Nostalgia & History > A Bunch of Milwaukee Snow Fighting Equipment

Another set of Paul Bingman's pictures. He loved the Milwaukee Road and the Milwaukee sure had some interesting snow fighting equipment - much of it homemade and much of it used to the very end in Washington and Montana, from what I can tell. They were all shot between 1974 and 1976.

Total of 17 pictures so give me some time to get them all up. All collection of Don Hall, taken by J. Paul Bingman.

1: Haugan, MT
2: St. Maries, ID
3: Cle Elem, WA

Don
Yreka, CA



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/12/12 21:47 by odub.

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4: Harlowton, MT
5: Haugan, MT
6: Tacoma, WA

All shot in the mid-70s.

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7: Avery, ID
8: Avery, ID
9: Alberton, MT

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10: Deer Lodge, MT
11: Tacoma, WA
12: Harlowton, MT

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13: Tacoma, WA
14: Harlowton, MT
15: Ringling, MT

Oh, I see I'll have to stick the final two in another post.

Don

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Hi Don.Those are some great pic's. Very interesting and different equipment. No two pieces are alike. Thank's for sharing these photo's.Bill

16: Ringling, MT
17: St. Maries, ID

Hope you like 'em.

Don

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WOW! That is some really cool stuff. I love the flanger box car with the caboose window that is only being half used with the other half attached to the car body with a pole. Looks like they just went out to the yard and saw what they had laying around that might fit.

Too cool. Thanks for posting these.

AL Bayer

These are great! Some real life kitbashing. In picture No 8 the rotary has a pantograph, does anyone know if this was this for power, to clean the contact wire or used to keep the contact wire out of the way of the snow?

Jim

Really nice collection of snow fighting equipment. The Milwaukee Road folks were pretty resourceful!

Steve Mitchell
http://www.yardgoatimages.com

Interesting equipment, almost like a logging road gone wild.

I think that the wedge plow from Ringling is now displayed at Harlowton:

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tq-07fan Wrote:
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> These are great! Some real life kitbashing. In
> picture No 8 the rotary has a pantograph, does
> anyone know if this was this for power, to clean
> the contact wire or used to keep the contact wire
> out of the way of the snow?
>
> Jim


I beleive the pantograph was used to power the rotary
wheel itself, and the plow was pushed by electric
locomotives. The pan was eventually removed, and the
plow got a power car. When the Milwaukee removed its
electric service, the plow was moved to St. Paul and
saw service in Iowa during a couple of storms. I want
to say 1981. It was readily identifiable by the insulators
still on the roof.

Always thought the tenders turned into flangers were
really a neat idea, although I never saw one in use.

Nick Tharalson,
Marion, IA

Great series......being an architect, my interest was also drawn to the first photo and what appears to be an over-sized concrete pier that was perhaps a part of a much larger structure. Any clue as to what that might have been? An old coaling tower maybe?

Thanks,

Bill

bbethmann Wrote:
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> Great series......being an architect, my interest
> was also drawn to the first photo and what appears
> to be an over-sized concrete pier that was perhaps
> a part of a much larger structure. Any clue as to
> what that might have been? An old coaling tower
> maybe?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Bill

The base was for the oil towers for the steam engines and passenger electric boilers. The one in Deer Lodge lasted for quite some time the one in Avery might have as well.

The MILW steam engines west of Harlo (?) were all oil fired engines.

Posted from Windows Phone OS 7

tq-07fan Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> These are great! Some real life kitbashing. In
> picture No 8 the rotary has a pantograph, does
> anyone know if this was this for power, to clean
> the contact wire or used to keep the contact wire
> out of the way of the snow?
>
> Jim

The pantographs were probably the original power but by the early 70s all were powered by diesel units trailing. The pans remained to be used if the rotary wheel got jammed up with ice or trees. The traction motors used to turn the wheel came from retired GE boxcabs and Westinghouse Quills.

Posted from Windows Phone OS 7

Photos 1 and 12 show this equipment which may be unique to the MILW. The wings swung open to about 45 degrees. Now instead of shoving the machine to force the snow out it was dragged through the cut and shaved snow from the edges of the cut which was deposited between the rails..This was later lifted out by another pass of the rotary or wedge plow.

Posted from Windows Phone OS 7

fbe Wrote:
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> Photos 1 and 12 show this equipment which may be
> unique to the MILW. The wings swung open to about
> 45 degrees. Now instead of shoving the machine to
> force the snow out it was dragged through the cut
> and shaved snow from the edges of the cut which
> was deposited between the rails..This was later
> lifted out by another pass of the rotary or wedge
> plow.
>
> Posted from Windows Phone OS 7

It looks like that may be the case but, if so, it's not unique. The RhB in Graubunden Switzerland has used similar equipment to bring snow between the rails and then move it out with a rotary snowplow. It appears the RhB uses this technique in areas in which the snow is too deep to move it to one side or the other.

Don

Don, on behalf of all the "Milwaukiholics" in the crowd, much thanks.

I believe the plow shown at Ringling was actually owned by the WSS&YP (but of MILW heritage).