Nostalgia & History > Greasing the Rails?

This is one of the short stories I have in my Wabash railroad book that should be out in January. I have censored the names and the location for Trainorders. But I am sure someone is going to see this in the book and say it's Bull. Has anyone heard of anything like this before? I find my source very creditable and suppose that even though the locomotive and cars had brakes that the momentum of the train and engine slid it down the track. I suppose it's possible my source's older brother had heard of this before. I have heard of the collision of two interurbans with the one that was supposed to stop, sliding on wet leaves.


"My older brother A was always coming up with mischievous ideas. I don’t know how A came up with them but this one topped them all. Before he revealed it to us, our plan on this particular evening was for A, me and our pals, the B Boys, C and D, to ride our bikes into E for some ice cream. But Mom had a chore for A to do first. He was to take a can of rancid lard and throw it on the trash pile. All farms had a trash pile, as in those days it was common to dispose of your own trash in any way possible. But A just pretended to throw it on the trash pile and brought it with him in the basket on his bike. That’s when the B Boys asked what it was for and he explained, but not before we were part way there.

E was a coal and water stop for Wabash trains and almost every train stopped there. It was just dusk when we reached the edge of E and A said that this was the place to start. We hid our bikes in the tall grass and got to work. Our assignment was to take handfuls of the lard and grease the rails as fast as possible, about a quarter of a mile before the coal and water stop. We did this in a record amount of time. From there it was all downhill as we waited in the weeds for the next train. We didn’t have to wait long.

The engineer blew the whistle for the U.S. F Crossing and applied the brakes, but the train did not stop. It went right past the coal dock and water plug. The engineer locked things up but to no avail. We stayed hidden in the weeds, laughing our sides off. When the train did finally stop, the engineer put it in reverse, backed up, and tried another go of it—only to overshoot the stop again. (When he started to back up, his wheels just spun.) It took over twenty minutes to get the train under the coal dock and water spout so the crew could take on water and coal. This must have been of great consternation to an engineer who always prided himself to stop at the exact spot every time.

But the crew knew something was amiss. We could hear cussing above the sound of the steam engine and we knew we had better stay hidden; if they found us, we’d be in big trouble. What a crazy thing to do. This was in the early 40s and, of course, there was a war going on. We often saw army tanks, trucks and guns on flat cars hauled in the trains. It’s a wonder the FBI hadn’t investigated. Needless to say, we never did it again and never told anyone until years later."



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/07/12 15:41 by wabash2800.

This is similar to a famous MIT student prank (called "hack" in the MIT vernacular) that supposedly took place in the 1940s or 50s: The Boston MTA subway station nearest the campus is Kendall Square (now MIT/Kendall), and at the Boston end of this station, the tracks start up a grade that leads them up to street level and then over the Longfellow Bridge. On the bridge, the tracks could be easily accessed by climbing over a low railing.

The Boston MTA at the time shut down for several hours each night, and it kept its trains in a yard near Harvard Square, to the north of Kendall Square.

The MIT students got a hold of several buckets of grease, and embarked on some unauthorized "adhesion experiments" on the grade between the station and the bridge. Needless to say, when the first train of the morning came down from Harvard Square, it couldn't make it out of the Kendall Square station, causing a pretty significant interruption to that morning's rush hour.

Ray

wabash2800 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> This is one of the short stories I have in my
> Wabash railroad book that should be out in
> January. I have censored the names and the
> location for Trainorders. But I am sure someone is
> going to see this in the book and say it's Bull.
> Has anyone heard of anything like this before? I
> find my source very creditable and suppose that
> even though the locomotive and cars had brakes
> that the momentum of the train and engine slid it
> down the track. I suppose it's possible my
> source's older brother had heard of this before. I
> have heard of the collision of two interurbans
> with the one that was supposed to stop, sliding on
> wet leaves.
>
>
> "My older brother A was always coming up with
> mischievous ideas. I don’t know how A came up
> with them but this one topped them all. Before he
> revealed it to us, our plan on this particular
> evening was for A, me and our pals, the B Boys, C
> and D, to ride our bikes into E for some ice
> cream. But Mom had a chore for A to do first. He
> was to take a can of rancid lard and throw it on
> the trash pile. All farms had a trash pile, as in
> those days it was common to dispose of your own
> trash in any way possible. But A just pretended to
> throw it on the trash pile and brought it with him
> in the basket on his bike. That’s when the B
> Boys asked what it was for and he explained, but
> not before we were part way there.
>
> E was a coal and water stop for Wabash trains
> and almost every train stopped there. It was just
> dusk when we reached the edge of E and A said that
> this was the place to start. We hid our bikes in
> the tall grass and got to work. Our assignment was
> to take handfuls of the lard and grease the rails
> as fast as possible, about a quarter of a mile
> before the coal and water stop. We did this in a
> record amount of time. From there it was all
> downhill as we waited in the weeds for the next
> train. We didn’t have to wait long.
>
> The engineer blew the whistle for the U.S. F
> Crossing and applied the brakes, but the train did
> not stop. It went right past the coal dock and
> water plug. The engineer locked things up but to
> no avail. We stayed hidden in the weeds, laughing
> our sides off. When the train did finally stop,
> the engineer put it in reverse, backed up, and
> tried another go of it—only to overshoot the
> stop again. (When he started to back up, his
> wheels just spun.) It took over twenty minutes to
> get the train under the coal dock and water spout
> so the crew could take on water and coal. This
> must have been of great consternation to an
> engineer who always prided himself to stop at the
> exact spot every time.
>
> But the crew knew something was amiss. We
> could hear cussing above the sound of the steam
> engine and we knew we had better stay hidden; if
> they found us, we’d be in big trouble. What a
> crazy thing to do. This was in the early 40s and,
> of course, there was a war going on. We often saw
> army tanks, trucks and guns on flat cars hauled in
> the trains. It’s a wonder the FBI hadn’t
> investigated. Needless to say, we never did it
> again and never told anyone until years later.


i was waiting for elemenooopeee to hop off the train and start chasing you all and turn you all in to eexxxwyezeeee ... and how much lard does it take to grease a 1/4 mile of track ... must have been a 55 gallon drum :-)



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/07/12 17:05 by Out_Of_Service.

There's a scene in the movie "Emperor of the North" in which they grease the rails, causing a train to stall out on a grade.

I was told my a SP employee back in 1967 in San Luis Obispo, CA (SLO) that the rails were once greased on the lower part of Questa Grade north of SLO. He said the momentum of a freight train caused the engines to pass over the grease spreading it all over the locomotive's wheels and then gravity caused the train to reverse and slide most of the way back to the station in SLO.

It must have been a mess to clean up. Rumor has it that it was Cal Poly students.

It's all fun until somebody gets hurt. So you didn't do it again but you put it into print. What's the difference, really?

Posted from Windows Phone OS 7

??? I didn't do it. My source, his brother and friends did in the early 1940s.

fbe Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> It's all fun until somebody gets hurt. So you
> didn't do it again but you put it into print.
> What's the difference, really?
>
> Posted from Windows Phone OS 7

I guess you could say "it's no big deal", especially in light of the fact that the RR's occasionally do to themselves. On a trip west on the former CB&Q line known as the C&I, I nearly stalled on Waterman (IL.) hill. I had a ridiculously overpowered train and almost did NOT get up the .8% grade. I noticed a blueish-green tint in the snow on either side of the rail but did not, at the time, realize its origin or its implications. The BN had decided to conduct a rail flaw test in zero degree weather. The testing required a film of water on the ball of the rail to enhance image quality but, since temps were well below freezing, plain water wouldn't work very well. PRESTONE !! Works great - for the imaging crew but not so well for the Engineer. Automotive antifreeze is a tenacious substance and, as such, goes away slowly. Two eastward trains had an extreme surprise as they descended this hill and were required to reduce speed or stop at Mored siding. No mention of this substance being used on the rail that day was made.

Dawn dishwashing detergent works well also. We used that stuff at the TTC test track during locomotive testing.

qman



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/08/12 06:51 by qman.

One afternoon on the SP Peninsula Commute line from San Francisco to San Jose a similar thing happened, the hand held rail joint test gear used a squeeze bottle of motor oil to make an acoustic coupling between the transducer and the rail. After about a mile of having a 2-3 foot long smear of oil at every joint applied the stage was set. The first afternoon train ran up toward the station (I forget which) and made a strong set for one of the usual "parachute" stops and slid right through the station.
I think this is when the SP changed to dilute dish detergent as the coupling fluid.
This was related to me by one of the rail flaw detector operators, wish I could recall his name now.

I have heard several stories of such greasing. From these I concluded it was done many times in the 30's and 40's and was was common that kids did it.

Back when this was legal, we did a drop on a box car into a spur in either Walnut or City of Industry (UP). The spur was quite a bit lower than the main line, and short, so it was a steep grade down to the spot at the loading dock, and to the bumper at the end of the short spur.

The problem is that the spur was covered in tall weeds (grass). When we dropped the car I was riding the brake and as soon as we cleared the main I started furiously cranking away at the brake. But it was all for nothing. The brakes easily locked the wheels, which them proceeded to slide down the spur like a puck on ice. As I watched the loading dock and bumper approach, I was weighing my options and decided to ride it out. The car finally stopped once the track flattened out, about a car length from the bumper. I recall a number of people on our subdivision had a similar experience at this spot as well.

The point being, it truly was as slick as ice. And that was just from overgrown grass. I can only imagine how a little grease could reduce the friction on the tiny contact patch a steel wheel has on a rail to almost nothing. It was a lesson learned, and one I haven't forgotten even to this day.

Another story for which the "statute of limitations" has presumably run out: This was on the Pacific Electric Northern District on the west side of Alhambra (east of LA and south of Pasadena.) At one time, the Alhambra-San Gabriel line branched off at Sierra Vista and went all the way to Temple City. This service was abandoned in 1941, and most of the track and wire removed. The wire was retained to a few hundred feet east of Sierra Vista, and the track was left for several blocks more to serve the industrial spur on Palm Ave. By the time of this story, the freight switching on Palm was done with diesel switchers. The Sierra Vista locals (usually 600-700 class "Hollywood" cars) would pull off the main line and lay over on the remnant of the Alhambra line. Some of the local kids (including the co-worker who told me this story in the 1970's or 80's) found a can with some leftover axle grease, and, with the Devil finding work for idle hands to do, applied it to the rails where the cars would stop. This was done on a number of occasions, usually the cars would slide out from under the wire, and the operator would have to flag down the next car to arrive, warn about the slippery track, and spread sand on the rails. If the affected car had not gone too far, the "follower" could retrieve it. But--if the operator had come into the layover spot faster than usual, and slid quite a ways from the end of wire, he'd have to go to the company phone and call the dispatcher. Then he'd have to wait for a diesel switcher to come up from the yard in LA with a chain to tow the stranded car back to its source of electricity.

In more "natural" settings it's not at all unusual to run an engine into a grain handling facility and find youself unable to come back out. Soybeans make an EXCELLENT lubricant !!!

qman

A TCRT Conductor called the dispatcher to report his car was on the corner of Annapolis and Manomin and had lost all power, and please send help. [Edited to add street names]

Dispatcher said OK, then realized, "We don't have any track on that corner!"

Pix follow, Note the PCC in the far distance, a full city block beyond the end of the track and overhead.

-LD



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/08/12 13:00 by LarryDoyle.

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Wonder what the motorman's laundry bill was that week?
I've hit spots from flange oilers, etc, and had the 1522 break loose. Wakes you up quickly. Most embarassing one was leaving a meet and working hard and the fireman said he was surprised she didn't slip and I told him "A good engineer never let's his engine slip", no sooner said slip when we hit a patch and guess what? I still hear about that.

Former SP locomotive engineer and all around good guy Errol Ohman told me this story a several years ago:

Errol was working a night shift on the Alameda Belt Line some time in the 80s. The conductor was giving lantern signals while switching the yard out. Whenever the conductor would signal "that'll do" he would try to stop but the engine would slide all over the place. "Ahead" and it took forever to move. Back and forth, slip and slide. The more the engine would slip and slide around, the more pissed off the conductor was getting. The lantern signals were getting more and more aggressive in nature and it was obvious that the conductor was about ready to fly off the handle. Errol also noted that it was a full moon that night and he happened to look backwards and saw something on the tracks in the moon light. He turned on the back headlight and saw a brakeman with the journal box oiler can in his hands pouring gallons of oil all over the tracks. When the headlight came on, the brakeman put his finger up to his lips to give the internationally recognized hand sign of "shhhhhh".

Errol didn't say a peep to his conductor, who by the end of the night was about two beats away from having a coronary.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/07/12 22:52 by MarkMeoff.

railstiesballast Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> One afternoon on the SP Peninsula Commute line
> from San Francisco to San Jose a similar thing
> happened, the hand held rail joint test gear used
> a squeeze bottle of motor oil to make an acoustic
> coupling between the transducer and the rail.
> After about a mile of having a 2-3 foot long smear
> of oil at every joint applied the stage was set.
> The first afternoon train ran up toward the
> station (I forget which) and made a strong set for
> one of the usual "parachute" stops and slid right
> through the station.
> I think this is when the SP changed to dilute dish
> detergent as the coupling fluid.
> This was related to me by one of the rail flaw
> detector operators, wish I could recall his name
> now.

Sperry should have stock in Johnson's Baby Oil ... their hand testing employees buy that stuff by the cases to use as a contact conductor to fill in any air gaps between the transducer and the rail

I have a now long deceased great uncle that grew up to be a machinist for the NYC in Elkhart, IN. He was quite the hellion as a kid (independently confirmed), and a consummate BSer as an adult. He claimed to grease rails on a semi-regular basis. The two tales to follow are offered with full knowledge of this

His best tale involved a gravel pit somewhere in Lagrange County that had a narrow gauge installation, and there was a pond that was quite popular with the kids for swimming. One day, Pete and his buds went there to go skinny dipping, and he brought along some grease to have some fun because the narrow gauge went right by the pond. The kids greased the rails, then went skinny dipping as usual. When they heard the train coming, they got out of the water and hid in the bushes, still naked. The train came along, hit the hill and the grease, and slid back down coming to a rest directly between the kids and their clothes. The engineer knew exactly what was going on, so he just sat there, and whenever the undergrowth rustled, he'd open the cylinder cocks and give them a blast of steam to keep the nekkid kids exactly where they were.

Pete lived in Elkhart, and the usual target for his pranks was the streetcar line. They were greased on a regular basis. One day, however, he was at the yard with family, and he managed to walk away with a double handful of torpedoes. It didn't take long for about 5 of them to be lined up on a streetcar rail. Purportedly, the next streetcar that came along, and those 5 torpedoes generated enough force to lift the flanges up and over the rail head. Pete claimed he wasn't seen for a few days after that.

He also claimed that the job of chiseling the frozen hoboes from the back side of the tender after hitting the track pans in the winter was saved for him.

How will the most modern diesels react to a greased rail? Will the high tech anti-slip systems prevent a stall in most situations due to a quicker reaction than could be provided in the old manual world?

I'm surprised we don't hear more about such pranks today. Kids are still kids for the most part.

Milwaukee Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> How will the most modern diesels react to a
> greased rail? Will the high tech anti-slip
> systems prevent a stall in most situations due to
> a quicker reaction than could be provided in the
> old manual world?
>
> I'm surprised we don't hear more about such pranks
> today. Kids are still kids for the most part.

they're either walking down the gage with ear buds in listening to some vulgar laded lyrics or at home in front of a video game killing other players