Monthly Calendar Report for July, 2012

Train 20T eastbound down Two at “Ledges.” (Photo by BobbaLew with Phil Faudi.)

—The July 2012 entry of my own calendar is the most successful photograph I ever got at “Ledges,” a photo-location downhill from Horseshoe Curve on Allegheny Crossing.
It’s Train 20T, a stacker, eastbound downhill on Track Two.
“Ledges” is a large rock outcropping next to the old Pennsy mainline, now Norfolk Southern, to Allegheny summit.
Standing atop the outcropping looks down on the tracks.
That new signal-bridge is a distraction, and rock takes up the right side of the view.
“Ledges” was first shown to me by Phil Faudi (“FOW-deee;” as in “wow”), the guy I chase trains with in the Altoona area.
I took pictures at that time, but I never felt it was photogenic.
Yet this photograph, taken recently, is fantastic.
In morning light the lighting is perfect.
I always felt I needed a double in this location, one climbing, already past, on Track Three, and one descending on Track One.
Or in the other direction, one descending, already past, on Track One, and one climbing on Track Three.
Two trains at once are fairly often. I’ve even seen three at the same time!
The climbing train would obscure anything on Two.
But this single train descending on Two is extraordinary!
The fact it’s on Track Two centers it in the composition.

Photo by BobbaLew with Phil Faudi.

Track One never works.

Track one, to the left, would be off-balance.
And climbing on Three in morning light makes the light wrong.
I was surprised by this photograph.
It’s extraordinarily successful.
“Ledges” is a great place to watch trains, but to my mind not a good photograph.
Yet this photograph blows me away.
Lead is a GE wide-cab Dash 9-40CW.
Second is a non wide-cab Dash 9-40C.
I have no idea what the third unit is. (It looks like a wide-cab.)
Dash 9s are usually 4,400 horsepower (Dash 9-44C). But Norfolk Southern ordered derated Dash-9s (Dash 9-40C) for reliability.
Three units is typical power for a stacker.
Stackers are priority, somewhat.
This train is rolling downhill at the speed-limit for freight, I think 30 mph.




Stacker west over an old Pennsy stone-arch. (Photo by Rich Borkowski.)

—Wow!
The July 2012 entry of my Norfolk Southern Employees' Photography-Contest calendar is equal to my own calendar-shot (above).
We are in the Susquehanna (“suss-kwe-HAN-nuh”) river valley. The bridge is over Sherman Creek, which flows into the Susquehanna.
Farther south (railroad east) is the famous Rockville Bridge, another stone-arch but all the way across the Susquehanna.
Rockville is a monster; it’s bridge number-three, and was finished in 1902.
It was built by Pennsy, wide enough for four tracks.
It would take a direct hit from a thermonuclear warhead to take it out.
It still remains the longest stone-masonry arch railroad viaduct in the world. It’s comprised of forty-eight 70-foot spans, for a total length of 3,820 feet.
This bridge north of Rockville in Duncannan (“done-cannon”) is a much smaller brother. Same construction though: stone-masonry arch.
Many bridges on the old Pennsy are stone-masonry arch.
Pennsy built for time-immemorial; no wooden trestles.
The Susquehanna was one major barrier to building the original Pennsy, Harrisburg to Pittsburgh.
The other barrier was the Allegheny mountains, breached with a grading trick, world-famous Horseshoe Curve.
By looping within a valley, the railroad breached the Alleghenies without steep grades.
The breach is steep enough (averaging 1.75 percent; which is 1.75 feet up for every 100 feet forward) to often require helper-locomotives, but not impossible. (Like 4 percent.)
The Susquehanna was bridged with a massive bridge that crossed the wide river north of Harrisburg.
First it was only two tracks; the final bridge (Rockville) can carry four. (I think it’s now down to two and three.)
Another railroad also bridged the Susquehanna north of Harrisburg, Northern Central, but theirs was only a single-track covered bridge.
Pennsy’s bridge was substantial, and Pennsy later gained control of Northern Central. When they did, Northern Central trains started using Rockville Bridge.
The original Northern Central bridge was removed.
All over Pennsy you find stone-masonry bridges, even on lines Pennsy later came to control.
For example, the original public railroad from Philadelphia to the Susquehanna, later taken over by Pennsy.

Photo by Willis McCaleb.

Stone-masonry piers on the Trenton Cutoff.

A massive bridge on the Thorndale Cutoff for freight around Philadelphia toward New York City is stone-masonry piers.
(The Trenton Cutoff is also called the Thorndale Cutoff.)
Pennsy’s bridge over the Delaware river into Trenton, NJ is stone-masonry arch, as is the gigantic bridge over the Schuykill (“skoo-kull”) river in Philadelphia.
Both bridges are Pennsy’s old line to New York City, now Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor.
The “High-Line” freight bypass over Pennsy’s 30th-Street Station in Philadelphia is stone-masonry arch.



(My calendars are sorta plain from here on.)




1970 Dodge Challenger 340-SixPack. (Peter Harholdt©.)

—The July 2012 entry of my Motorbooks Musclecars calendar is a pretty good picture, but I wouldn’t call it a musclecar.
A 340 cubic-engine isn’t big enough.
What we have here is a really great car, but not a musclecar.
It would have the balance a musclecar wouldn’t have. A 340 cubic-inch engine is not so heavy it would make the front-end plow in corners.
Nevertheless a 340 SixPack is a hot-rodded engine. “SixPack” is three two-barrel carburetors.
The car is also called the “T/A,” for SCCA’s (Sports-Car Club of America) Trans-Am series, which raced ponycars like the Mustang and Camaro.
Ponycars were such a success, Chrysler wanted in on the action.
Their Plymouth Barracuda, the first ponycar, based on the Plymouth Valiant, had to be improved to make it competitive with Mustang and Camaro.
This Challenger, and Plymouth’s new Barracuda, are the result.
But they are larger, based on Chrysler’s intermediate car.
If I have this right, the car’s firewall and windshield are Chrysler’s intermediate, the Charger and the Satellite.
The new Chrysler ponycars were bigger and heavier than the GM and Ford ponycars, which were based on compacts, the Chevy II and Falcon.

Race-driver Swede Savage’s Trans-Am Barracuda.

The newer Chrysler ponycars were raced in the Trans-Am series, although not very successfully.
I’m not sure they ever won a race.
They had major backing and a good driver, but weren’t very well developed, that is, reliable.
Chrysler had to market the T/A to race Trans-Am.




A Pennsy war-baby (2-10-4) goes up The Hill west of Altoona. (Photo by Fred Kern.)

—The July 2012 entry of my AII-Pennsy color calendar looks very familiar.
It looks like it’s at Brickyard Crossing just west of Altoona, PA.
The highway-crossing is not Brickyard Road. It’s actually “Porta” Road.
But the grade crossing had a brickyard nearby, since torn down.
So the crossing was called “Brickyard Crossing.”
I’ve been to Brickyard many times.
I found it maybe 10 years ago on an Internet map, and looked for it.
You’re up-close-and-personal.
And so many trains are on this line, there’s a pretty good chance you’ll see one.

Photo by BobbaLew with Phil Faudi.

WOW!

In 2009 I snagged one of the best Faudi pictures I ever got at this location.
You go up the gravel embankment at left; there’s a path.
One evening I found a fan up there in a lawnchair.
Pepsi in hand, he was watching the parade.
Right at the grade-crossing there’s a downhill defect-detector for Tracks One and Two. “Norfolk Southern milepost 238.2, Track One, no defects,” right on your rail radio scanner. (It’s not there any more; it’s been moved slightly up The Hill.)
A downhill train had already called out the signal not far west of the crossing. It was on Track One.
It started past.
And now a second train was coming up Track Three out of Altoona, just like the train pictured; climbing The Hill toward Allegheny summit.
The second train hove into view, blowing for the crossing.
BAM! Got it.
A double; two trains at once. One downhill on One, and a second train uphill on Three.

This engine has a Belpaire firebox.

Pennsy’s J 2-10-4 is it’s only engine without the famous slab-sided Belpaire firebox, a Pennsy trademark.
When WWII broke out, Pennsy found itself with tired old locomotives, and the War Production Board wouldn’t allow Pennsy to develop replacements.
Pennsy tried the Norfolk & Western “A” articulated (2-6-6-4), and also the Chesapeake & Ohio T-1 Texas type (2-10-4).
The J is the C&O Texas, a Lima SuperPower locomotive.
SuperPower principles were a special design to maximize steam capacity. They entailed a large boiler and a gigantic firebox.
SuperPower was an incredible steam-generator. The idea was to not run out of steam at high speed (where steam consumption was greatest).
The J was Pennsy’s first application of SuperPower principles.
But on Pennsy they were sort of misapplied.
Pennsy had too many grades to be a high-speed railroad.
But to handle WWII’s incredible traffic-demands, Pennsy needed something to replace its tired locomotives.
C&O’s T-1 was already designed, so the T-1 was what the War Production Board allowed.
Pennsy made a few small styling changes to make the T-1 a Pennsy engine.
But not the square-hipped Belpaire firebox. That would have been a major redesign.



The Cliff Hansen 1931 Ford roadster-pickup.

—The July 2012 entry of my Oxman Hotrod Calendar is a severely-raked 1931 Model-A roadster-pickup.
This car is fairly attractive.
At least it has the ’32 Ford grill.
But that rake is too much, the fact it sits way lower in front than in back.
The tires are also different sizes, the rears being huge.
And the top is cut so low I wonder if it would be drivable.
Not with the top up. You’d be scrunched.
The color is nice, especially the red trim on the louvers.
There also is the fact it’s a pickup, but not very functional.
The pickup box was shortened.
Nothing to carry manure in. —I don’t like hot-rodded pickups.
The rod has a souped-up 410 horsepower 350 Chevy, and a Tremac 5-speed tranny. (“Tranny” = transmission.)
The right stuff.
But about the only way to enjoy driving this thing is top-down as a roadster.
Otherwise it’s a trailer-queen.
To my mind a hotrod isn’t worth it unless it’s drivable.
And the rake is so extreme on this thing I’d be scared of it.




Alcos on the Bel-Del.(Photo by H. Gerald McDonald©.)

The July 2012 entry of my Audio-Visual Designs black-and-white All-Pennsy Calendar is two Alco road-switchers on Pennsy’s old Belvidere-Delaware branch (“the Bel-Del”) north of Trenton, N.J.
“Alco” is American Locomotive Company of Schenectady, NY. For years, American Locomotive Company was a primary manufacturer of railroad steam locomotives. (It was originally a merger of many steam locomotive manufacturers.) —With the changeover by railroads to diesel-locomotives, American Locomotive Company brought out a line of diesel-electric railroad locomotives much like the railroads were changing to, and changed its name to “Alco.” Alco tanked a while ago; they never competed as well as EMD (General-Motors’ Electromotive Division).

Photo by Edward Ozog.

A Washington Terminal RS-1.

Photo by BobbaLew.

A six-axle RS-3 in Wilmington’s (DE) Edgemoor yard.

The RS-3 was not Alco’s first road-switcher. That would be the RS-1 introduced in 1941.
The RS-1s were only 1,000 horsepower. The RS-3 is 1,600.
A six-axle version of the RS-3 was also manufactured. I photographed one long ago in northern DE.
The road-switcher was a concept that revolutionized railroading.
The engines had a cab with hoods at each end.
The long hood housed both the engine and generator. The short hood might have nothing, or only a small steam-generator to make steam for passenger-car steam-heat.
Walkways were outside, beside the hoods.
A road-switcher could be easily operated in either direction. It had the advantage of easy vision.
The first diesel locomotives on many railroads were full-cab units, like EMD F-units, or the Alco FA.
A full-cab behind you made it hard to see, difficult to operate in reverse.
A road-switcher negated this by -a) putting the walkways outside, and -b) putting the engine and generator in a narrow hood, like a switcher.
A road-switcher was essentially a road-unit without the full “covered-wagon” cab.
It could be easily operated in reverse.
The thing on top of the first unit is a trainphone antenna.
Train-engineers could communicate with tower operators via radio, the trainphone antenna.
Radio has advanced well beyond the trainphone antenna, but Pennsy was the first railroad using radio (I think).
Pennsy’s pretty Belvidere-Delaware branch is gone, abandoned and torn up.
Railroads have become conduits of freight over mainlines.
Branch-lines have become unviable; or somewhat unviable.
Branch-lines were often sold to independent shortlines, or abandoned.
An example of this is the old New York Central Auburn-line through Auburn, N.Y.
The Auburn was the first railroad across New York state into Rochester, N.Y. —Although not for long.
It avoided an immense defile just east of Rochester.
Railroad was soon built across that defile, becoming the New York Central mainline.
The so-called “Water-Level,” because it paralleled rivers and the Erie Canal. There were no mountain grades.
That defile, not that deep, just wide, was bridged with a fill.
But the Auburn was never abandoned. It was circuitous compared to the new railroad, but it went through farm-related traffic-generators.
It could also be used as a bypass when the mainline was blocked.
The Auburn is still extant as the independent shortline Finger-Lakes Railway. It was parceled out by Conrail, the successor to New York Central after Penn-Central failed.
The Auburn, under regular railroad labor-rules, was too costly to operate.
Finger-Lakes isn’t regular railroad labor-rules. As a shortline, job-descriptions are wide-open.
Delivery of freight in small lots has gone to trucking.
Small-time railroading just can’t compete with trucking, which has the advantage of infrastructure (highways) funded by taxpayers.
Although railroads were often funded by local merchants buying stock in the proposed railroad.
Highway infrastructure is crumbling. Taxpayers can’t afford to keep it up.
But for moving great quantities of freight, such as coal, or vast quantities of freight-containers, a railroad is all over trucking.
NO WAY could trucking deliver the quantity coal that can swallowed by a single coal-car.
And a single train might have 100 or more of those coal-cars.
And NO WAY could trucking efficiently deliver trailer-containers of freight when a double-stack train might have 200 or more freight-containers.
That single (or double) freight-container requires a driver, whereas a double-stack train of 200 or more containers has a crew of only two.
Plus railroads have nowhere near the rolling resistance of highways, so use less fuel per ton-mile.
Plus those 100 cars dutifully follow the pathway. Put more than two trailers behind a truck and you’re all over the road. Everything stays on path thanks to the flanged wheel.




Hawker Demon. (Photo by Philip Makanna©.)

—UGH!
Another biplane (“bye-plain;” I only say that because as a youngster I was mispronouncing it “bip-lane”).
The July 2012 entry of my Ghosts WWII warbirds calendar is a Hawker Demon.
I’ll let Wikipedia describe it: (It’s not on my WWII warbirds site.)
“The Hawker Demon was a fighter variant of the Hart light bomber. Developed when the Hart entered service, it was virtually uninterceptable by the Royal Air-Force’s fighters, which was demonstrated in air defense exercises.
While the Hawker Fury offered better performance, it was expensive and was only available in small numbers, so when a fighter version of the Hart was suggested, the Air Ministry selected the type as an interim fighter until higher performance dedicated fighters could be bought in larger quantities.
The new fighter variant added a second Vickers machine gun, while the coaming of the rear cockpit was angled to give a better field of fire, and a supercharged Kestrel IS engine was fitted.
Evaluation of an initial batch of six aircraft during 1931 was successful, and larger orders followed for the fighter Hart, now known as the Hawker Demon.
Over 200 Hawker Demons were built for the Royal Air-Force.
The Demons were powered by varying types of the Kestrel engine. It had an armament of a single rear .303-inch (7.7 mm) Lewis Gun with two .303-inch (7.7 mm) Vickers machine guns in the nose.
Large numbers of the type were fitted with a hydraulically powered turret in the rear, which had been tested on the Hawker Hart.”
At least this biplane doesn’t have the ugly cylinders of a radial-engine out there in the airstream.
Many do, cylinders unshielded by a cowl.
And the Demon ain’t a trainer. But as a fighter-plane it’s outdated.
Biplanes were an older design. Their radials, when used, weren’t the technological heavies of a Corsair or Bearcat.

Tiny (that’s a Hawker Hurricane at left).

About the only biplane I approve of is the Pitts Special, an airplane designed for aerobatics.
It’s a powerful engine in a tiny maneuverable airframe.
You just about have to do a biplane for aerobatics.
And with the Pitts Special the engine isn’t out there to destroy the look.
But it’s a biplane, all struts and bracing guy-wires, lacking the grace of a monoplane.

Beechcraft Staggerwing.

Another attractive biplane is the Beechcraft Staggerwing, an early ‘30s design.
“Staggerwing” because the lower wing was in front of the upper wing. Usually it’s the other way around.
There are a few Staggerwings left. I think the 1941 Historical-Aircraft Group in nearby Geneseo has one.
It’s a classic airplane, and fairly attractive as a biplane.
The Staggerwing was apparently the first airplane Beechcraft manufactured, and people thought Walter Beech was foolhardy to bring it out in the depths of the Depression.
But it was the first successful executive aircraft, and set the standard for a while.
Beyond that, The Staggerwing had retractible landing-gear. Most biplanes don’t.
It has a radial engine, but at least it’s in a cowl.

A Stearman trainer.

Most depressing are the Stearman biplane trainers.
Old and docile, they can hardly get out of their own way.
Their radial-engines are usually out there for all to see.
They’re hardly the elegant hotrods the Mustang and Spitfire are.