Canadian Railroads > Monday MLW

couple of images, July 1985 at Hixon BC on the BC Rail Prince George sub. It would appear the lead unit has been "renumbered". Doug

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Yeah, the 704's numbers and nose stripping started to peel after a while.

This shot reminds me of a question I wanted to ask you, Doug:

This seems to be one of those instances where the remote set was placed up in front with the lead units when the train was originally put together at the terminal of origin.. Later, depending upon pick ups along the way, the M420B and C425 might be placed back in the train in remote service.
On the other hand, I remember many times when they were never moved out of the lead consist, despite the train becoming quite long. I saw trains on the Squamish Sub of 70 or cars that still had the remote set up front.

What was the policy on BCR for when the remotes would be cut away from the lead and placed back in the train? Was this a union rules thing?


Thanks in advance...
Brian E

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/11/17 09:10 by m420.

Placing remotes in the train was a decision made usually in the Chief Dispatcher office. It all depended on train make up, loads empties and work on line. For a long time remote units were only used on south bound trains, eventually as traffic and tonnage increased remotes were used on north bound trains. North bound trains were generally empty cars and to distribute the power was not necessary. Later on, power on #23, the VP symbol would run through from North Vancouver to Chetwynd. Having the remote unit setup and sequence tested in North Vancouver eliminated the need and delay at Prince George for a power swap and quite often the remote control unit was cut in the train prior to arriving at Prince George.
Rule of thumb for placement of the remote unit was 2/3 back in the train by car count, although this did not always happen. There were no "collective agreement" issues concerning the use of remote control units in a train. Locomotive Engineers received an extra hourly pay rate allowance "Locotrol Allowance" for handling remote units. Doug

Thanks for this.

Over the years I occasionally saw a train leave Prince George leave with the remotes on the head end and later (At Quesnell or Williams Lake) they would be set back in the train as the crew made pickups along the way.

Brian E