotives, instructions on throttle, dynamic brake, warning signals, unusual status like wheel-slip alarms.

The throttle is an eight-position electric control that signals (older locomotives) an electro-mechanical governor on the diesel unit - the leader, or, through the jumper cable, all the trailing locomotives. New locomotives are 100-percent computerized; but the jumper cable remains. It just signals to the chip, not to the primitive governor.

I'm not sure how many units can be reliably controlled. On Conrail and CSX, we had a limit: No more than four units online, when operating. More will probably work; but EACH connection between locomotives is a weak point - like a primitive ethernet cable between computers. More connections, more problems.

Brakes on the locomotives (independent from the trainline) were controlled with three air hoses. One was to connect all the Main Air Reservoirs (more air capacity); one was the Independent Brake pipe (straight air through the locomotive consist) and one was the Release signal (when the trainline brakes are applied, the locomotives' brakes are applied also, unless the engineer "bails them off" - that's done routinely. Use the train cars' brakes to stop, while pulling lightly with the locomotives, to prevent slack action.

When you see five, or eight, units on the head end...those are being transported. Some of those are along for the ride.

The big thing when I left, seven years ago, was "Rail Science" edicts - by technologists, who have never run a train; who put out edicts, how many units may be run. With CSX, they would order, on a train, to turn off all but two locomotives, or, occasionally, only one. And they'd track you for compliance with Wi-Fi.

Units in the middle of the train: In the past, those were called "helpers." They'd be cut into the train at (on this vid) Helena at the yard. They'd have a two-man crew on them; and they'd get in there and push, manually. When they started pushing, was usually about five miles west, when the grade started steepening. They'd be in radio contact - but there wasn't much for them to do, other than cut their power in, and be on it for unusual circumstances. Mostly, they'd just get into full throttle and ride - until the tunnel, when they'd have to close windows, put on gas masks (no, I am not kidding!) and cut the throttle when they saw they were getting close to the west-side exit. Right at the west portal, was the peak of the grade. Downhill all the way to Missoula.

Today, now, that's done with Distributed Power - DP. Digital radio control. You set it up like Bluetooth, only it's a far more-powerful signal. With DP, the power in the middle and end - two separate radio link-ups (that is new; seven years ago, most of the DP programs only allowed one set) it's just the head-end crew, working their electric throttle and brake (also controlled through electric braking controls and used with DP).

rblong2us said:

Why do you sometimes put strings of heavy / full carriages behind empty carriages ? Surely a higher chance of getting the empties to stack under braking ?

Click to expand...

With local merchant traffic, those are often set up in blocks for easy set-outs along the way. Or, they were picked up. Of course, doing work close to the head end, is much easier.

If the line is flat and straight, it's no problem. In extreme situations, as you saw on the vid, it does matter.

Sometimes, some jag-off will have set up your train in a bass-ackwards way, before you get to it and take it over. Most times, you just have to run with it - unless there's some HazMat legal violation.

rblong2us said:

Does all the rolling stock have brakes ?

Click to expand...

Yup. In fact, if cars' brakes are bad...the rule of thumb was, no more than 5 percent of a train's cars can be bad order or cut out. If there is A car failing brake testing in a yard, it has to be set out. Failure en route, the train can continue to the next terminal where the bad-order cars must be taken out of the train.

rblong2us said:

How do you balance the braking, do the brakes work like a trailer 'override' brake, or do they have antilock / ABS ?

Click to expand...

Nope. The brakes are all similar in design - yeah, that means it's basically, 1910s technology. MUCH better train brakes could be used, and are out there, for specialized applications - excursion trains, where those cars are never coupled to other cars.

But to put, say, antilock disc brakes on freight cars...for them to work safely, the changeover would have to be 100 percent from Day One. That won't happen; and tens of thousands of rail workers are experienced with the brake system we have. So we keep using it.

Freight-train brakes can be APPLIED incrementally; but can only be released completely. The brakes work off air, supplied by each car's air reservoir, filled off the pressurized air train-line.

They work sort of like a car's vacuum-booster brakes work. The trainline pressure is DROPPED; and the DIFFERENCE between the reduced air pressure of the pipe, and the full reservoir on the cars...that air is sent to the brake piston, through a spool valve.

It takes one second a car, for train brakes to apply or release); and about one minute a car for them to recharge. When you have 20 cars, that's nothing. When you have 120 or more, it's an important factor.

Controlling slack-action is critical. There's about three inches of in-and-out action for each car. If there's severe slack action, an engineer can break a drawbar or a car can be literally bounced up and off the rails.

rblong2us said:

In some places it looked like the trackbed was wide enough for dual track but either it never got built or it got removed ?
Whats the story behind those occasional junctions and tunnel headers ?

Click to expand...

That line was never double-tracked. In places there's room for service trucks to get up there.

There were more tunnels in the past, but some of them were cut open...given the improved earth-moving technology with time. The line was laid down in the 1890s. There were no shovels, only dynamite and cheap labor. Tunnels were the only way they knew how to do it. That new cut that you saw...that had been a tunnel; it was cut out.

Tunnels are a real danger and a pain. They fill with diesel exhaust - if the train has a failure IN the tunnel, the crew has to don gas masks. The exhaust will kill in short order, if the train is stationary, or if the helper crew doesn't have windows in their cab that seal.

Not sure what you meant by "occasional junctions." What you saw were passing sidings, which are all over, on that line. It's a busy line, even today.

rblong2us said:

Thanks for the insight into a world I really know nothing about (-:

Click to expand...

No problem.

Thank you Casey
All good answers / info.
Hopefully I will avoid becoming a 'foamer' but there is something curiously compelling about the engineering of the terrain ( my speciality as a civil engineer for too many years ) and the delicate mechanical engineering balance within the kit that uses the railway.

However I do kinda melt when I'm having a cream tea ( S. W. England speciality ) at a certain railway station and a steam train pulls up alongside for a couple of minutes, then pulls away ..........

Came across this by accident. Interesting so I figured I'd post it. Hopefully @Casey Jones will read it and give us his thoughts.

searcher said:

Came across this by accident. Interesting so I figured I'd post it. Hopefully @Casey Jones will read it and give us his thoughts.

Ridin’ Dirty: A Basic Reference for Freight Hopping

Anonymous Ridin’ Dirty: A Basic Reference for Freight Hopping 07/20/2024

theanarchistlibrary.org

Click to expand...

Interesting, in its presentation. Many of those terms I've never heard; but I only knew the CSX/Conrail/CN (USA) systems. And of course, Rail Link out here.

I was never a railroad bull (cop) so I never got to know the hoboes. Not many in the Great Lakes area - the weather. We didn't see many riding on Rail Link - if someone was going east out of Spokane, a High Line train (on the BNSF, former Great Northern line) was much quicker.

My thoughts on riding those things? My opinions, right now, are colored by my own issues. I'm sitting here with a hairline fracture on my hip...while doing usual grown-up-kid stuff, I took a fall; and most of my pastimes/pleasures are out the window.

So I'm cognizant of "getting hurt."

Which is what probably will happen if you hop trains. I'd put your odds at, one-in-ten. Do it ten times, you're gonna have something painful or catastrophic happen, likely. Bounced off the place you're riding, or slammed into a freight-car bulkhead...or you fall asleep without tying yourself down.

Or you lose your water, or run out. Not enough clothing, and you get critical hypothermia. Or just break an arm getting on - getting off will be A PROJECT.

You can be frozen, overheated, killed by more-experienced, psychopathic riders...killed, getting on or getting off...and for what? A trip to a city 200 miles away? The "adventure" of it?

Let me tell you. Everything going okay...not cold or hot, not without water...riding a train is one of the more boring activities you could imagine. All you can do is avoid pain and minimize danger. There's little upside. The scenery is fine - but you'll have other issues, the whole time you're on the train. Not the least of which will be, avoiding arrest.

If you want to ride a train and cannot afford Amtrak, I'd suggest:

Begging, borrowing or stealing the money for an Amtrak ticket. Less danger and work.

OR

Getting on the Distributed-Power locomotives. Rear set, or center set of locos, if they're there. Now, DP was just coming on when I retired - CSX didn't have it when I was there, and Rail Link only saw BNSF run-throughs with it - but my experience is, the doors to those things are unlocked. There's no real-time video of the cab; so you can just stretch out. Touch nothing. Enjoy the ride. Bulls will be watching the DP power when you go through yards, so be ready to get on the floor when in major urban areas.

And don't be surprised if someone else tries the same. AND if that someone else is a lot tougher and more psycho than you.

Iffn you fellas want to vicariously live the life of a Hobo

Casey Jones said:

Getting on the Distributed-Power locomotives. Rear set, or center set of locos

Click to expand...

Casey Jones said:

And don't be surprised if someone else tries the same. AND if that someone else is a lot tougher and more psycho than you.

Click to expand...

Can the door be locked once one gets inside to keep the more psycho train hoppers out?

Asking for a friend. Lol


On a side note, I recently watched a UP go by with 205 cars. Had two pusher locos, one loco at about the 2/3rds point in the train, and five up front pulling. They were all running, and sounded to be working hard as they went by. Longest train I'd seen in awhile. Usually they are in the 100-150 range, or short locals.

And did anyone else see the news about the 17yo moron who deliberately caused a train to crash so that he could film it for his youtube channel?

Dude was an idiot. I hope he gets jail time for it.

True rail fans only watch and admire.

Joe King said:

And did anyone else see the news about the 17yo moron who deliberately caused a train to crash so that he could film it for his youtube channel?

Click to expand...

First I've heard of it so I looked it up.

Nebraska teen accused of causing train derailment for 'most insane' YouTube video​

A17-year-old Nebraska boy is facing felony charges after he was accused of derailing a train and posting the subsequent crash on YouTube.

The Bennet, Nebraska boy was charged in Lancaster County Juvenile Court last week, though prosecutors have filed to get the case moved over to adult court, according to documents obtained by multiple local outlets.

More:

Video of the actual incident is in this video starting about 2:30 mark.

Vid also shows other incidents of people filming themselves doing stupid and/or illegal things on RR property and equipment.

Joe King said:

Can the door be locked once one gets inside to keep the more psycho train hoppers out?

Asking for a friend. Lol

Click to expand...

Depends on the locomotive - its maker; its generation; whether the cab was rebuilt, and by whom.

EMD locomotives, pre-Safety-Cab, had locks that could be set up inside, and opened with a key outside. Those are rare, now - the last conventional-cab EMD units were made in 1998, special order, for Norfolk Southern. Half of them were painted in Conrail livery - Conrail was being split up and half going to the NS - and those units were essentially CKD units, parts shipped to Juniata Shops in Pennsylvania. Part of the Pennsylvania Railroad/Conrail empire.

GE made its last conventional cabs about eight years earlier.

Now, rebuilds, have bar-lock devices that are slid over to lock, like a tool-shed deadbolt - but a lot sturdier. You can get locked in with those.

The unrebuilt safety-cabs have no lock on the nose door. SOME of them have locks on the second, fiberglass door - a sort of airlock, not sure why they were built that way. Not all of them have that second door. You can sometimes jam up that latch - it's a simple rotating latch, but very heavy-duty. Jam a wooden dowel or stake in it, and it'll jam.

You won't know until you get in there. Best solution is to travel armed, if you dare. Let the invading psycho know you have a piece and he'll probably back right off.

Of course, if you mistake an employee for another hobo, the employee is gonna raise holy hell and you'll get some gaol time.

Joe King said:

On a side note, I recently watched a UP go by with 205 cars. Had two pusher locos, one loco at about the 2/3rds point in the train, and five up front pulling. They were all running, and sounded to be working hard as they went by. Longest train I'd seen in awhile. Usually they are in the 100-150 range, or short locals.

Click to expand...

I have no idea what the UP is doing.

Trouble is, neither does the UP, know what they are doing.

Our rule of thumb was, no more than four locomotives on the head end, online. More could be dead-in-tow, and in fact if we had a locomotive move, that's where they would go.

CSX and UP seem pretty casual in where they put middle-of-the-train DP. Not sure why only one in the middle and two at the rear...unless the rear ones were lower horsepower. Or, sometimes, a crippled old unit will have perfectly-good DP equipment on it, where a newer high-horsepower unit, for some reason, won't pair up.

So they use the cripple as the DP link unit, and make the other a trailing unit. It, the trailing unit of the rear set, might do most of the pushing.

Great thread...

Casey Jones said:

Our rule of thumb was, no more than four locomotives on the head end, online. More could be dead-in-tow,

Click to expand...

Maybe, but they all sounded like they were pulling hard as they each passed by. Me and a friend were only about 30 feet from it, so we could hear it pretty good. It was going over a bridge, and we were under it and a little off to the side.

I'd heard that five locos can pull more cars than the couplers can sustain, and that if a train has five locos in front, it'll always have pushers and/or distributed power.

Don't know if that's true or not, it's just what I've heard.

Joe King said:

I'd heard that five locos can pull more cars than the couplers can sustain, and that if a train has five locos in front, it'll always have pushers and/or distributed power.

Click to expand...

Depends on the locomotives. A 2500-hp GP-20 (early 1960s; a few are still out there) is not even comparable to a 6000-hp GE AC6000CW. Both raw power and final drive (DC versus AC traction motors) are wildly different.

CSX used to count the big 4500 or 6000 AC units as 1.5 locomotives. So you could only have three online. But even then, a simple unit count doesn't measure up when one of your helpers might be a tiny GP-15 1500-hp unit...built like a road loco but really, best used for branch or yard work. Sometimes one of them did get put out with a road train.

EDIT: Some roads now are counting up the horsepower attached to the train, or any part thereof. That's a better way but not foolproof - there's a lot of design differences. GE made a number of six-axle road units for BNSF with only four traction motors - an idler axle in the center of each truck. Not sure why, because it really reduced tractive effort at starting.

It's ungodly complicated, now - and intentionally so. KISS, as an operating guide, was thrown away a long time ago.

Why, would an engineer dim his headlight?

Oncoming train on another track.

Or to show that the train was stationary - some railroads forbid turning OFF the headlight when sitting there. It's a safety thing. Unlike car headlights, there's not a hi-beam/lo-beam reflector setup - it's only bright, or dim, reduced voltage.

Those headlights and ditch lights are so bright, on full-intensity, you can't see anything around it. Like, say, a road crossing five car-lengths back

Casey Jones said:

Oncoming train on another track.

Click to expand...

Although this was on double track, there was no on-coming train.

This train was coming down a 1.6 mile long straight set of track.

Casey Jones said:

Or to show that the train was stationary

Click to expand...

It was moving. At least 20mph, but not much, if any, faster.

Casey Jones said:

Those headlights and ditch lights are so bright, on full-intensity, you can't see anything around it. Like, say, a road crossing five car-lengths back

Click to expand...

There are no crossings anywhere along where I saw this train with a dimmed headlight. He turned it to bright just before he passed me, but I was grade separated, so I doubt I was the reason. He wouldn't even been able to see me, where I was at in relation to the train and tracks.

Closest grade crossing was approx 1 mile behind the head end of the train.

Was asking because until then, I never had seen a loco with a dimmed headlight. I always just thought they were full brightness when on.

Any number of things could have been going on. He may have had a bad connection with the headlight switch. Or he may have turned it (rotary switch) going for another switch (depending on the model locomotive, there can be other switches next to it)

He may even have turned it off out of courtesy for road traffic, if it were night, the track paralleling the road, and no crossings. I know, outside Buffalo, there's an eight mile stretch where the main parallels NY 5, which at that point is a major traffic route. If going through there in the dark with rush-hour traffic (as in, winter) and knowing we were going to stop at CP 5, before any crossing...I'd often dim the lights.

Casey Jones said:

He may even have turned it off out of courtesy for road traffic, if it were night, the track paralleling the road, and no

Click to expand...

Nope. This is all grade separated, no parallel roads. Nearest level crossing was a mile behind the train at the point I could first see it. Tracks are up on a bridge. I was on the grade under, but to the side of the bridge watching it approach and pass by. There are no roads there. Just a river and a big wide flood plain with no roads or structres on it.
I had about a half mile visibility of it before it passed by.
It's a stretch of double track that can be very busy.
...but there were no oncoming trains at the time.


It's not a big deal, just never saw a dimmed light like that before, and just wondered as to the reasons an engineer might do that.

I've seen many trains over several years time, from that location.
....and seen lots more over the course of my life, but never recall seeing a lead loco with a dimmed light, and it got my curiosity piqued.

If there was no obvious reason, probably it was a mistake.

Really. The railroad basically runs on century-old technologies. Granted, there's new space-age stuff, like Positive Train Control; but other things haven't been brought up to date.

Occasionally you'll see a train running down the track with headlights off. Because he turned them off, or the previous crew did, when they were stationery; and for whatever reason, he didn't think to check his switch.

Or, it could be, his unit's headlight control is mistakenly set to TRAIL.

Really. The headlight LEAD / TRAIL switch is on the back panel, separate from the ON LINE / OFF LINE / START switch. Purpose there is to make the headlight switches (two of them; FRT and REAR work properly, through the jumper wires). But if your leader is set to TRAIL and you put your FRT headlight on bright, it's only going to show dim. Because that's how the logic of the circuit-board is.

And I didn't want it changed, either. Running in blizzards...Conrail had the headlight set at the top of the cab. Later, CSX favored headlights mounted at the top of the NOSE, quite a bit lower and forward. But, they weren't modifying former Conrail units. So, you run into a blizzard, and your top headlight is blinding you, lighting up the white-out.

Running with just the ditch lights, though, gave you better lighting. Remember, the ditch-light setup dates back to 1992 or thereabouts. Prior to that, there was just the two-headlight assembly, center of the mass...on the nose or up by the number boards.

The way the switches were, if you had the lead locomotive with its headlight control in TRAIL and you turned the headlight switch on to BRT + DIT the ditch lights would be on but the top light only very dim. MUCH better snow lighting.

Maybe snow, or fog, had the engineer set it up that way, and then he forgot to correct it after getting out of that condition.

Casey Jones said:

Or, it could be, his unit's headlight control is mistakenly set to TRAIL.

Click to expand...

Yea, could be that. Headlight went bright about halfway across the bridge.

Thanks for the responses.