Years ago, one of the Western Pacific museum volunteers used to work with me at the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant. I remember him calling our credit union to get a loan to buy one of the old F units for the museum, and they finally said yes. The gent was legendary for his knowledge of DCPP's emergency diesel generators. He also had a personalized license plate on his car, which read WP U23B. A real died-in-the-wool train guy!
Thank you for a very interesting video. Thumbs up. Not too long ago I had the pleasure to operate the WP 917 EMD F7. The feeling of sounding the horn and stepping up through the notches was nothing short of pure bliss.
Wow, the 913 coming to the crossing by the marina in Sacramento sounds like a goose with a cold. Good video. Can't wait until the next season of Portola starts so I can work the caboose trains again.
I don't think you covered the tanker truck collision that all four were involved in, to my knowledge 918 was on the point and completely burned the others suffered significant damage
Perllman Green was hideous !!! Imho Nothing compared to that lovely Orange and Silver livery with that awesome Western Pacific logo with the feather in the center. 😍😍 Growing up in San Leandro, Ca. and watching those GP7 and GP9 "Geeps " doing their switching and kicking cars was something for a young kid to behold. I was in awe of the sound of those EMD567 Prime Movers with those Roots blowers whining loud at notch 8 and doing the hard work.
'No F Units were harmed....' except technically the parts unit that was scrapped , I'd like to hope that wouldn't happen today but....that's hindsight I guess.
Great job on the video, Gary! Good education on those beautiful F-Units. Uh, no F-Units were harmed, but someone really whacked the jack outta that horn but good (6:48)! Gary, you might know, or one of your viewers, but seriously, what was wrong with the horn? Was that a damaged diaphragm, or an air leak? Or maybe they were so excited to see you it lost control and spazzed or something? Anybody have an educated guess on the horn? I don't have one, but just wondering what would cause that God-awful sound. Ghost of SP
Sorry I'm a novice, is that an SD7 at 2:19? I don't think it is, but something very similar. I am loving these old pictures and have got 7 more minutes to go!!! Hooray!!! Thanks :)))
That horn, I'll be honest, sounds pretty awful. I bet when diesel engines were rising in popularity, that was probably one of the worries of many railfans, that train horns would have no personality. Many of them probably wished that train horns sounded better. I guess they got their wish, because horns sound much better nowadays.
