HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: brennan@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu (Joseph Brennan)
Subject: Re: Unusual Trackage (Was: Unusual tunnels?)
Reply-To: brennan@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu (Joseph Brennan)
Organization: Columbia University
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1993 19:38:28 GMT

>> 2) At Bay Head on the NY&LB ( CNJ/PRR 50/50 ) there was a reversing loop
>> so that power did not have to be run arround the train.

That's still there.  What purpose it serves now with push-pull trains
beats me.  I was talking to a conductor on the Bay Head train last
summer and he said, well they only have to flip the seats at the Long
Branch end of the shuttle.

>> More well known is the reversing loop under Grand Central Station (NYC).

On both levels.  One reason for this is that long-distance trains got
cleaned and prepared at Mott Haven, the Bronx, just north of
Manhattan.  Incoming trains discharged passengers at the arrivals
platforms at the west side (far right as trains came in), and then
could run forwards around the loop to go to Mott Haven.  This doesn't
really explain the loop on the suburban level, which possibly was to
reduce conflicting train movements at least for the trains that
looped.  A loop terminal is more efficient than a stub terminal since
with a loop you shouldn't have to have outbound and inbound trains
crossing.

>> I seem to recall that maps may also indicate a loop at Sunnyside Yard.

That is definitely still there.  The yard is on the north side of the
main tracks that run to New England and to the Long Island RR.  Trains
from Penn Station use the loop to pass under the main tracks and enter
the yard from the east or far end.  When leaving the yard, they run
out the west end.  This is a very nice arrangement as all trains in
the yard face the same way (west/south); the loop serves both to cross
the main and to reverse the trains.

>> From maps, there appears to have been a reversing loop at Harmon, NY on
>> the NYC, however I don't recall seeing one there.  There seems to be
>> some evidence that one existed just north of the shops.  Anyone know
>> when this was removed?

Don't know when it was removed, but before the 1970's anyway.  You can
see the remains, and there is now a road bridge over the tracks there
providing access to new houses on the water's edge.  Now this loop
went from the northbound line to north end of the yard, which is on
the west side of the main, which is perhaps peculiar, since only EMUs
and electric engines would run forward through such a loop.  Harmon
was the southern terminal for steam power, and I wonder whether steam
locomotives would -back- over the loop to get to the front of
northbound trains?  EMUs were not stored at Harmon originally but in
another yard just north of Croton station, which was later named Croton
North and then closed around 1970; Croton station was near the village
of Croton.

These are the only loops I can think of on mainlines near New York.

Joe Brennan     Columbia University in the City of New York
                ("affiliation shown for identification only")
via Internet:   brennan@columbia.edu
via BITNET:     brennan@cunixf

Newsgroups: rec.railroad
From: SDupa@xview.csuohio.edu (Scott Hewis)
Subject: Re: Wisconsin Central power on the Wheeling?
Organization: Cleveland State University - Telecomm 
Distribution: na
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 16:29:04 GMT

In article <P235wB4w165w@railnet.nshore.ORG> rad@railnet.nshore.ORG (Rick DeMattia) writes:
>From: rad@railnet.nshore.ORG (Rick DeMattia)
>Subject: Wisconsin Central power on the Wheeling?
>Date: Sat, 09 Jan 93 21:21:00 EST

>Has the Wheeling & Lake Erie purchased some Wisconsin Central
>power?  I drove through Glenwillow OH today, and the Wheeling
>job tied up there (5-day-a-week railroad, you know) had a locomotive
>in Wisconsin Central paint.

>-- 
>UUCP: {uunet|backbone}!railnet!rad   rad@railnet.nshore.org
>CompuServe: 72517.666@compuserve.COM

The Wheeling has leased a small number of Wisconsin Central engines to 
replace the *old and beat up* NS engines that NS took back.

Scott Hewis
--------------------------------------
* Scott Hewis; Telecom Specialist    *
* Cleveland State University         *
* email c/o scott@asgard.csuohio.edu *
--------------------------------------
From: rfj@alpha.sunquest.com (RICHARD F. JONES)
Newsgroups: rec.railroad
Subject: Arizona excursion help requested..
Keywords: Arizona,excursion
Date: 11 Jan 93 16:37:00 GMT
Organization: Sunquest Information Systems, Tucson AZ
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.4-b1

Greetings!!

While out east of Tucson, Az. this past Saturday (1/9/93)
photographing Amtrak's Sunset Limited, a second passenger train came
through the area and I could use some help locating who sponsored it. 

The excursion train was composed of about 6 old "Arizona RR" cars,
including an old Zepher style observation car and an open rear deck
observation car.  The train was heading East, East of Tucson at about
1:30 P.M. MST and was being pulled by two engines (I recall SP 7210 in
the lead).

I have several photographs of the train as it was passing through a
canyon and would like to send copies of the photos to the organizers
of the trip.

If you know of anyone I can contact regarding this, please send their
name/address/phone via E-mail to me, as I can post to rec.railroad but 
I do not have access to read messages on rec.railroad.

Thanks!!

Richard Jones   rfj@alpha.sunquest.com  -  internet
From: raveling@Unify.com (Paul Raveling)
Newsgroups: rec.railroad
Subject: About diesels...
Date: 7 Jan 93 17:28:15 GMT
Organization: Unify Corporation (Sacramento)


	Dave Pierson (pierson@empror.enet.dec.com) asked...

> So, what makles a diesel a diesel?

	A diesel engine is one that uses the diesel cycle, named for
	Dr. Rudolf Diesel [I think] around the turn of the century.
	It's one of the well-known thermodynamic cycles, and consists
	of these four phases of action on its working gas:

	    --  Adiabatic compression
	    --  Heating at constant pressure
	    --  Adiabatic expansion
	    --	Cooling at constant volume

	For those who've had enough time to forget, adiabatic refers
	to something that happens without a net gain or loss of
	energy (heat).

	Some other thermodynamic cycles of interest are ...

	    --  The Rankine cycle, which is the one applying to
		steam in the cylinders of a steam engine

	    --	The Otto cycle, which is used by typical
		gasoline engines [in Ottomobiles ...er, automobiles, & such]

	    --  The Carnot cycle, probably the first one mentioned
		in typical textbooks.  It's actually a class of cycles;
		any cycle bounded by two isotherms & 2 adiabatics.


	The common image of a diesel is 2-stroke engine that uses
	igniters only for starting, but this isn't the whole truth.
	Some locomotives use 4-stroke diesels, and some diesels use
	electrical ignition in the same way as gasoline engines.
	In the end the thing that counts is which thermodynamic cycle
	it uses.


------------------
Paul Raveling
Raveling@Unify.com
From: grr@cbmvax.commodore.com (George Robbins)
Newsgroups: rec.railroad
Subject: Re: When is a diesel not?
Date: 6 Jan 93 04:45:32 GMT
Reply-To: grr@cbmvax.commodore.com (George Robbins)
Organization: Commodore, West Chester, PA

In article <1993Jan4.180010.7163@ryn.mro4.dec.com> pierson@empror.enet.dec.com (dave pierson) writes:
> When is a diesel? [1]
> 
> Most RRs use diesel engines, to run the alternators(generators) which run
> the traction motors which....
> 
> But several in the USA have been experimenting with alternate fuels.  The
> articles I have seen, to date, had not been clear as to whether these
> conversions were, in fact "diesels", or whether spark ignition had been added.
...
> So, what makles a diesel a diesel?  Compression Ignition.  Originally intended
> to increase thermal efficiency, compressions high enough to be "self igniting"
> also were found to be more reliable than spark ignition.  It is ironic, in view
> of developments, to note the Dr Rudolf Diesel was funded by the German COAL
> industry.  They wanted an alternative to the Otto (spark igntiion) engine,
> running off city/illuminating gas, that was cutting into coal sales for
> stationary power.  Dr Diesel built them one, running on powdered coal.

I'm not sure of how much of this was a question.

One significant difference between the spark ignition engine and the diesel
is *when* the fuel and air is mixed.  In the spark ignition engine, the fuel
and air are mixed before compression and do not spontaneously ignite - a time
spark ignites the mixture at, or slightly before the point of maximum pressure.

In the diesel engin, the *air* is compressed resulting in a high enough
temperature to ignite the atomized fuel when it is sprayed into the combustion
chamber.

Despite claims that a diesel can run on *any* fuel, the requrirements are
somewhate different.  The spark-ignited fuel must not spontaneously ignite
at a low temperture/pressure, must not quench the spark and must burn
cleanly and quickly.  The diesel fuel must ignite *reliably* at a fairly
low temperature, must atomize well and burn with a minimum of ash and
carbon deposits.

Your diesel fuel injector system relies on the hydraulics of an incompressible
liquid fuel - something like LNG or LPG that can vaporize would probably cause
vapor-lock in the injection lines and would also have trouble lubricating the
injection pump and nozzles.  I'm not sure, but the flash point of methane
might also be higher than fuel oil, leading to problems with compression
ignition when cold or running at low power settings.

Anyway, I'd expect these engines to be mostly spark ignition or perhaps some
kind of hybrid scheme.

With respect the LNG / LMG issue, this is kind of an interesting question,
since natural gas is almost entirely methane, other fractions such as propane
and butane which can be liqufied at ambient temperatures and moderate
temperatures being separated for LPG sales.

-- 
George Robbins - now working for,     work:   to be avoided at all costs...
but no way officially representing:   uucp:   {uunet|pyramid|rutgers}!cbmvax!grr
Commodore, Engineering Department     domain: grr@cbmvax.commodore.com
From: czl30@duts.ccc.amdahl.com (Chris Lee)
Newsgroups: rec.railroad
Subject: Re: Electric Train Sparking
Date: 12 Jan 93 15:54:53 GMT
Reply-To: czl30@DUTS.ccc.amdahl.com (Chris Lee)
Organization: Amdahl Corporation, Sunnyvale CA

In article <8153@skye.ed.ac.uk> ken@aiai.ed.ac.uk (Ken Johnson) writes:
>
>There are stories of trains on the Southern Region (650v AC third rail)
>arcing so vigorously that the pick-up shoe became welded to the third
>rail.  I have no idea whether this is true or not. 
>
>Ken Johnson  (current kit: `Linda', F.R., 60% finished)
>
>
>
>-- 
>Son, all the pretty, intelligent, healthy     #    Ken Johnson, AIAI,
>young women are taken. It's a basic rule of   #    80 South Bridge, Edinburgh
>the universe, and if you don't like it, go    #    Tel 031-650 2756 
>somewhere else.        -- my dad  1906-1992   #    Fax 031-650 6513

I've heard stories of 4-REPs getting their shoes welded to the track.
The current drawn by these at top speed caused some pretty spectactular
arcing. I haven't seen the new Wessex electrics, though. Presumably they
have the same problem? Modern Railways (delivered approx a month late)
has mentioned some pretty fast runs with them, and I seem to remember
reading that they used some of the old traction equipment to save money.

Chris Lee
Newsgroups: rec.railroad,alt.religion.kibology
From: rsholmes@rodan.syr.EDU (Rich Holmes)
Subject: Re: RailPhones (was Re: The Elvis Stamp)
In-reply-to: news@geovision.gvc.com's message of Mon, 11 Jan 1993 18:17:22 GMT
Organization: Syracuse University
	<C0oCFx.KvE@world.std.com> <dz+39gh@rpi.edu>
	<C0pC50.Htn@geovision.gvc.com>
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 93 23:10:49 EST

In article <C0pC50.Htn@geovision.gvc.com> news@geovision.gvc.com (News Administrator) writes:

>I've taken the train between Ottawa and Toronto exactly 3 times.  The third
>time, it was 5 hours late (on a route I can drive in 5 hours) because of
>snow.  You know what they do to make up for you being 5 hours late?  They
>give you a voucher for 50% off the _next_ time you take the same route.
>Yeah, like there's going to _be_ a next time!

It could be worse. They could give you a voucher for 50% off on
Amtrak.

<rim shot>

Actually I like riding the train between Syracuse and, say, Albany...
just as long as it's *not* the Lakeshore.

"Is the Lakeshore on time this morning?"

"No, it's six hours late."

"Oh."

"Wait, I'll check. No, I was wrong. It's eight hours late."

"Oh."

--
- Rich Holmes
"Grown men, he told himself, in flat contradiction of centuries of
accumulated evidence about the way grown men behave, do not behave
like this." -- Douglas Adams
From: marr-leon@cs.yale.edu (Leon Marr)
Newsgroups: rec.railroad
Subject: Toy Train and Miniature Steam Engine Exhibit at Eli Whitney Museum, Hamden, CT. [MODEL]
Date: 12 Jan 1993 17:20:12 -0500
Organization: Yale University Computer Science Dept., New Haven, CT 06520-2158
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: zoo-gw.cs.yale.edu

Poster seen at the entrance to the Yale Medical School today:

The Age of Steam:

Explore the power of play.
An exhibition of toy trains and miniature steam engines.

Wednesday and Sunday, 12 noon to 5PM
Thursday, Friday and Saturday, 10AM to 3PM
Through 18 Jan 1993.

The Eli Whitney Museum
915 Whitney Av.
Hamden, Connecticut

(203) 777-1833

(Unfortunately, I have no further details.  I've never been to the Eli Whitney
 Museum, which should not be confused with the Whitney Museum in New York.)

Leon Marr
marr-leon@cs.yale.edu
Newsgroups: rec.railroad
From: lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich)
Subject: Electric Train Sparking
Originator: lip@s1.gov
Organization: Lawrence Livermore National Labs, Livermore CA
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1993 15:09:25 GMT


	Do any of you people have some favorite electric-train
sparking anecdotes?

	One of my favorites concerns the Market-Frankford
subway/elevated line in Philadelphia. A lot of times when getting off
at the northern platform of the 15th St. station, I'd look as the
train departed, and see _lots_ of illumination from third-rail sparks
-- it would seem almost continuous for about a second or so.

	In the Bay Area, I've occasionally seen BART sparking; every
BART third-rail spark or spark illumination I've ever seen is
instantaneous, however.

	On the Pentrex NEC videos, I've seen some sparks on the
overhead cable in some shots.

-- 
/Loren Petrich, the Master Blaster
/lip@s1.gov
From: btiffany@pbs.org
Newsgroups: rec.railroad
Subject: Re: X2000 in Corridor service - February
Date: 11 Jan 93 14:57:59 EST
Organization: PBS:Public Broadcasting Service, Alexandria, VA

Danny O'Bedlam writes:

> An AMTRAK staffer told me today (while I waited at 30th St station)
> that the X2000 train will be in service, as a Metroliner, beginning of
> next month.  He said it will leave Washington D.C. as a morning train
> to New York, and return back as an evening.  [meaning, miker@panix
> was right, they're keeping it parked in Washington]

The schedule on p#52 on 2/93 TRAINS is as follows:

1/21 - 2/5 n/b #112 lv DC noon ar NY 14:55, s/b #223 lv NY 16:30 ar DC 19:10
2/8 - 4/2 n/b #114 lv DC 13:00 ar NY 15:55, s/b #125 lv NY 18:00 ar DC 21:00
4/5 - 4/30 n/b #202 lv DC 6:50 ar NY 9:55 ar New Haven 11:55
	   s/b #223 lv New Haven 14:30 lv NY 16:30 ar DC 19:10

In May the X2000 will be running between New York and Boston, with New Haven -
Boston turnarounds on weekdays and special Boston - New London weekend trips.
Turboliner power cars will pull the train east of New Haven.

-- Bruce Tiffany

Newsgroups: rec.railroad
From: andre@king.slc.mentorg.com (Andre' Hut)
Subject: Re: Amtrak and cold weather
Organization: /net/king/usr1/andre/.organization
Date: 5 Jan 93 11:57:49

In article <5780@gold.gvg.tek.com> groverc@gold.gvg.tek.com (Grover Cleveland) writes:
   >Actually besides the snow, there has been a great deal of
   >ice heaving on the track. Not the kind of thing you would
   >want to run passenger equipment over.

   >I have this on good authority from a friend who works and travels
   >throughout Idaho and Montana. 

I've just spotted Amtrak headed east from Salt Lake City -> Denver
at 11am Mountain.  That's about 6 hours late.  It's ***COLD***
here!
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------
My opinions are solely my own, and do not necessarily reflect those
of my employer.

Andre' Hut       andre@slc.mentorg.com  or  utah-cs!caeco!andre
Mentor Graphics, Suite 300, 5295 South 300 West, Murray, Utah 84107
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: rec.railroad
From: rl@ferris.cray.com (Randy Lambertus)
Subject: Re: Electric Train Sparking
Organization: Cray Research, Inc.
Date: 12 Jan 93 08:23:33 CST

In article <1993Jan11.150925.2246@s1.gov> lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich) writes:
>
>	Do any of you people have some favorite electric-train
>sparking anecdotes?
>
>	One of my favorites concerns the Market-Frankford
>subway/elevated line in Philadelphia. A lot of times when getting off
>at the northern platform of the 15th St. station, I'd look as the
>train departed, and see _lots_ of illumination from third-rail sparks
>-- it would seem almost continuous for about a second or so.
>
>	In the Bay Area, I've occasionally seen BART sparking; every
>   (text deleted to save space)
>
>/lip@s1.gov

  Yes, I remember winter mornings in Pfaffenhofen, Gemany (Bavaria)
when the first train of the day, 5:30 A.M., would arrive. On some
particular days the Hoarfrost would have coated the catenary wire
and as the train came in from Ingolstadt, the pantograph looked
like a Fourth of July sparkler. An image I'll never forget.

Randy Lambertus               Cray Research, Region 4            rl@uk.cray.com
_______________________________________________________________________________
____________|____________|____________|____________|____________|____________|_
                                    /^^^\   
 __<+--+>__======================___\___/__    __<+--+>__======================
|_________/[]|O|## _\ /_  ##|O|[]\_________|  |_________/[]|O|## _\ /_  ##|O|[]
|============| |===\PRR/====| |============|  |============| |===\PRR/====| |==
|_4811_______|_|____\_/_____|_|_______4811_|@@|_4890_______|_|____\_/_____|_|__
| o=o  (_)  (_)  (_)    (_)  (_)  (_)  o=o |  | o=o  (_)  (_)  (_)    (_)  (_) 
===============================================================================
**[]****[]****[]****[]****[]****[]****[]****[]****[]****[]****[]****[]****[]***
Newsgroups: rec.railroad
From: cal@ee.ryerson.ca (Calvin Henry-Cotnam)
Subject: Re: Radial Railway Museum
Organization: Ryerson Polytechnical Institute, Toronto
Distribution: na
Date: Wed, 13 Jan 1993 02:33:28 GMT


salfi@53iss6.Waterloo.NCR.COM (Mike Salfi) writes:
>
> [very good description of the Halton
>  County Radian Railway Museum deleted]
>
>You can ride the streetcars indicated on a mile of wooded track to the
>eastern terminus, which houses another shed that contains additional cars,
>however these are in very bad shape.

It's worth adding that the mile (or so) of wooded track follows the
original ROW of the old Toronto-Guelph radial railway line.


Calvin Henry-Cotnam, CATE          | "...My brain IBM"
Ryerson Polytechnical Institute    | "So if you see me, acting strangely..."
Toronto, Ontario, Canada           |                  STYX, Mr. Roboto
Newsgroups: rec.railroad
Subject: Re: INFO REQUEST: Railroad Tycoon for the Atari ST bug?
From: mccartney_g@ab.wvnet.edu
Date: 9 Jan 93 14:08:10 -0500
Organization: Alderson-Broaddus College

In article <JR.93Jan7092256@gilligan.ksr.com>, jr@ksr.com (John Robinson) writes:
> In article <1993Jan6.020656.21687@borland.com> johnh@borland.com (John Haskey) writes:
> 
>    p.s.  Try building a signal tower before you've built a station.  Loco's appear
>    out of nowhere!
> 
> I have the Mac version.  Agree on all the obsessing; I got mine for
> Christmas 1991 and have logged many late-night hours...  There don't
> seem to be too many bugs in this version, but I did bump into this one
> early:
> 
> Before I understood about dynamiting the stations I don't want any
> more, I tried rebuilding a station into a signal tower to eliminate
> it.  This caused all sorts of confusion in the mouse interface to the
> maps used to set up train schedules, and other odd things as I recall.
> 
> I wish there weren't a limit of 30 (or whatever it is) stations...
> 
> I also wish it would let you really take over a RR you have bought out
> (connect to their track, and schedule their trains, etc.).  Anyone
> ever retired as Prsident of the US (or Prime Minister)?
> 
> Minor bug: you can't get a subsidiary to build to another city (I
> think this describes the bug - I'm hazy on it).
> 
> Toot-toot,
> --
> /jr, aka John Robinson                       Place stamps here
> internet: jr@ksr.com                    Post Office will not deliver
> uucp: {world,harvard,uunet}!ksr!jr      mail without correct postage




I have the IBM version and have had some of the wishes listed above, but the
thing that really made me mad was the fact that you had to retire within one
hundered years from when you started, thus not allowing you to use GP units in
the east US.  Another thing that made me really mad was the fact that you can
not cross their tracks but they can cross mine.  This happened when I had a
line that stretched from Norfolk to somewhere in the north next to the
Greatlakes area.  One of the other compannies came and built a track and
tunneled under mine, but when I tried it, I wasn't allowed.

I downloaded a file that was supposed to upgrade the game but I can't tell any
difference so far.

						Greg McCartney
						McCartney_G@ab.wvnet.edu
From: grr@cbmvax.commodore.com (George Robbins)
Newsgroups: rec.railroad
Subject: Re: Steam Heat on Electric Locomotives
Date: 10 Jan 93 06:46:02 GMT
Reply-To: grr@cbmvax.commodore.com (George Robbins)
Organization: Commodore, West Chester, PA

In article <8886@orbit.cts.com> rambler@pnet51.orb.mn.org (Dan Meyer) writes:
> 
> Someone explained to me that a steam generator was a diesel engine driving 
> an electric generator and that boils the water. Also, the heat from the 
> diesel's cooling system was used to temper the incoming water before 
> it was heated in the boiler.

Someone was confused.

A "steam generator" is essentially a "boiler".  The term tends to get used
where one wants to distinguish the device from a normal direct fired pressure
boiler.  In this case the distinction is that the steam isn't under any
significant pressure - just enough to blow through the steam line through
the train.

The "diesel" part is often a reference to the boiler buring "diesel fuel",
which is essentially the same has home heating oil, whereas most steam
locomotives used "Bunker C" industrial fuel oil, which is much heaver and
needs to be heated before it will flow through pipes.

As other have mentioned, there have been some attempts to use waste heat
from the prime-mover diesel to provide heat, but for heating a whole train
a separate steam generator is needed.

One diesel electric car (doodle-bug) I'm familiar with used the engine
cooling water for hot water heat, but this was apparently supplemented by
a coal burning stove with an hot-water coil.

-- 
George Robbins - now working for,     work:   to be avoided at all costs...
but no way officially representing:   uucp:   {uunet|pyramid|rutgers}!cbmvax!grr
Commodore, Engineering Department     domain: grr@cbmvax.commodore.com
Newsgroups: rec.railroad,alt.religion.kibology