Grassroots Railroad Sports?

In reply to NickD :

I swear if they fail to raise funds for this one, they only have themselves to blame for this. I've already pledged to donate at least 50 dollars and hopefully more in the future.

The official announcement trailer, which lays out the plan. The "You can't just restore it and run it on the mainline, as the kids say" line had me wheezing.

FWRHS has done a great job of answering some of the concerns that people have had with the announcement of this restoration.

One of the big ones was "Why get NYC #3001 when you already have Wabash 0-6-0 #534 and NKP 2-8-2 #624?"

The Wabash 0-6-0, which was neglected for 30 or more years before FWRHS saved it, would require at least $1.4 million dollars to restore to operation, while still being of marginal size for their current operations. While it would be nice to have a Wabash engine running again (there's only two preserved) aand back on Wabash rails (part of the Indiana Northeastern is the old Wabash Fourth District) it's too small and even if used on the shorter trips out of Pleasant Lake, the local water quality in Pleasant Lake and the appetite of the #534 would have when running their normal shorter runs means they'd also need to solve not just the water problem but the water quality issue in town. According to Kelly Lynch, had the riverfront plans in Fort Wayne, known as Headwaters Junction, evolved, then the #534 would have been the daily driver and perfectly suited for it, but Headwaters Junction appears to be canceled or at the very least on a very long hiatus, which is part of why FWRHS acquired the Pleasant Lake depot and freight house. He did say that while the #534 isn't being restored to operation, the younger volunteers have taken a shine to it and have been giving it more attention in the past 5 years than it ever received in the preceding 30 years and it's certainly not rotting away, and they also wouldn't be opposed to re-homing it, if a group came forward with pressing interest and a solid plan for it.

As for NKP #624, it would be neat to be able to see a restored (and maybe operational) NKP Mikado alongside an NKP Berkshire and SD9 for the most diehard NKP fans but it was remarked by the FWRHS that visually the #624 is very similar to the #765, just a little bit smaller with a slightly different wheel arrangement, and the average person likely wouldn't notice the difference. The #624 was also badly vandalized (literally immediately after donation to Hammond, IN) and spent 60+ years outside with no roof over it's head, and 30+ of those years it still had the boiler jacket on with asbestos lagging beneath it, and there's rumors of a cracked boiler as well. It would likely cost the same amount to operationally restore as the #3001, but finding folks willing to pony up to see an NYC Mohawk run again is a lot easier than people who have a burning desire to see an NKP Mikado. As Kelly Lynch put it, regarding a cosmetic restoration at this time "Once you raise a quarter million to cosmetically restore a non-functioning display piece, that opens up a dozen other costly questions and challenges. What do you do with it? Where does it go? How does it contribute to your program? Before you even start down that road, is there a donor pool capable of supporting a cosmetic restoration without a compelling narrative or plan around it?" FWRHS isn't a museum, and they are on the Indiana Northeastern Railroad, so there really isn't a place to display it at this time. When it was acquired, it was largely because the group taking care of it had dissolved, Hammond, IN wanted the derelict engine gone, and there were genuine concerns about it being scrapped, so FWRHS stepped up to save it. At that point, Headwaters Junction was still the big future plan and they had hoped to cosmetically restore it and display it in the proposed roundhouse with the #534, SD9 #358, and the #765.

As for why Elkhart was willing to get rid of the #3001, there's a couple reasons for that. The museum at Elkhart wants to trim down their museum's collection to a more manageable level, with the museum volunteers admitting that the scope of the museum has exceeded their workforce's capacity and was reaching that dangerous "display junkyard" level that has caused issues with many other organizations. The city wants the museum to be a cornerstone for the neighborhood across the street and is planning a bit of redevelopment and wants to deaccession some of the less crucial pieces. So, why the #3001. Well, the city of Elkhart doesn't actually own it.

When it was moved from Frisco, TX to Elkhart, IN as part of the trade for PRR GG1 #4903 the GG1, and then the #3001, were owned by the Lakeshore Railroad Historical Foundation. The LRHF then leased the #3001 to the city of Elkhart for display at the National New York Central Railroad Museum. The Lakeshore Railroad Historical Foundation dissolved several years ago, and at that time the rights to the engine actually reverted to the Museum of the American Railroad in Frisco, TX. So, the #3001 was never owned by Elkhart, and Elkhart really didn't have a claim to the engine, and the Museum of the American Railroad did not contest FWRHS taking full possession.

As for concerns about them being stretched too thin between keeping #765 running, restoring the Empire State Express cars and working on the #3001, Kelly Lynch's reply was "We had two large steam locomotives in our stable at one time, and while keeping the #765 running we've restored one diesel locomotive and six passenger cars." The other steam locomotive they mentioned was C&O #2716 which they repaired and briefly operated while also doing a 13 year overhaul of the #765. The only reason they didn't continue with the #2716 was that, despite having flues with less than 60 days of run time, they were going to need to do a 1472 (the flues had been put in 15 years prior by Southern Railway, who then cracked the firebox and parked it) on it when the FRA got rid of flue extensions and they didn't want to have two engines out of service and undergoing overhaul. There's also the fact that there's often downtime while waiting on parts and materials, so having multiple projects keeps you from having the shop idled while waiting on components for one project. Just move that outside or go over to the neighboring track/stall and work on the other project. Not sure if FWRHS operates the same way, but there is also frequently separate car shop and locomotive mechanical crews.

Also, although it hasn't been officially announced it yet, they have a partnership with another organization that is sponsoring a half-million-dollar ship expansion and/or new shop construction, FWRHS just has to determine where it will go. I imagine the original plan was to have it in Fort Wayne, as part of the original Headwaters Junction plan, but it seems like now the new plan is to set up a major base of operations at Pleasant Lake.

I will say that I signed up for the $30.01 monthly pledge, so I'm doing my part. Honestly, if they were closer, I'd volunteer too. I hate that a lot of the organizations I'd love to volunteer at (WW&F, FWRHS chief among them) are all 7 or more hours away. I tried to volunteer at Adirondack several times, and they couldn't be bother to ever answer back. I suppose that Rochester & Genesee Valley, at almost 2 hours away exactly, deserves consideration.

In reply to NickD :

You and I both my friend. I would even go as far as move myself there as most of my friendships were all formed online and we're all in different parts of the world anyways. Only problem is that getting a job that'll allow me to do that is hard to come across.

For now though I'll make a 3D model to keep the hype rolling as much as I can.

I've mentioned Headwaters Junction several times. Headwaters Junction, or at least the concept, dated back to 1986, when landscape architect and Headwaters Park designer Eric Kuhne proposed creating a "Grand Central Park" at 4th and Clinton Streets in Fort Wayne, which would include a railroad tourist attraction and a streetcar system, but it wasn't until 2008 when idea was first introduced for the former New York Central yard/Omnisource facility, known locally as “North River”. The concept was that there would be a turntable and roundhouse where the #765 and FWRHS's other equipment could be serviced and displayed in between excursions, as well as areas for public use. There would also be a trolley connection, for rides to and from Headwaters Junction to other Fort Wayne destinations, and there was hopes of operating short excursion with #765 or other equipment on connecting railroads. The idea was basically "Steamtown, but not dysfunctional".

The concept was voted in the top three ideas for Legacy Fort Wayne funds through public voting in January of 2011, although by that time the old NYC freight house at North River had been sadly demolished. Studies were done, committees voted, sites were alternated between (in 2015 a new site was selected between Harrison and Wells Streets, current site of a Pepsi distribution center and adjacent to Fort Wayne Outfitters, the latter of which is housed in a former New York Central passenger station, and then in 2017 it went back to North River), politicians and newspapers espoused how much Headwaters Junction would benefit Fort Wayne, and there was some progress.

2018 - The City of Fort Wayne's Riverfront Fort Wayne brochure lists Headwaters Junction among future attractions within Riverfront Fort Wayne: "Phase I, Promenade Park, and Phases II and III are intended to help position our rivers as part of a larger network of destinations in fort Wayne, including Parkview Field, downtown museums, The Landing, Headwaters Park and future developments like Headwaters Junction."

2018 – Headwaters Junction, Inc. negotiates with Norfolk Southern to purchase historic railroad right-of-way.

2019 – Headwaters Junction, Inc. acquires the historic Craigville depot for restoration and relocation.

2019 – Headwaters Junction, Inc. acquires a historic railroad passenger car to convert into an ADA-accessible lounge car for trips, meetings, and events.

2019 – Headwaters Junction, Inc. signs a purchase agreement for nearly a mile of railroad right-of-way in the Riverfront District.

2020 – Headwaters Junction, Inc. and the City of Fort Wayne agree to work together to develop a regional attraction.

2021 – Headwaters Junction, Inc. announces Phase I at 1010 Cass Street.

In 2017 NKP #624 was acquired and work began on Wabash #534 (acquired by FWRHS in 1984) presumably to operate and/or display at Headwaters Junction. And then last year, FWRHS announced they were acquiring the Pleasant Lake depot and freight house and quietly announced that they were pivoting from Headwaters Junction. So what happened?

Part of the issue was that the City of Fort Wayne kept announcing plans for the redevelopment of North River, then pausing them, then announcing them again, and then pausing them again, making connections on the northern end of the proposed tourist line delayed or questionable. Another was that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has a planned project in downtown to move the flood wall levee into the right-of-way acquired by the development, which would force a relocation of the right-of-way and threatened to pause the project for 6-8 years minimum. Major donations hinged on the inability or delay in developing the right-of-way and the 6-8 year wait would also stall momentum, and fundraising, on the project. It's hard to keep people interested and donating when it's possibly 10 years before you even break ground.

Also, after a decade of occasional discussions, FWRHS signed a long-term operating agreement with Indiana Northeastern that is 46 rail miles from its current shop in New Haven, IN. Setting up a headquarters in Fort Wayne and then having their actual operations be in Edon, OH didn't make a lot of sense. Especially since the #765 is no longer running Class I mainline excursions and a lot of Class Is are tough to even get deadhead or ferry moves over. 

The new plan, according to Kelly Lynch, is to develop basically a Headwaters Lite at the new Pleasant Lake facility, and there are also talks to develop the old NYC station at Hillsboro, MI as well. As he put it "Essentially the core tenants of the concept remain, the zip code has changed, and all of those years working on that potential long-term plan set us up fairly well to jump when we had the chance on the local short line. Case in point: we went from zero serviceable passenger cars to four, and then six in less than three years."

There's also some rumors going around of something going on with C&O #614. It's been sitting on static display at the C&O Historical Society in Clifton Forge, VA in the green paint for the stillborn Greenbrier Presidential Express since 2011, but last ran back in 1999. Apparently it's been receiving black paint on the running gear, and according to a random person on Facebook "Ross called and said his people were coming and they did. Pulled her auxiliary tender out of the weeds, lubed and worked on her running gear, uncoupled her from the museum cars, and painted her lower gear."

Now, having the headlights and numberboards and number plate and bell removed is pretty common for an engine being transported, to prevent them from vanishing during any layovers, but also, you typically tend to remove that stuff during painting just to avoid overspray. It's also really weird to be painting the running gear and pilot and cylinder jacketing before you do any mechanical work. Why waste time and money and resources when you might find, say, rust in the cylinder jacketing that needs replacement or a crack in a drive wheel center that requires replacement? 

The other issue is that, as I fairly recently learned, Ross Rowland reportedly doesn't even own the #614 anymore. After the NJTransit excursions came to an end, the #614 sat there for a long time and NJT started getting after him for storage fees. He tried to auction if off, nobody was interested in buying it for the price he wanted, and supposedly some wealthy private individual officially bought it to pay for the debts, while he's remained the publicly-visible owner. I've also heard that Historic Red Clay Valley, who owns and operates New Hope & Ivyland, is somehow tied into the #614's ownership (I know Rowland is a guest engineer there frequently).

Rowland, when asked on RYPN, just gave his usual "Big news on the way, things are looking up for #614", but he's been giving that, without any specifics, since pretty much 1999 when the #614 went out of service. If it actually is going to be restored to operation, I have to wonder if the plan is to bring it to Buckingham Branch and completely bypass the Virginia Museum of Transportation and N&W #611, after the whole meltdown that occurred at VMT.

The #614 was stored at R&N's shops at Port Clinton after basically being evicted from NJT, and I've heard that Andy Muller was really interested in buying it (at the time, both #425 and #2102 were both parked) but couldn't come to an agreement on price with Rowland. Too bad, because the big 73"-drivered, roller bearing-equipped "Greenbrier" would have had a good home at R&N, although #2102 has more of a historical connection to the era.

ATSF #2926 made it's move over to the Albuquerque rail yard over the weekend for New Mexico Railroad Days. It hops on BNSF just to move a couple miles at 25mph, which is so far the farthest and fastest it's traveled. I'm honestly a little concerned on this engine. My recollection is that the first fire up was August of 2018 and that the folks in NM started installing tubes in #2926 in January of 2015. My understanding is that the 15-year clock begins to toll one year after the first tube goes in or on the first fire-up, whichever comes first, which would be January 2016. By that count, they would have only about six years and three months left on the current boiler ticket and it's run four blocks to the brewery four separate times and twice to the rail yard about 2.5 miles away for maybe a grand total of fifteen miles of movement with no passengers behind it. The big issue is they really don't have any place to run it at the moment, the hope has always been that either BNSF will allow it out on there rails or that NMDOT will let them out on the New Mexico Railrunner line. New Mexico Rail Heritage also doesn't have any sort of a coach fleet, just a baggage car converted to a tool car. And, they went through the trouble and expense to install LeaPTC, which lets it piggyback the PTC system on a trailing diesel, only to realize that getting a host railroad to make the modifications to a diesel to make it work with LeaPTC and reliably provide that locomotive was pretty much a 0% chance. So now they're yanking that off and fundraising to try and get fully independent PTC system on it, which is more time sitting burning the boiler ticket.

In reply to NickD :

Shame they can't work something out with Sky Railway out of Santa Fe to run there.

In reply to 02Pilot :

I think weight would be problem. That's the old Lamy-Santa Fe branch, which is a fairly light-duty line (the only power they run are a pair of first-gen Geeps) and the ATSF 2900s were heavyweight engines. They were based off the earlier 3765-series Northerns but`because they were war babies, Baldwin couldn't get lightweight materials and so the 2900s were 974,850lbs between the engine and tender. That takes a pretty rugged infrastructure to support. Grand Canyon Railway has said that ATSF #3751 and #2926 are welcome to come run there, provided either engine's owner can make the arrangement to get them moved there by a Class I. On top of that, if your name is New Mexico Rail Heritage and you've gotten the people of Albuquerque excited to see "their" engine run and then you all of a sudden go, "Well, it's now 7 hours east in Arizona", that can cause some hard feelings the next time you ask for money locally. 

The big problem is that between when they started the restoration (1999) and when they first fired it up (2019), the landscape has changed dramatically. Back in '99, BNSF was still allowing Frisco #1522 and ATSF #3751 to run on their rails, and you could use the Amtrak charter loophole to run mainline excursions. But now no Class Is are steam friendly, Amtrak no longer allows chartering trips to get insurance, PTC is required. As it is, there's one other similar engine, ATSF #3751, all dressed up with nowhere really to go, having returned from an overhaul in 2022 and run exacatly zero excursions since. 

There's honestly quite a few big 4-8-4s around the country in kind of the same boat as the #2926. 

Reading & Northern does get credit for running the #2102 on yearly trips open to the public, and quite lengthy trips at that, but really the #2102 only runs about 6 trips a year. Expense in operating it, restrictions on some of their other lines (there is no way you're taking it to Tremont, for example) and lack of turning facilities at Port Clinton make it difficult to operate as regularly or as system-wide as the #425.

Southern Pacific #4449 last hauled an excursion in 2021, and has been sitting at the Oregon Rail Historical Foundation's Portland facilities ever since. I believe it's last mainline excursion was in 2018, and in 2019 and 2021 it hauled some short, low-speed Christmas season trains on the Oregon Pacific Railroad, only for Oregon Pacific to say that the #4449 isn't allowed to run on their rails anymore due to severe wear and damage to their rails and roadbed. Mainline opportunities are limited by the fact that the #4449 lacks PTC and it also has solid bearings on the drive axles.

Spokane, Portland & Seattle #700, also owned by ORHF, is finishing up it's restoration to operation, and this one has really left me scratching my head. ORHF already has the #4449, which had dwindled down to a couple trips on a shortline at Christmas time in terms of excursions, and yet is still pushing forward with getting the only slightly smaller and lighter #700 up and running.  Like the #4449, Oregon Pacific doesn't want it on their rails and it lacks PTC, although at least it has roller bearings all throughout the engine.

UP #844, The Living Legend itself, hasn't run a trip since 2019, when she and UP #4014 ran the doubleheaded trip to Promontory Point for the 150th anniversary of the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad. No word on if or when UP plans to take it out again, with the UP Steam Program primarily focusing on the #4014.

N&W #611 has sort of had a hard luck situation. It was parked in '94 when NS shut down their steam program and sat at VMT. Then NS restarted their steam excursion program in 2011, and talks to get the #611 running gain began around 2013. They got it running again in May of 2015, it ran some excursions during that year, but NS CEO Wick Moorman retired that year and his successor ended the program the fall of that year and Amtrak ended their charter policy in 2018. It's really been a struggle to find a place for it to run ever since, with it doing some time down at NCTM and then a couple years running tender-first at 5mph at Strasburg, and last year seemed like maybe it finally found a place to stretch it's legs only for the Buckingham Branch/Virginia Scenic Railroad agreement to fall apart due to backroom politics at Virginia Museum of Transportation.

ATSF #3751 came off a 5 year restoration in 2022 and it's made a couple of moves under it's own power to Fullerton, CA for static display but that's it. It was equipped with LeaPTC, which was actually developed by #3751's owner, San Bernadino Rail Historical Society, but they found the same issue that the New Mexico Rail Heritage group found and they are now trying to fundraise it to install fully independent PTC.

The road bed wear is no joke. Three weeks ago SMS had their little switcher #303 about .9 mile south of Riegelsville for the first time in decades, with a flat car, some ties, maybe a rail or two and a crew that came by road. On Saturday, so maybe volunteer. You can still see where they stopped from the rail depression.

In reply to TurnerX19:

It's even worse with a steam locomotive. SMS has that 0-6-0, and that thing would really chew up old ties if they ran that down there. Any sort of steam switcher lacks lead and trailing trucks specifically to increase the weight on the drive wheels, and between that and the lack of a lead truck to control the oscilliating motion that a steam locomotive gets from having the two big power pulses on opposing sides timed 180 degrees out. Strasburg has said that their little CN 0-6-0, #31, was harder on the rails than their 2-10-0, 4-8-0 or 2-6-0 for those reasons. When Strasburg first brought steam back to those rails in '62, the roadbed was in pretty bad shape from years of declining traffic and maintenance during the original common carrier era. It didn't take long before they started having serious issues with the #31 busting ties. And as bad as an 0-6-0 is, an 0-8-0 is even worse. There's a reason that only one 0-8-0 has ever run in the US in the preservation era, and it only ran briefly, like a couple months, before it's appetite for breaking rails resulted in it being parked.

In regards to #3001, what are the winglets in front for? Vortex generators?

In reply to VolvoHeretic :

Smoke deflectors. You have to have to have the leading edge of them out past the smokebox and they basically catch the air and funnel it along the boiler. That forces the smoke to sucked down into the low-pressure boundary layer that form alongside the boiler, which would blow the smoke right back into the cab, and the crew's faces. New York Central had the issue where, due to their tight clearances on the east end of the system, if they made the boiler as large as they could, then you ended up with an extremely short smoke stack, which didn't get the smoke above the boundary layer, so they used the big "elephant ear" smoke deflectors on the L-3 and L-4 Mohawks and Niagaras. Union Pacific applied them to their 4-8-4s, as well as the handful of "Greyhound" dual-purpose Challengers, and the D&H used them on their K-62 4-8-4s, as well as some of the earlier Pacifics.

Meanwhile, Boston & Maine preferred little angled smoke deflectors on their heavy Pacifics and their R-1 Mountains, and when Lehigh & Hudson River ordered some duplicates of the R-1s, those also came with the little smoke deflectors.

Southern Pacific preferred the "skyline casing", which is the big boxy enclosure that surrounds the stack and domes. In addition to streamlining the upper part of the engine, there's a little "ski jump" immediately behind the smokestack, so that the wind hits that ramp and forces the smoke to go upwards. SP applied them most famously to the "Daylight" 4-8-4s, as well as most of their 4-8-2s, all of the 2-8-8-4 "Gila Monsters" and even some heavy Pacifics. Particularly curious were the Western Pacific's GS-64s, a copy of SP's GS-6s, which were essentially a reprint of the earlier GS-2s. WP's engines had both the SP's skyline casing as well as the large elephant ear smoke deflectors, curiously mounted inboard of the running boards.

And ATSF's fix was the extendable smoke stacks. They could be lowered for tunnels or other tight clearances, and then raised to get the top of the stack above the boundary layer

In reply to NickD :

Thanks for that detailed explanation, it was very informative and appreciated. 

Nickel Plate Road actually had a batch of 4-6-4s that sported smoke deflectors. Kind of an odd choice, since no other NKP power sported smoke deflectors. If I had to guess, the smoke deflectors, along with the modern 4-6-4 wheel arrangement, were to draw attention away from the fact that their new passenger power wasn't very modern. Delivered in 1927, these 73" drivered machines were basically a 10 year old design (USRA Light Pacific) with an extra trailing truck axle grafted on to make them seem like the latest in steam passenger power. A far cry from the 79-84"-drivered speed demons on the NYC, Milwaukee Road, CB&Q and ATSF, they were small, short-drivered, had only a 225psi boiler, and didn't have anywhere near enough grate area to require a 2-axle trailing truck. One of them, the #170, survives in St. Louis and it would make a pretty neat companion to the #765 (it seemed liked they were teasing that a few months back) but an NYC Mohawk is also pretty awesome.

Some nice footage of Arcade & Attica #18 running. I need to get out there and see it, but I've just been really busy the past couple weekends. Boy, she's really working climbing up over Cattaraugus Creek on her way out of Arcade. I've been at that spot when I went for the center cab charter, but I guess I didn't notice how stiff that grade was. It's too bad they only go as far as Curriers with their regular excursions, because some of the really scenic bits are north of there, particularly Ghost Pond at North Java, but they have all their passenger facilities at Curriers. Who knows, maybe someone will do a photo charter all the way up to North Java and back in the future.

Not the typical Bring A Trailer fare. Adorable little thing.

https://bringatrailer.com/listing/1946-h-k-porter-company-inc-steam-locomotive/

Was there an advantage to drivers that small? (Listing said 27") From what I have learnt in this thread, big drivers are good for high speed, so are little drivers good for high torque / quick acceleration but lower speed? Listing mentioned use in industrial yards so I can see speeds being low but needing grunt to move things around. 

DjGreggieP said:

Was there an advantage to drivers that small? (Listing said 27") From what I have learnt in this thread, big drivers are good for high speed, so are little drivers good for high torque / quick acceleration but lower speed? Listing mentioned use in industrial yards so I can see speeds being low but needing grunt to move things around. 

Basically. It's kind of like the difference between putting 2.74:1 or 4.56:1 rear gears in a car. Taller drivers are easier to balance and cut down on the reciprocating speeds of your valve gear, and they also reduce tractive effort and can be slippery when starting. Shorter drivers make for better starting power and faster acceleration, but they're harder to balance at higher speeds and your machinery speeds get higher. But at an insular industrial railroad, there were often tight clearances and sharper curves that precluded a larger locomotive, and they weren't ever going more than 5-10mph, so it was an easy way to pull more cars.

This photo of the running gear on Texas & Pacific 2-10-4 #610 shows the effects of trying to balance 63" drivers, on a 10-coupled engine no less, for 60mph speeds. As delivered from Lima, the locomotives suffered from balancing issues that pretty much kept them below 40mph. Texas & Pacific and Lima ended up making a number of changes, including a Baldwin disc driver on the main drive axle, cross-counterweighting the engines, hollow crossheads on the valve gear, lightweight connecting rods, and numerous other tweaks, resulting in a machine that was 60mph, capable when asked. During WWII, as things heated up on the Pacific, the T&P I-1s were frequently found thrashing away on the head end of troop trains. You can see the sheer size of the counterweights to try and get these engines to balance out. Even with all that, you didn't want to run them at 60mph unless you absolutely had to.