If you're simulating RRs you should do it right
- Thread starter gus1911
- Start date
Railwoodman
Well-known member
Just a thought , wouldn't that depend on the route , grade, and the tonnage of your coal cars ? Engines were not assigned for just there ability to pull the consist . But for braking and power to control there consist over that 50 miles . And if up grade , just might require pushers to get there . My 2 cents
Matt
Matt
I see where you're coming from. Using a pair of sd-45's to haul 20 coal cars seems like overkill. It might not even seem prototypical if they have to traverse switches too tight for six-axle locos. I found that underpowering the motive power on my layouts gave me more of a challenge and personal enjoyment. This meant less six-axle locos and more four-axle locos. Also I tried not to pair them as often, so that I got the chance to run the loco backwards, which can be fun.
I did notice though, that when another player in my multiplayer session attempted to get his single loco going with his consist, he couldn't get it moving. Apparently DCC mode may not in fact be the easiest method of getting a heavy train moving. This might explain why you see overpowered equipment in the in-game sessions, because they were concerned about people getting stuck using DCC mode. Just my theory.
You can test this for yourself at the curved track leading to the power plant on Kickstarter County. Stop the loaded coal cars on the curve, and try to get it moving again.
I did notice though, that when another player in my multiplayer session attempted to get his single loco going with his consist, he couldn't get it moving. Apparently DCC mode may not in fact be the easiest method of getting a heavy train moving. This might explain why you see overpowered equipment in the in-game sessions, because they were concerned about people getting stuck using DCC mode. Just my theory.
You can test this for yourself at the curved track leading to the power plant on Kickstarter County. Stop the loaded coal cars on the curve, and try to get it moving again.
https://www.facebook.com/Jib228/videos/10212003678031263/?l=8498465732847187862
How ever, having over powered trains isn't all ways unprototypical.
How ever, having over powered trains isn't all ways unprototypical.
Sure in our "play" world this is fine, but sometimes railroads need to use smaller locomotives for their heavy trains due to track conditions and curves. You can see this sometimes on smaller branch lines with rough track, or perhaps management not willing to fork over some cash to lease or purchase appropriate power like the local railroad in my area where SD45s, GP40s and SD40s are their mainstay.
The binding of the wheels on the coal trains will happen in real life as well considering that the wheels are biting into the track due to the weight of the loaded coal hoppers. This will happen due to the cars being pushed "into" the track on the curve.
Keep in mind too that coal its self is very heavy and this is why there are short coal trains in the eastern US while in the west in the Powder River region, there are coal trains nearly a mile long. Speaking of these mile long coal trains... During my Midwest and western Midwestern travels, I have seen large SD70s, and various GEVOs on both ends of these trains. While they move in the 40 mph back here in the east, they are moving at 50-60 mph across the Great Plaines.
cascaderailroad
New member
A train has an approximate departure time, and crews are called when to arrive, the engine shop readies locos that are to be available for crews. Some temporary crews take the readied locos to the next yard storage area so the road crews can man them, and couple up to the consist(s). Sometimes you will see ten or more huge locos traveling at track speed with little or no railcars in tow, as they are needed 100 miles distant due to loco shortage at the far away terminal. Naturally a huge 6 axle loco would not be preferred as a branchline switcher loco on the NJ Vineland secondary, but it may be used.
I would use 4 axle GP's, SW's, and smaller wheelbase locos on a tight radius branchlines
Some rail yards have only 2 locos on the ready track by the yard tower, as the corporate dispatch center predetermined that amount of locos were needed at least 12 hours in advance
Most roundhouses have only a few locos on the ready track, and most tracks are vacant of locos
I would use 4 axle GP's, SW's, and smaller wheelbase locos on a tight radius branchlines
Some rail yards have only 2 locos on the ready track by the yard tower, as the corporate dispatch center predetermined that amount of locos were needed at least 12 hours in advance
Most roundhouses have only a few locos on the ready track, and most tracks are vacant of locos
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John, the coal trains out here are beasts weighing in at a whooping 16,000 tons. The real spectacle is watching them climb out of the Powder River Basin. It's all upgrade out of the basin to the high plains of Wyoming and beyond. It takes every ounce of power those units can provide to get them over the road and into Nebraska and beyond where ever their destinations are. Power is usually given at a hp/ton ratio. a 20 car coal train is something that shortlines like here in Idaho handle. EIRR was at one point handling 35 car coal trains for the sugar beet plants in Rupert, Burley, and Paul. These trains were powered by the more powerful 4 axle units in the Eastern Idaho Railroad fleet, GP40's. However, UP sends them occasional 75-100 car unit grain trains for the ethanol plant in Burley. The entire EIRR fleet is not powerful enough to handle the monster trains, so they barrow the UP power and run them through to the plant, and then back to UP at Minidoka. It's an extremely slow run because the track isn't made to handle highpseed 6 axle trains. Max speed in general is probably about 35 even for the turns and local trains the EIRR runs. However, recently started about 2 years ago, UP decided to run Z's between Global 1 in Chicago, and Brooklyn Intermodal yard in Portland, OR. These trains are ZG1BR, and ZBRG1. Usually, neither train is massive, sometimes only running an extreme 18 cars. But because they run on such tight schedules, UP intentionally over powers these trains in order to keep speed on the 2 day run between Chicago and Portland. I've seen some running 25 cars with 5 units on the head ranging from GEVO's and SD70's to AC4400CW's and even a C40-8. Just watch and see how your road operates, you'd be surprised at what you might find racing across the landscapes out there.
P.S. if you want to see some of the trains I'm talking about, I have a few here you can watch and enjoy
https://www.youtube.com/user/TheUPguy1/videos
John, the coal trains out here are beasts weighing in at a whooping 16,000 tons. The real spectacle is watching them climb out of the Powder River Basin. It's all upgrade out of the basin to the high plains of Wyoming and beyond. It takes every ounce of power those units can provide to get them over the road and into Nebraska and beyond where ever their destinations are. Power is usually given at a hp/ton ratio. a 20 car coal train is something that shortlines like here in Idaho handle. EIRR was at one point handling 35 car coal trains for the sugar beet plants in Rupert, Burley, and Paul. These trains were powered by the more powerful 4 axle units in the Eastern Idaho Railroad fleet, GP40's. However, UP sends them occasional 75-100 car unit grain trains for the ethanol plant in Burley. The entire EIRR fleet is not powerful enough to handle the monster trains, so they barrow the UP power and run them through to the plant, and then back to UP at Minidoka. It's an extremely slow run because the track isn't made to handle highpseed 6 axle trains. Max speed in general is probably about 35 even for the turns and local trains the EIRR runs. However, recently started about 2 years ago, UP decided to run Z's between Global 1 in Chicago, and Brooklyn Intermodal yard in Portland, OR. These trains are ZG1BR, and ZBRG1. Usually, neither train is massive, sometimes only running an extreme 18 cars. But because they run on such tight schedules, UP intentionally over powers these trains in order to keep speed on the 2 day run between Chicago and Portland. I've seen some running 25 cars with 5 units on the head ranging from GEVO's and SD70's to AC4400CW's and even a C40-8. Just watch and see how your road operates, you'd be surprised at what you might find racing across the landscapes out there.
P.S. if you want to see some of the trains I'm talking about, I have a few here you can watch and enjoy
https://www.youtube.com/user/TheUPguy1/videos
That's an awesome description, Matt!
Back east here we get 10 to 40 car trains of mostly scrap metal, plastic pellets, sand, and some chemical tanks. The old paper plant trains are long gone - the ones that once hauled hoppers and tanks of clay and chemicals and boxcars full of newsprint, and the more common container trains don't usually run east of Ayer.
When I was out in northern Colorado and heading into the Dakotas last year, I saw a number of really, really long coal trains as they headed east across the region. The wye at Orin, WY was quite amazing with its realignment of tracks. There were work trains and MOW trucks out that day relaying rail on the junction.
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Here in Detroit the PRR had an old bridge you had to go over to get to the passenger station and it had a load limit that was to low for there 4-6-2 engines so passenger trains had to come into the station pulled by a 0-6-0 yard engine. This lasted up to the PRR getting EMD E's.
That did run through my mind a couple of times. It's funny I'll take a storm chasing trip and may or may not see a lot of trains. When I usually see them, my video camera is buried under the seat and by the time I dig it out, we've turned on to another road, after paralleling the tracks for 100s of miles, only to now see nothing or nothing but abandoned ROW.
One of the more memorable trips took us along the Strafford Sub and across to La Junta CO. We've done this a few times now, and the busy highway parallels the railroad for a good portion of the trip. There is a constant stream of BNSF freights lined up one after another as far as the eyes could see.
Being closer to dark during one trip, we could also see the railroad signals all lit up as well and saw them flip from green to red as the trains moved along. These were mile long container, auto, and general freights and the shear number of trains reminded me of a model railroad or Trainz route.
Another time, we were heading from Clovis NM east, and as we passed through the same area, as we approached Strafford, there were trains going both directions along with locals serving the elevators and methanol plant.
On another trip, we were up in Montana. We were watching storms in the area and traveled up to Shelby. Heading into Shelby was like driving the Marias Pass X route. I knew the track layout and recognized the yard. Another day we headed up to Browning then into Glacier National Park. As we drove through Essex, there were a number of freights, though not very long due to the grades, along with Amtrak's Empire Builder consists. On this same trip, we stopped in Forsythe, MT for gas and there were long coal trains lined up in the yard. Sadly this trip brought us up along US 12 as we headed to Great Falls. This highway paralleled the old Pacific Extension. Some of the viaducts were in place, and some of the yard structures were visible in Melstone with an old gantry still standing that was used for train orders.
Anyway, the west and Midwest hold a lot of interest and could mean a whole new world of modeling. Heck, I've been through Mobridge, SD and up into the Standing Rock reservation so that could mean a whole MILW route too!
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John, I've been to Salt Lake City a few times, and it always amazes me at the number of UP trains that pass through that city. On my most recent adventure about 2004 timeframe I saw at least 12-14 trains passing while traveling through. Intermodal, grain, manfiests, you name it passes through the wonderful SLC backdrop. One of these days I'm gonna get back down there just to watch the trains in and around area as it would be great fun. It used to be here on the OSL one could see trains lined up in the sidings in stuff, and 20+ daylight freights weren't un-common. I used to watch a great deal with my grandad while he was working. He'd be doing something inside one of his sites along the route, and I'd be out watching the trains. There are a few places I knew I would see a train even if we were there for only 10 minutes. It was so much fun. Sometimes we would be out all day from dawn to dusk, and I one time spotted over 30 trains in our journey through Idaho. Shoot now I can't even count 30 trains in an entire day. Just some good memories though
.In the UK, DB Cargo use their standard Class 66 traction (3300hp diesel) on anything from 2 - 3 wagon trips of less than 100 tonnes trailing, to 2000 feet 4000 tonne trailing loads. The days of having a wide range of motive power for different types of work are gone. A high hp loco working a light train will accelerate quickly and can shut off power or reduce throttle to keep momentum just as economically as in the old days when you would have an 1100hp Type 2 diesel thrashing its guts out to move a lightweight train. (Of course the Type 2 sounded better, but that's not really a consideration when it comes to commercial operation of a railway!).
I saw that in some videos but not knowing the horsepower of the locomotives it didn't make sense.
We tend to run shorter freights where I live due to the lack of business and somewhat steeper terrain. Long gone are the days of nearly mile-long freight trains. The last time I saw one of those heading out of Lawrence, MA was about 20 years ago. When I was growing up there were the paper and potato trains that came down out of Maine. There were mile long consists of nothing but boxcars that had State of Maine on them in red white and blue an used for potatoes. The BAR and MEC ran trains of plain-looking boxcars (MEC orange and BAR boxcar brown) for newsprint and lumber products.
Heading north were slurry tanks with Kayolin clay and hoppers with dry clay for the newsprint business. Today there are only a few paper plants left and those mostly ship by truck. Guilford Transportation did a number on this business as they focused on the mainline instead of the smaller branch lines and lesser volume as the paper industry declined.
norfolksouthern37
what's a normal map?
ive made a little spreadsheet that helps and is close enough to correct for what im doing.
in this example, 8500 tons up a 2% grade at 25mph. this tells me how many locos i need to do the job.
in this example, 8500 tons up a 2% grade at 25mph. this tells me how many locos i need to do the job.
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cascaderailroad
New member
CSX from Baltimore to NY is relatively flat, and they only use 2 six axle big locos ... sometimes a short train will have only 1 loco ... sometimes you will see a 5 car train being pulled by 8 locos, as these locos are needed in a distant terminal ASAP, and they decided to tag on some extra mis-sorted railcars. Sometimes a section of Tropicana reefers are tagged on to the rear of a regular freight, or a section of trash train consist is hooked on to the rear. Usually there is a shortage of power at all terminals, and it is a constant shell game HS movement of locos to distant terminals.