Railroaders' Nostalgia > Sticking My Hand Out the Window

I began my railroading career as a hostler in 1973 at UP's roundhouse in Kansas City, KS.  The fireman protected the hostling jobs at that time and had for many years.  When it came time for me to enter the engineer training program, I was assigned to the KC to Marysville, KS Pool with veteran engineer W.R. "Ridge Runner" Woodson, so named because of his Arkansas roots and very definite accent. 
I had been with "Ridge" for a couple of months when we caught an eastbound coal load out of Marysville.  Believe it or not, this was the only coal train on the Kansas Division at that time.  The coal was destined for Kansas City Power and Light's Hawthorne Plant located just east of the KCS Kenoche Yard.  Power for this train was usually 4 or 5 400 class SD24s. 
The pull out of Marysville to the top of the hill at Upland was no different to me than a lot of heavy manifests I had handled.  From Upland it's all down hill to Frankfort and at that time a 30 mph speed over the Mop's northern branch from Atchison to Downs and Lenora, KS. 
We topped the hill at Upland and as we were picking up speed I set "First Service" on the automatic brake valve.  Ridge jumped up and ran across the cab and yelled, "If you set first service on a train like this, you might as well stick yo hand out the window"!!!!   He was right but it was too late as we went over the Mop at about 40 to45.  By the time we got to Topeka, I realized that the "First service" was a joke and adjusted my braking accordingly.   AH the days before dynamic braking. 

Thanks for listening. 

Bob Helling
PRose



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 10/27/15 14:37 by PRose.

Glad this is a railroaders board.No one else would know what 1st service was.

Uncle Joe,Seffner,Fl.

retcsxcfm Wrote:
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> Glad this is a railroaders board.No one else would
> know what 1st service was.
>
> Uncle Joe,Seffner,Fl.

I thought this was a rail fan board also, I guess this will be my last subscription, don't want to intrude into the private world of railroading.

Mike Harris
Crane, MO.

retcsxcfm Wrote:
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> Glad this is a railroaders board.No one else would
> know what 1st service was.
>
> Uncle Joe,Seffner,Fl.

Subtle, very subtle!  Heck, I don't have a clue either!

Rob

When I started firing, the hardest stopping train we had was the one made up of the new "10 Pack Fuel Foiler" cars, which were constructed in Topeka. It was almost like having no air brakes at all. You set all you had and you could barely feel it. LC Mallon brought one of these (a 188 I think) into Wellington for a crew change. He passed the info on to the outbound Waynoka man, who kinda smirked and indicated he knew how handle fast trains. First red board he came to, he got fired.

Posted from Android

I have heard it said, " First Squirt"


Nudge

SilvertonRR100 Wrote:
...Heck, I don't have a clue
> either!
>
> Rob

First detent on the brake valve.  Service brake vs emergency brake application.  'Just a fan so I'll leave better explanation to those who know what they're talking about.  Basically, he was saying the minimum brake application on that train in that spot was as effective as sticking your hand out the window and letting the exra air resistance slow you down.

With a 90 lb brake pipe it's a 6-8 lb reduction. If I remember, it establishes preliminary quick service on the cars.

Posted from Android

Bob, at least the curve is good for 45 today!
 

kool story, but i don't understand the comment about the days before dynamic brakes. uncle pete's sd24s certainly had them . . . failing minds want to know!

Engineers hardly ever used dynamic braking when I was firing.  Everything was stretch braking.  I don't think they trusted them.  I didn't start using dynamic braking until the cabooses
went away. 

Actually the Railroaders Nostalgia board was created so the railroaders on here would have a place to tell stories and talk about work. Todd posted a notice when this subforum was first added, asking on railroaders to post threads in here. This is the one section of TO that is ours.


Mike_B Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> retcsxcfm Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Glad this is a railroaders board.No one else
> would
> > know what 1st service was.
> >
> > Uncle Joe,Seffner,Fl.
>
> I thought this was a rail fan board also, I guess
> this will be my last subscription, don't want to
> intrude into the private world of railroading.
>
> Mike Harris
> Crane, MO.

Posted from Android

DG .
Unknown, US

When I started, the main concern was not to hurt anybody on the rear end, so for planned braking, we were taught to have a minimum reduction under the train before we ever started reducing the throttle, an keep it stretched down to a stop. If the train had a kicker, then we'd start early and see what the DB had to offer, but nobody expected much, just some bells maybe. But, fuel was cheap back then, and it cost money to maintain the DB's most never used anyway. That all changed later, when fuel prices went up, The DB's became more reliable and effective, and there was nobody on the rear end to get slam-dunked anymore. As technology improved, adding event recorders helped too.

Posted from Android



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/28/15 08:05 by ddg.

trkspd Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Actually the Railroaders Nostalgia board was
> created so the railroaders on here would have a
> place to tell stories and talk about work. Todd
> posted a notice when this subforum was first
> added, asking on railroaders to post threads in
> here. This is the one section of TO that is ours.
>
>
> Mike_B Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > retcsxcfm Wrote:
> >
> --------------------------------------------------
>
> > -----
> > > Glad this is a railroaders board.No one else
> > would
> > > know what 1st service was.
> > >
> > > Uncle Joe,Seffner,Fl.
> >
> > I thought this was a rail fan board also, I
> guess
> > this will be my last subscription, don't want
> to
> > intrude into the private world of railroading.
> >
> > Mike Harris
> > Crane, MO.
>
> Posted from Android

Todd created this board for rails and fans alike, with one exception: Posts are to be started by rail from their experiences, but, if I'm not mistaken, can have comments by the fans.



V

SLOCONDR

Personally regardless of whether there was a caboose or not I preferred "power braking", even with DP units, and always did it although I did cut back somewhat after event recorder downloads got more and more frequent. I learned running with power braking and just always preferred it. I figured if they didn't want me to power brake then why did they equip the engine with an automatic brake valve.

What scares me is they don't teach power braking so now when you get a newer guy and he has dynamic brake failure, or conditions don't favor dynamic braking, they have no idea how to do things safely to avoid train separations - and they get quite a few.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 10/28/15 21:07 by Railbaron.

Mike_B Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> retcsxcfm Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Glad this is a railroaders board.No one else
> would
> > know what 1st service was.
> >
> > Uncle Joe,Seffner,Fl.
>
> I thought this was a rail fan board also, I guess
> this will be my last subscription, don't want to
> intrude into the private world of railroading.

Don't look at it that way.

First, I doubt that is what retcsxcfm meant. I'm not even a rail; I'm a consultant. There are several consultants here. Look around here at trainorders and see the insults regularly aimed at consultants. That doesn't keep them away or keep them from providing information that most here are eager to get.

No matter the profession, folks tend to relate in the language of the profession. At least in railroading, it isn't done to be exclusive or pretentious, it's just the commonly used expression for an action or a thing. I guarantee that if you go to the hallowed halls of a class 1 control center, you'll find a plethora of folks who wouldn't have a clue about first service, first squirt (yeah, Nudge, I know that one too), or even minimum brake pipe reduction (so many words in newspeak). It's not a rail vs fan thing at all.

Yeah, the railroaders' nostalgia board was set up for rails to discuss (basically tell stories, or old head as it is called, or used to be at least, in railroading). That doesn't mean nobody else can go there. In fact, I don't think anyone who writes here has any intention of being exclusive. A substantial part of the readily-available knowledge at trainorders.com comes from the rails - old, young, retired, from a wide array of the various professions of railroading. I've been here for over a decade and don't remember ever seeing an instance of a rail ridiculing anyone for asking a question. They get irked when know-it-alls make pronouncements, but generally, if there is a question about any aspect of railroading, by a rail or by a non-rail fan, there is an answer in short order.

TAW

Railbaron Wrote:
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> Personally regardless of whether there was a
> caboose or not I preferred "power braking", even
> with DP units, and always did it although I did
> cut back after event recorders and downloads got
> more and more frequent. I learned running with
> power braking and just always preferred it. I
> figured if they didn't want me to power brake they
> why did they equip the engine with an automatic
> brake valve.
>
> What scares me is they don't teach power braking
> so now when you get a newer guy and he has dynamic
> brake failure, or conditions don't favor dynamic
> braking, they have no idea how to do things safely
> to avoid train separations - and they get quite a
> few.

That and getting on/off moving equipment are, as far as I'm concerned, two big safety deficiencies in the brave new world of railroading. The complete inability of dispatchers to know what is on their railroad without a video display that has train symbols is another, along with not knowing that the CTC display is not reality, but a model of reality. If I thought about it, I'd come up with a lot more.

TAW

TAW, you aren't going to get away that easy.....you're a crazy just like the rest of us.

:)

TAW Wrote:
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>I'm not even a rail; I'm a consultant.
>
> TAW

Posted from Android

DG .
Unknown, US

trkspd Wrote:
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> TAW, you aren't going to get away that easy.....you're a crazy just like the rest of us.

> :)

Never said I wasn't - and doing it for over 50 years proves it.

TAW

ddg Wrote:
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>The DB's became more
> reliable and effective, and there was nobody on
> the rear end to get slam-dunked anymore.

As a BN colleague responded years ago to controlling the train with dynamic...nope, just the freight.

TAW