Thread: Alco 48 class loco pics

I thought I would mention to what appears to be a large audience of train worshipers here that the thirlmere train heritage museum rebuild is almost complete.

http://www.railheritagecentre.com.au...010_Summer.pdf

Sorry to butt in but thought it might interest people.

Originally Posted by dullbird

I thought I would mention to what appears to be a large audience of train worshipers here that the thirlmere train heritage museum rebuild is almost complete.

http://www.railheritagecentre.com.au...010_Summer.pdf

Sorry to butt in but thought it might interest people.

That’s not butting in, thats adding to the interest level.

With some posts earlier mentioning banking & Ardglen, I thought you might like to see what's happening now..

this is one of the new TT rakes with a Newcastle crew being banked past Kankool (you can just see some of the wagons snaking along behind over Chilcotts Ck in the distance:



a pic the TT locos coming up through Ardglen:






This is the banking setup - 12000hp pulling (TTs), 9000hp (81s) pushing 7200t gross up a 1:40 at 20km/hr -

the sound of the 2st supercharged & turbocharged engines is magnificent for an interested person - but you'll just have to imagine it for now




by this time the lead locos are well through the tunnel and on the downhill side

Great pics and Brother is that GREEN.

I will have to post up some video I took just a few years back and everything is brown and dead.

There's something that I've always wonderd about those bank-engines - do they use Locotrol from the front lashup, or is the driver in the rear just really good at judging how much throttle he can apply without bunching the train up?

Hi scanfor, the driver at the back gets his running orders via radio from the front crew and it’s virtually “They have the road” so the back crew goes slowly to full throttle, where it remains till they get to the top of the crossing loop at Ardglen, just before the tunnel.

The bank engines, ( rear locos ) don’t actually couple up, they just push and at the top, they shut off the throttle and come to a stand, while the train continues on it’s way.

Real neat to watch!

Originally Posted by scanfor

There's something that I've always wonderd about those bank-engines - do they use Locotrol from the front lashup, or is the driver in the rear just really good at judging how much throttle he can apply without bunching the train up?

The rear loco set is worked independently and it is not connected to the rake, it pushes on the coupling without the pin being dropped so that when the rake accelerates it just pulls away. 3 - 4 notch gets it rolling.

re power judgement ..... one of the drivers' skills I guess, but soon after departing Willow Tree they are up to full power and speed then will gradually drop to 20km/hr on the 1:40. That full power setting is maintained until the major part of the rake is over the hill..... That's why it sounds so good

The load is designed for the locos to be at full power, the power isn't adjusted to suit the load

They were using 92's on the head end when I was there a month ago,would have liked to have seen that lash up!I'm still trying to uploadmy footage to you-tube on my old desk top,Ardglen is good for video and as you say ,they are n
otch 8 all the way.Drivesafe,I've seen a Bigboy in G-scale,pretty impressive but you'd need some space and broad curves to do it justice!!,are you still running HO or G only at the moment?
I also have footage of the helpers detatching at Ardglen ,you have to be lucky to be in the right spot as it happens pretty quickly,every now and then ,the coupler pin drops and they get towed all the way to Murrundi!!Cheers Gregg.