Monthly Calendar-Report for July 2013

Eastbound Train 24W, a stacker, climbs past South Fork, PA. (Photo by BobbaLew with Phil Faudi.)

—In my humble opinion the July 2013 entry of my own calendar is the BEST image in my calendar, train 24W headed uphill on Track Two past South Fork, PA.
It’s a potshot, proving yet again “just shut up and shoot!” You never know how well you might do.
A friend I once worked with, who now lives in Denver, who dabbles in scenic photography, tells me it isn’t so much setting up a good photograph, as recognizing the good photographs from the 89 bazilyun you might shoot.
I find this to be true. Pictures I compose often bomb, yet some of my potshots are fabulous.
I shot a frontal-view of this train as it approached. Then I turned around and shot this picture after the train passed.
The frontal-view has good face-on lighting, yet it’s this parting view that works.
It’s called “modeling.” the backlighting is casting a shadow of the cab.
It used to be “modeling” never worked. Anything in shadow went completely black. Photographers used to have to fill-flash to get the face of a baseball-player wearing a baseball-cap.
Now you might have to still do that — after all, the shadows in my calendar-picture are black.

My 2012 Christmas-card image. (Photo by BobbaLew with Phil Faudi.)

But photography is better than it was 30 years ago. Information in shadow might depict.
My frontal-view doesn’t have that modeling.
Often it’s my photograph with modeling that works.
My Christmas-card image, at left, was very dramatic, another backlit picture.


Barely visible in the foreground are the tops of loaded coal-cars off the South Fork Secondary, awaiting movement over The Hill.
The South Fork Secondary feeds the mainline at South Fork, and has coal-tipples out along it.
One of the reasons this old railroad, originally Pennsy, was so successful, is because it was moving so much coal mined along its line.
It still is.
Coal-tipples still feed massive coal-trains, although the tipple may more likely be a transloading facility instead of a mine.
That is, coal is trucked from surrounding mines to the tipple.
I think there are two tipples out along the South Fork Secondary.
Come to South Fork, and there’s a pretty good chance you’ll see loaded coal-cars awaiting movement over The Hill.
Coal no longer in a coal-pile; warehoused in coal-cars.
Just along the west slope of The Hill are two branches that feed the main. One is the South Fork Secondary, and the second is the original Pennsy main (it was bypassed in 1898 to reduce curvature).
In Cresson (“KRESS-in”) are a bunch of feeders that used to be Pennsy, but now are a shortline. They too feed coal.
But what’s impressive about this photograph is how well it works. Just shut up and shoot!



The famous “Widow-Maker” coupe.

—The Deuce in my Oxman Hotrod Calendar looks familiar.
It’s that paint-job that looks familiar.
I remember that car and it’s paint-job, which I never liked.
The calendar says it was inspired by similar paint-jobs on Watson Indy racers from the ‘50s and early ‘60s (“Indy” is the Indianapolis 500).

Pegasus (Mobil’s high-flying horse).

I’m intrigued by the Pegasus decal.
How many people know what that signifies?
Pegasus was the icon of Mobil Oil Company.
It’s no longer used; it was retired in 1974. In fact, Mobil merged with Exxon in 1999, creating ExxonMobil.
Surely some of those Watson Indy-racers were sponsored by Mobil.
So they carried Mobil’s Pegasus icon.
Mimicking the Mobil-sponsored Indy-racers, the original owner of this hotrod decided it needed a Pegasus icon.
I always wanted a Pegasus.
Mobil gas-stations had it as a neon sign.
It had flapping wings.
Pegasus was above Mobil gas-stations flapping its wings in red neon.
It’s from the era of neon signage, no longer seen.
An era of my youth.
Despite that, this hotrod is questionable.
I’ve never been able to assimilate that paint-job.
But the ’32 Ford three-window is the BEST-looking hotrod of all time.
Spare and beautiful.
This car is not a trailer-queen. It’s driven to shows, and has a hot-rodded 350 Chevy.
But the transmission is automatic. To me a hotrod is manual tranny, four-on-the-floor.
Chopped tops look cool (this car’s top is chopped), but they destroy headroom.
Does the operator have to scrunch into this car to drive it, or sit on the floor? Is he a midget?

Flames!

Too much motor.

Two of the best-looking three-window Deuces I’ve ever seen are at left. The calendar-car is almost equal; the only thing wrong is its paint-job.
The black Deuce at top only falters because of the flame-paint. Take out that, and it would be gorgeous, although I dare not attempt a driveway with it — it’s too low.
The yellow Deuce is gorgeous; the best color.
But I bet that motor weighs at least 400 pounds more than what was in there at first.
Too much motor.
The poor thing would be a handful to drive; the front would be far too heavy.
Give it a SmallBlock Chevy; that’s maybe 150 pounds heavier.
Another car too low. The poor thing would bottom in the slightest dip.
(I’ve seen it happen. Lower too much and sparks fly.)



Boss 302. (Photo by Peter Harholdt©.)

—The July 2013 entry in my Motorbooks Musclecar calendar is a 1970 Boss-302 Mustang.
The Boss-302 Mustang was Ford’s attempt to field a successful racecar for the SCCA (Sports Car Club of America) Trans-Am series in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s.
The Trans-Am series developed into a race-series for “pony-cars,” cars of the Mustang genre.
But the car that dominated Trans-Am was Chevrolet’s Camaro. It had a fabulous engine in the SmallBlock V8, and Chevrolet brought a Z-28 option-package to market, a Camaro set up for racing.
Ford was skonked. The pony-car was their development, yet the Z-28 Camaro was dominant.
Ford wanted to field a Trans-Am racer comparable to the Z-28.
That car was the Boss-302, introduced in the 1969 model-year.
There had been earlier Trans-Am Mustangs, but they didn’t dominate.

The Bud Moore Trans-Am Boss-302 driven by George Follmer. (Photo by Bobbalew.)

302 cubic-inches is rather small, but could be made quite powerful.
A good 302 small-block might generate 400+ horsepower.
Ford had two versions of their small-block V8, introduced in the 1962 model-year at 221 cubic-inches.
My neighbor bought a four-on-the-floor V8 ’63 Fairlane, but traded for a Mustang as soon as it came out.
All Ford small-block V8s used the same block, but the “Windsor,” manufactured in Windsor, Ontario, was rather plebeian, more a grocery-getter.
High-performance versions of the Windsor V8 were made, but it was the “Cleveland” version that made the great leap. It had cylinder-heads designed for high performance.
Assembly was in Cleveland, Ohio.
The heads had gigantic intake and exhaust passageways, and valving, to maximize engine-breathing at high speeds.
The heads also had splayed valves, like a Chevy Big-Block, to better aim at the intake and exhaust manifolds; almost a “Hemi” (“HEM-eee;” not “HE-mee).
The Boss-302 was the Cleveland engine, but at only 302 cubic-inches.
The Boss-302’s engine was incredibly strong, perhaps even more than Chevy’s SmallBlock.
The Boss-302 turned into a phenomenal racecar, perhaps the best Trans-Am racer of the series.
That was because Bud Moore, an old NASCAR racer, who had raced Trans-Am earlier, took over the program.
His schtick was to apply NASCAR engineering to the Boss-302.
The main thing was making the solid rear-axle, antediluvian, more stable and dependable.
The rear-axle was located in a linkage independent of the springs. Such an arrangement was less likely to self-steer.
NASCAR racers did this. It was Moore’s experience.
Moore also hired Parnelli Jones (“parr-NELL-eee”) to be his lead driver. Jones had raced and won at Indianapolis (the 500), and once said “if your car’s not out-of-control, you’re not driving fast enough.”
Jones could drive as fast as Mark Donohue in Roger Penske’s Trans-Am Camaro.
Moore had George Follmer as his number-two. Follmer was an experienced road-racer.
Moore also apparently did cheating bodywork to increase top-end speed.
NASCAR was rife with cheating. Moore was expert. His Boss-302 might pass SCCA tech-inspection, which included body-templates, but those templates didn’t hit everything. —Moore’s cars weren’t stock. They were aerodynamically slipperier than a stock Mustang.
As such, the Boss-302 Mustangs are very collectible, as are the earlier Mustangs, and the Shelby GT350 Mustangs.

A 1969 Mach-One. (Photo by Peter Harholdt©.)

But none are what I’d want. I prefer the 1970 Mustang, as illustrated in the calendar-picture, but as the Mustang Mach-One, illustrated at left.
The Boss-302 is too much a racecar. Its motor is cammy, and would foul its sparkplugs if you asked it to idle at a stoplight.
You’d have to keep goosing it to keep it running.
Better for the street is the Mach-One Mustang with its 351 Cleveland motor.
It’s something you could enjoy. It wouldn’t be the challenge a Boss-302 would be.
Of course, a Mach-One wouldn’t attract like a Boss-302.
Both cars would be classics, but at least you could drive your Mach-One to a show. A Boss-302 would be nearly impossible.
Sadly, the Mustang became bloated. The ’70 was the most desirable Mustang, the most desirable to me.
But for 1971, the Mustang became almost a mini-Thunderbird, that is, more a personal luxury cruiser than a small sporty-car.
I don’t see any ’71-and-up Mustangs at shows, and later the Mustang became a Pinto derivative.
Recently the Mustang was reformed like the Mustangs of yore.
As recent cars, they are better than the early Mustangs.
There are even Boss-302 versions of the recent Mustang, cashing in on the old Boss-302 image.
But they are more street cars than racecars.
There is a Boss-302 image I’ll never forget.
Jones and Follmer were one-two in the Trans-Am at Bridgehampton road-course out at the end of Long Island.
I had stationed myself down a blind downhill curve at the end of the start-straight.
I heard Jones and Follmer put the hammer down as the race began.
Jones and Follmer entered the blind downhill side-by-side flat-out at 165 mph, Jones in the lead.
No quarter at all! No caution for the blind downhill.
Sparks flew as the Moore Mustangs bottomed their rear-suspension linkages at the bottom of the hill.
Donohue was in third in the Penske Camaro.
Somehow his performance didn’t seem equal to the Moore Mustangs, although it probably was.
As I recall, Donohue won the race after both Moore Mustangs dropped out.
Jones and Follmer charging flat-out over that blind brow is going to my grave.
“If your car’s not out-of-control, you’re not driving fast enough.”



An eastbound Norfolk Southern freight passes the old Norfolk & Western Roanoke shops. (Photo by Mark Erickson.)

—The July 2013 entry in my Norfolk Southern Employees’ Photography-Contest calendar, is very dramatic. It’s a nighttime shot that includes the old Norfolk & Western shops in Roanoke, VA.
Norfolk Southern has become a major power in the national railroad industry. But one has yo remember the original merger included Norfolk & Western, the most successful railroad in the nation.
Norfolk & Western served the Pocahontas coal-fields; it shipped rivers of coal.
Norfolk & Western covered a large area, but most of its traffic was from the Pocahontas coal-region, a rather small area.
Norfolk Southern also merged most of the ex-Pennsy lines when Conrail was broken up and sold in 1999. Like Norfolk & Western, Pennsy was a mountain railroad that shipped large quantities of coal. In fact, Pennsy tried to merge with Norfolk & Western but was foiled by the government.
Norfolk & Western developed and built its own steam-locomotives at its Roanoke shops. N&W was the last steam-powered railroad in the U.S.
It’s just that steam-locomotion can’t be as efficient and easy-to-operate as diesel, although N&W tried, and did quite well with efficiency.
— Norfolk & Western tried to stay with coal-fired steam-locomotion.
Pennsy also developed and built its own steam-locomotives, but was too conservative and fell apart with WWII.
Norfolk & Western developed some great locomotives, like the A (2-6-6-4), the J (4-8-4), and they maximized performance of the Y compound articulated (2-8-8-2.)
Compounding uses the steam twice. Exhaust-steam from the rear cylinders is used to power the front cylinders.
The Y is a general locomotive design from WWI, but N&W kept improving it. The design was maximized on N&W.
The Y had immense tractive-effort. It was slow but strong, and also fairly efficient. Many railroads tried compounding, but only Norfolk & Western made it work.
Improving the Y was at Norfolk & Western’s Roanoke shops.
And the locomotives developed at Roanoke shops were designed to perform well on Norfolk & Western.
They performed so well, the railroad came to think of them as “their” engines.
I doubt a Norfolk & Western locomotive would perform well out west. (The drivers of a J, at 70 inches diameter, would be too small.)
In fact, Pennsy tried a Norfolk & Western A articulated for consideration as its WWII locomotive (see below).
The A was designed to move fast-freight, which would been okay for Pennsy, but Pennsy went with the Chesapeake & Ohio T-1 2-10-4 (below), loathe as they were about articulation, and needing more of a dragger.
So do the old Roanoke shops have the cachet they once had?
Like Altoona, they were at the base of a mountain railroad.
Train-loads of coal came down out of the mountains for assembly into long drags to Norfolk. Coal also got shipped cross-country, as well as transloaded into ships in Norfolk.
Pennsy’s Altoona Works has been reduced to Juniata (“june-eee-AT-uh”) Locomotive shops, once part of Pennsy’s vast Altoona Works, which no longer exist.
Altoona Works could build locomotives, although Pennsy had such an appetite it often farmed out the work — to Pennsy’s design.
Juniata can build locomotives, although they’re a non-Altoona design; e.g. EMD diesels. It services the railroad’s locomotives.
Norfolk Southern buys non-Roanoke locomotives, diesel-electric, and operates them quite well.
Norfolk & Western was the last fully steam-operated railroad in the nation. A Y could come close, but it couldn’t move as much as a four-unit freight-diesel.
Beyond that, steam-locomotives required expensive lineside water and coal-towers. All diesels needed was a refueling stand and fuel-storage.
Also, side-rod steam locomotion delivered its power in pulses. Power from a diesel-electric was constant. (Electrification without wires.)
Side-rod steam locomotion was about at the end of its development. Boilers were already at 300 pounds-per-square-inch, and higher pressure didn’t seem worth it.
The next step seemed to be some sort of steam-turbine electric.
Experimentals were tried, but paled versus the diesel-electric.
Another option is the coal-fire directly working the turbine. But that has yet to work. Turbines haven’t been built yet that can long endure the output of a coal-fire, which includes fly-ash and soot.


War-baby caboose-hop. (Notice the tower-man is waving.) (Photo by Jim Buckley.)

— The July 2013 entry of my All-Pennsy color calendar is a Pennsylvania Railroad J-1 (2-10-4) in a caboose-hop headed past North Attica tower in Ohio, probably to pick up its train.
The J-1 is Pennsy’s war-baby.
I’m sure I’ve told this story before, but I’ll tell it again.
When WWII broke out Pennsy found itself totally unprepared for the massive increase in traffic.
It had old and worn-out locomotives. Capital investment had gone into electrification during the ‘30s, so Pennsy hadn’t developed up-to-date steam-locomotion during that time.
Pennsy was also conservative, so stayed away from some of the improvements that enhanced steam-locomotive efficiency, like those embodied in Lima’s SuperPower (“LYE-muh;” not “LEE-muh — Lima Locomotive Company in Lima, Ohio).
Pennsy developed its own locomotive designs. They might farm out construction due to needing so many, but if so it was Pennsy’s design.
So buying locomotives from Lima was anathema.
SuperPower was a bunch of enhancements to maximize steam-locomotive performance; a hot-rodded steam locomotive — stuff like feedwater heaters and front-end throttles. But its main thrust was to increase steam generation, so the locomotive could meet steam demand at speed.
Steam-locomotives could run out of steam. I have a recording of a Pennsy Decapod (2-10-0) running out of steam.
Such principles would have been misapplied on Pennsy with its grades. This was especially true in PA. SuperPower was aimed more at boomin’-and-zoomin’.
So with WWII Pennsy needed a new steam-locomotive to replace its tired engines.
But the War Production Board wouldn’t allow Pennsy to develop a replacement. Pennsy had to try out power from other railroads.

The Norfolk & Western A. (This is 1218.)

A C&O T-1.

A Pennsy T-1.

The single Q-1 experimental.

A Q-2.

It was probably just as well.
In my opinion, Pennsy steam development had fallen apart.
For whatever reason, they jumped on the duplex bandwagon.
So much that it diverted from steam-locomotive development.
Pennsy could also afford to sit tight; they had so much traffic, they could afford to get by with double-crews = double locomotives.
Duplex is multiple driver-sets on a single frame powered by multiple cylinders.
The Pennsy T-1 4-4-4-4 is essentially a 4-8-4 with four cylinders. The drivers are on a single frame, not articulated.
The Q-1 experimental is a 2-10-4 freight-locomotive with four cylinders. The front cylinders power the first six drivers, and the rear cylinders, facing backwards under the fire-grate, power the rear four drivers.
Putting the rear cylinders here limited the size of the fire-grate. The engine also had 77-inch drivers, a bit large for a freight-service.
The Q-1 wasn’t duplicated, but the Q-2 was. The Q-2 solved the problems of the Q-1, mainly smaller drivers (69 inches diameter) and a larger fire-grate. It’s rear cylinders were also turned around and placed in front of the rear four driver-wheels.
This lengthened the driver wheelbase, which was on a solid frame. A 10-drivered locomotive doesn’t work very well on curvy track. It’s driver wheelbase is so long it tends to derail.
The Pennsy T-1 had the same problem. Its driver wheelbase was so long it wanted tangent (straight) track — lines west of Pittsburgh, like in Ohio and Indiana.
But the Pennsy T-1 and the Q-2 didn’t serve east of Pittsburgh, although the T-1 did some. Like from Altoona west.
Too many curves east of Altoona.
So with WWII Pennsy had to shop around. It tried two of the most successful locomotives of all time, the Norfolk & Western A articulated (2-6-6-4) and the Chesapeake & Ohio T-1 (2-10-4), essentially a Lima SuperPower locomotive, although built by American Locomotive Company in Schenectady.
Loathe as Pennsy was to use articulation, the C&O T-1 won out. A J-1 is essentially the C&O T-1, although slightly restyled.

(This Belpaire firebox is on a Pennsy 2-10-2.)

Look carefully, and you’ll see the J-1 doesn’t have Pennsy’s trademark Belpaire firebox, a square-hipped design that enhanced steam generation.
But it does have SuperPower enhancements not found on earlier Pennsy steam-locomotives, like feedwater-heat and front-end throttles. “Gadgets” that needed maintenance, and weren’t applied to pre-WWII Pennsy steam-locomotives.
It was is if Pennsy was playing catch-up with steam-locomotive development. The J-1 showed them what they were missing, and these “gadgets” were applied to later Pennsy steam-locomotives, like the Q-1 and Q-2.
Pennsy seemed to be madly thrashing about. Duplex-drive seemed endemic of this.
The Pennsy T-1s all had Franklin-poppet valve-gear (like a car-engine); a bear to maintain.
And Pennsy refused to try articulation — a principle that would have allowed gigantic boilers.
The J-1 was a bit misapplied on Pennsy. Slogging a heavy train slowly upgrade over Allegheny Summit is not using SuperPower as intended.
West of Pittsburgh a J-1 could get rolling, boomin’-and-zoomin’ is SuperPower applied as intended.
All the J-1 did was give Pennsy the freight-engine it needed to replace its tired power for WWII.
None were saved, which is just as well. The J-1 wasn’t a Pennsy design.
Unlike most railroads, Pennsy saved one example of every steam-locomotive it designed. Most are now at Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania in Strasburg, PA.



Not a B-1! (Photo by H. Gerald MacDonald©.)

—I was fooled.
My first thought upon seeing the July 2013 entry of my Audio-Visual Designs black-and-white All-Pennsy Calendar was it was the B-1 electric switcher, but it’s not.

Two B-1 switchers.

No pantograph (“pant-uh-GRAFF”); in fact, it’s 0-4-0. The B-1 is 0-6-0.
I was fooled by the fact both are box-cabs, so look identical.
It’s Pennsy’s first diesel-electric locomotive, built in 1929 as a gas-electric, re-engined to diesel in 1930.
My vaunted Pennsy-Power II book, which I will never part with, trumpets an EMD SW switcher as the first Pennsy diesel-electric.


Purportedly Pennsy’s first diesel-electric.

Well, first entry of the EMD invader, built by other than Altoona. —The calendar-switcher was built by Altoona.
The calendar unit proceeds it; the EMD is 1937.
Pennsy was a coal-road. It wanted to stay with coal-fired steam-locomotives.
But a coal-fired steam switcher made little sense where this calendar-unit was based.
The locomotive pictured switched the tiny yard in Norristown, PA, west of Philadelphia.
The Norristown line was electrified; I think it still exists as a commuter-line.
Freight delivered to Norristown is probably now delivered by trucks.

A modern TrackMobile.

What switching needed to be done almost could have done with a TrackMobile, although TrackMobiles weren’t around back then.
Drive the trackmobile over to the track the cars to be switched are on, then shift the cars.
The calendar locomotive is 450 horsepower, yet seems to be coupled to a string of cars.
I don’t know as a TrackMobile could move that many. Plus the TrackMobile might need pavement to get to the tracks — although I’m sure TrackMobiles with off-road capability have been built.


A Pennsy A-5 switcher (0-4-0).

Pennsy used tiny steam switchers, 0-4-0, on the Delaware River waterfront in Philadelphia; Reading too (“REDD-ing;” not “READ-ing”).
Stubs to pier-side had very sharp radius. Only a short wheelbase locomotive could negotiate such trackage.
A diesel switcher like that pictured might have made more sense.
But those tiny 0-4-0 steam switchers had been around since time immemorial.
I’m sure the steam switchers were replaced by diesels of the EMD variety. With rotating trucks, such a switcher could negotiate sharp radius curvature.
And I’m sure shunting freight to pier-side is now done by trucks. Trackage is torn up or paved over.



Fieseler Fi 156 Storch.(Photo by Philip Makanna©.)

—I forgot! (Or almost forgot.)
The July 2013 entry of my Ghosts WWII warbirds calendar is so laughable I almost forgot it.
I thought I was finished, but I planned to run this calendar-picture last.
It’s a Fieseler Fi 156 Storch; hardly one of the dramatic planes of WWII. (Next month is the Chance-Vought F4U Corsair.)
With its gimpy wings and long landing-gear it looks ridiculous.
But goofy as it may appear, the Storch was very impressive.
It could do very short landings and take-offs.
That gangly landing-gear is tube shock-absorbers  with 18-inches of travel.
The Storch could operate on a very rough field. It didn’t need runway.
And since it could do short take-offs and landings. it didn’t need an airbase.
It looks like the Storch could operate of the field below, at least the road pictured above the plane.
It was a Storch that rescued Mussolini from a mountaintop. It landed in 100 feet, and then took off overloaded with Mussolini in 250 feet.
A helicopter had been planned, but it broke down.
The Storch also had wings that folded back along the fuselage, hinged at the wing-root.
A Storch could be trailered to a site. In fact, it could even be towed slowly.
It was designed for reconnaissance. Trailer a Storch to a location, take off, then scope out the location from above.
The U.S. Army Air-Corps had reconnaissance airplanes too, but they weren’t the Storch.
You don’t trailer a Cub or a Taylorcraft to some far-away location.
So for reconnaissance the Storch was a better plane.
With its extremely short take-off and landing requirement, it was built as a private aircraft after the war.
If the headwind was strong enough, a Storch’s landing-approach was so slow it might land vertically or backing-up.