(HD) FULL POWER up Mullan Pass Montana (LOUD) Mountain Scenery. 

i love the way EMD's roar and GE's rumble!!

I'm listening to this in June of 2020 with headphones and sound that allows the full surround sound experience and it's coming out loud and clear here. When those engines came out of that tunnel you could actually very clearly hear the sound of the superchargers pushing power and the sound of the exhaust gas coming out of the pipes, too. The deep roar of the engines in real life came out very nice here. My hat's off to whatever sound setup you were using. It was so nice I had to comment. Thanks a lot.

Terrence, I agree with you. I have loved the sound of 2 cycle EMD diesels since I was a child.

EMD'S all day!!!!!! That sound!!!!!! Wooooooo love the video!!!!!

Very nice video! THX for filming and posting, appreciate it.

Great video !!! Love the scenery and the struggle of heavy trains working upthe pass. Nice job 👍👍🙂🙂

I love to hear them EMDs at run 8 the sound never gets old

Great Video. Thanks for all the information you provided on screen.

Fantastic video. I love the effort you put in and your informative captions.

Thanks airing the Outstanding vid .your endeavors are unmatched.Bliss

God that sounds great!! The four EMD's on the bridge..

Great video! The sound was worth the price of admission!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Love those EMD SD70ACE's . Powerful Beast.

Super nice job "RailJames" Reminds me of being at the "Horseshoe Curve" in Pa. Lots of wheel squealing and engines roaring while only doing about 20 - 30 mph. Thanks for your efforts!

this is possibly the best framed and picturesque videos for trains hauling freight i have seen so far. great work.

Sweet video, the Montana Rail Link motive power is easy on the eye. John

Montana Rail Link is really cool! Amazing video!

when the local freight train passes by at the northern end of my street at 3.00 or 4.00 and im just getting to bed, it is literally one the the MOST relaxing sounds. i wish it would last all night, that way id never wake up.

I'm a retired engineer. I've operated GG1's-E44's-E33's, all kinds of GE's and EMD, ALCo's. Give me an EMD any day on any train, 24 air or 26, I don't care. My second favorite engines are ALCo's, RS11's especially.

We started out from the same point as the BNSF locos on a passenger special in 1997. Two Amtrak P42DCs ( well more like 1.25 as one was sick) and 11 private passenger cars. We stalled at Iron Ridge. MRL knew we had a bad engine so added a SD40-2 to the front of the following freight in case we needed it. They coupled up to the rear and shoved us up and over the bridge doing 40 MPH. Helper cut off just the other side of the tunnel and went back for the freight. That is one tough grade with all the curves.

Such a beautiful video!

Thanks RailJames! Nice video, well edited and good descriptions! Again, thanks

Great video with great sound, thanks for posting.

Great video. Really like the explanation about what's going on.

Thanks Marcel!

Very nicely done video. You have gained a new subscriber. Nice steady camera, and what beautiful country. Really enjoyed it. thank you for sharing.

Certainly makes a lot of sense breaking a long train up into two sections with the four 4300 hp locos in the centre of the string of freight cars; saves overstressing couplings.

This is the best area for railfanning in Montana.

Enjoyed your video! Thank you for posting.

🚂 Nice shots ! 👍🏻

Awesome video and descriptions helped alot very interesting!

Enjoyed this !

Dynamite vid.Keep em comming.

Talk about some power. Great video

What a great video. This will be a valuable asset to me as I build my HO scale Mullan Pass layout. Those closeups of the Helena depot and Skyline trestle show me details I haven't seen before. Thanks for sharing. Someday I hope to visit Mullan Pass myself.

Enjoyed the video greatly. Recalled the days when the NP Mainstreeter went this route. Last time I crossed Mullan Pass by rail was January 1970. The train was gone when Amtrak came 15 months later. Thanks.

Great video!

Nice work! Great video, great sound!

Just a couple months ago we drove into Helena from the east. I was impressed by how busy the RR was heading west from Bozeman up into Helena.

Love loud when it’s machinery and not whistles or signals.......great video 👍

subscribed.. your camera catches the sound of the engine very good!

Nice video. I went to GoogleMaps to see exactly where this is and amazingly, on the satellite image, there is actually a train on the bridge crossing over Austin Road!

Great video, thanks!!

cool I live in Helena Montana

Great video thanks.

MadNorsky, Thank you for the kind comments.

A bit of a correction here but at 0:40 seconds into the video you stated that BNSF's ES44C4's have A1A truck arrangements for better tractive effort and actually that's not true. A1A systems actually COST the ES44C4's tractive effort. The reason why A1A trucks are on those units is a cost saving measure that BNSF is gambling with whereby they remove two traction motors from the traditional six the unit would have and shift that tractive load onto the remaining four to reduce costs by cutting 50% of the total traction motor expenses by having that many fewer motors. The logic behind this is on a standard six motor ES44AC's each traction motor is only able to exert around 30,000 pounds of tractive effort even though the motors are capable of around 36,000 pounds of tractive effort. BNSF's thought being that by cutting two traction motors out of the equation but introducing a weight transfer solution due to hydraulics it consequently would put enough overall locomotive weight on the remaining four powered axles that they would be able to utilize their full 36,000 pounds of tractive effort. So simple math will tell you that 30,000 pounds of tractive effort on a standard ES44AC multiplied by six powered axles equals 180,000 pounds of tractive effort. On a ES44C4 the tractive effort is again 36,000 pounds but multiplying that by four and you get 144,000 pounds which is a difference of 36,000 pounds of tractive effort. So you cut two traction motors only to loose a bit over one traction motors overall tractive effort on a standard ES44AC. Now granted nothing is free here so yes you drop two traction motors which saves costs. However you add in a hydraulic system which has it's own operational costs as well as a computer management system on top of that. Plus you also a 20% additional load onto the four remaining traction motors which consequently will add additional wear and lead to a shorter life for them. Not to mention greater slow speed loads put on the track and related hardware as the center axle's weight carrying capacity is only returned to normal at speeds above 15 MPH. Hence why I say it's a gamble because it's kind of a running long term experiment that BNSF is doing to see if it pays off over an extended period of time. I personally don't agree with the projection in any capacity since it cuts locomotive performance right where it matters (slow speed high tractive effort applications) for a minimal savings at the cost which is offset by additional traction motor wear. I'm not alone in thinking this as BNSF and FEC are the only two roads to buy into this project. I work for UP as a engineer. Been here for a bit over 18 years now and speaking for myself and a lot of others in this industry we all feel a lot more secure knowing our power is pulling on every axle. But to each their own...

Awesome video!

Nicely done James. hit the good spots and got the action.

Awesome!!!

New subscriber. Like the snippets of information and the fact they are on the screen long enough to read. Looking foreword to catching up with

(LOUD) thats what we like is loud roaring EMD's!!!!!!!!!!!!

Great job!! I like mixed freights.

I live in Helena. Very familiar with this spot where the video starts. Worked within spitting distance of it for 30 years

Great video

great video. I like it

There is no tunnel east of Austin rd, trestle. The only tunnel on Mullen pass is the one at the summit which is west of Austin rd trestle. There is a cut so perhaps that is what you are mistaking for the train coming out of a tunnel prior to crossing the trestle.

Hey, it's my home town!

Very interesting video 👍

Great video! Only way to make it sound better is for GE to install EMD prime movers. Now THAT would be awesome! :)

great video...

Awesome video, spectacular camera work! I like the narrative throughout that explains what's happening. Awesome sound too. I wish all the you tube videos could be this good.

Why am I watching this?! I live next to a live railroad track. :)

very good video

Go Montana! Go By Sky Country!

Yay! Much better in the ad department - rail travel in Japan instead of Google Chrome! Who can beat this nice kind of advertising?

Great camera work excellent sound, tunnel or not still good.

A minor detail - there is no tunnel on either end of Skyline trestle. On the east side there is a rock cut that causes the sound effect you note. The only tunnel on Mullan Pass is the tunnel under the summit.

…..been there, done that, great train site !

I don't believe there is a tunnel on the east side of Skyline Trestle...I've been up there at both ends of the trestle in August 2014; on the east side is just a curved rock cut, along with a short access road (gated and locked) and some MOW equipment stored there. Distant on the west side is the east portal of Mullan Tunnel, but several hundred yards up the grade from the trestle. Someday I would like to walk over the old switchback grade the NP used before building Mullan Tunnel. I met the rancher / land owner up there and at the time he made no objection to me wandering around as long as I closed all the gates on his property before I left so his cattle wouldn't escape. I just was running out of time / daylight by then and had to continue on my journey towards the coast the next day. Interesting is how far up towards the summit of the gravel road the remnants of the old summit wye track extend...you can follow the old rails and roadbed for about 1/4 mile from Blossburg.Cool video - thanks for sharing.

Awesome video, just subbed

I wonder how much that bridge shakes when the train goes over it each time?

Love MRL's SD70ACe, MRL is a class II RR company with a fleet not big, but all are elite, like SD70ACe, SD45, SD40

Yeah! The former NP Main Street of the Northwest!

I would have liked to seen when they were doing this with SD-45's.

would it be correct that the 4 helper engines are servos to the lead engine ?

I own lots od railroad stocks, I'm a proud owner of railroads although very tiny lol.

OMG those 4 EMDs where pushing so hard at the steel bridge

Mmmm....i'm imagining these scenes in Milwaukee Road colors. lol

just here for the hissing sound

push i spose, surprise neither of the GEVOs chucked a turbo on the way up..

magic

Why do they turn some engines backwards?

I DID SUBSCRIBED TO THIS VIDEO ON YOU TUBE THANK YOU FROM DENISE TINDALL😂

Why didn’t they push from the back of the train?

I'm betting that over stretches of track like this, locomotives are likely always running in full power. I bring it up because I've always wondered if some kind of hybrid electrification arrangement couldn't be made, where the diesel-locos could draw from electricity from overhead catenaries in areas like this where their electrical demand is always going to be pegged? I would guess that it would also be likley that you could put larger traction motors **even if** they could only be "overdriven" when connected to overhead catenaries. To explain that last sentence more clearly, a 4400hp locomotive when operating solely on diesel gensets, but perhaps able to deliver 5000 (or more) hp when drawing electricity from overhead, etc.

The roar of the engines is awesome!!! great video!!! how many freight cars they usually move??

listen to the rails scream under all that weight wow

At 7:26 you say to listen to the train coming out of a tunnel. I have been there and didn't remember a tunnel so I checked Google Maps. Sorry, there is NO tunnel! There is a ridge that the train rounds before it goes over the curved trestle then goes into Mullan Tunnel. Maybe that is what you refer to. Also, at 3:16 between the pole and its support cable there is a little dark shape. It is a metal table that has broken coupler knuckles on it. If you are up there, check it out!

Awesome video, great sound! What did you use to record the videos?

To settle the GE vs EMD argument, GE is good for flat and fast, EMD is good for Hill and hard.

Too quiet for me. I long for the 135db unmuffled 567V16 of yesteryear.

I question the logic on two engines up front, followed by two empty flat cars, then four engines in the middle. Seems like a recipe for derailing.

i was an engineer on a tug , one emd 3000 shp makes more noise than a 100000 shp crosshead engine EMD, thirty noisy but weigh bugger all 900rpm in ships

is that the bridge in the movie Strips?

Does Montana Rail Link still have any of the SD45's with the original 20 cylinder EMD engine's, or are they history? I remember about 15+ year's ago, TRAINS Magazine had a feature about the EMD SD-45's which included both the Tunnel Motors and the original design. 🤠

Forget this diesel stuff. Let’s see some original Northern Pacific Z-5 action by here!

Beautifully shot! What is the ruling grade there?

EMD's as Helpers for GE's sounds about right lol

I assume theres a crew on the helper set to get it back and forth, but when its cut in it runs remote controlled?