This NEVER gets old! I keep playing the video over and over! I would have laved to trainwatch at this location in person! I could watch for hours, And enjoy the sound of the engines at full power working. I grew up in a train town myself! when we were kids, We lived not too far from the katy depot in denison TX. and my grandfather used to work at a railyard in the west part of town. Which was also a tar plant.
I work this mountain and often times the engines will over heat going through the tunnels. They reduce their load and sometimes wont come back up unless we stop and let them cool down.
This is my fave go to vid when i want to see ridiculously brutal horsepower at work,the thing fills the whole valley? Amazing,thanks so much for a great clip.
This is one heck of a vid! Great capture! I used to live in Bakersfield for years and my father and I chased Santa Fe and Southern Pacific freight through these mountains! Love the Loop!
Usually trains can't restart after stalling without getting more power. Maybe that BNSF stopped for signal 3526 and the crew waited for a better light. But what do I know I just work the UP mountain pool over Tehachapi.
Through experience, I have found out that the GE's will reduce power if they overheat; if either the radiator fluid gets too warm, or the traction motors don't get even air to cool them. They are also known to get "Hot Diodes" and would drop all their power. BTW, darn good video. Hopefully I will visit Tehachapi one of these days. A retired BNSF Engineer.
I would be willing to bet a locomotive fell down for some reason. They probably got it back up and running is the reason they got the train restarted so easy. The only other explanation would be the addition of helpers but none of them were added.
Terry Presnal, I have seen an MU lose control of one loco in the lashup. That loco was spinning it's wheels, adding very little to the pulling power of the string of locos. The crew had to break the train and double the hill, taking about 2 hours for a 5 minute climb. Phil in gorgeous Young Harris, Georgia, USA
A metallic sound like tinnitus, produced from the pressure between wheelsets and tracks. Unbelieveable the stress in the couplers behind the leading locomotives! We in Bielefeld/Germany decided to use a higher quality of tracksteel in our tube. So we have to change the wheelsets more often. But that was cheaper as the build in of new tracks. And the traffic can go on around the clock!
Awesome video, that is a very long train. I was expecting one or two bankers at the back. Restarting that train must have been an enormous effort for those 4 loco's. Unless they had equipment failure prior to stalling.
Yes, I know it's more about tractive effort and AC locomotives provide more of it than DCs. My comment was more about the locomotive consist and the NS unit in particular. I can go on in more details, but I hate typing a lot.
No big surprise here. I was talking to a BNSF engineer in Larkspur, CO and he said that they were notorious for assigning "just enough" power to a train. If one engine goes out (most likely a DC traction locomotive which cannot handle run 9 at such a low speed for extended duration) you're forced to stop and cool the motors.
The Dash-8s are with CN now. The Warbonnets BNSF ordered as well as the ATSF Warbonnets are still being used and I see them often, I doubt any are scrapped. Even the ATSF SD40-2s I see every once in a while, especially around Barstow. As to "up here", I see them nearly every time I go to Tehachapi if you mean Tehachapi as "up here".
To answer some the questions in the comments, NO AC motors don't over heat, and the head end power is anywhere from 16,000HP to 17,200HP, base on if the units are 4,000HP or 4400HP.
Yep i agree, i a Loco Engineer in New Zealand, i would say Traction Mtr over heat, we get the same here and our old U26C locos with a Brightstar computer system in them does the same when down to a crawl on a hard grade
Locomotives have the most tractive effort when already moving and less when starting. So the less tractive effort means that it wont spin its wheels and stall again. They more than likely waited to see if they could get help or permission to move again.
You obviously have never been to the loop. When I was out there in the late 1990s the SP ran trains twice that long with 9 of more units, 3 or 4 on the point, 3 mid train and 3 on the rear. The Santa Fe typically ran TOFC / COFC unit trains that would fit in Walong with 3 or 4 units on the point.
Fascinating; being out of the US I don't know anything about this operation; do they have a depot where additional locomotives can await trains to assist over the summit?
True, this train is not long. the sharp curving is what is giving the impression that its long. thats why its climbing slowly and you hear the steal rubbing, It did not stall.
.....about 390,000 lbs of pull before they break. Knuckles are designed to be the weak link by breaking to prevent string-lining derailments. Sorry for the long response. Just bored in a hotel.
Igot you on the diodes, are they AC, or DC traction, does it make a , diff.? AC traction really wipes out DC, I"ve seen GE ac"S start out on 3 and 1/2 % gradd With 12,000 tons , incredible Machines!!
Ok....here is my take, and I have first hand experience with this (BNSF Engineer). When climbing any grade that has the locomotives in Run8 for long periods of time at very slow speeds, the traction motors and diesel engines themselves get to a point where the cooling systems can not keep up. When this happens, the computer will start to de-rate (lower the power/energy output) of the locomotive. Often, there is a point of no return where even the slower speed.....
Maybe the European approach of limiting the max train weight to 2000T isn't such a bad idea. We haul our trains over the Alps with only 2 loco's with 80kmh
you do know railroads consider a stall once a train gets below 5 mph. It's the engineers choice on weather to set the air then stop of try to keep going.
@lotsoftrains123 I agree the train must had coupled middle and rear locomotives to help pushing. What about if cars could had uncoupled and caused a severe tragedy?
Yeah, there is a 2.9 MN limit on the couplers. That's one reason why when they use additional locomotives to get the train up the hill they're at the back.
