Eastern Railroad Discussion > Helpers on NS Centralia-St. Louis

I live in New Baden, IL within view and earshot of of Norfolk Southern's Centralia to St. Louis main. I've been seeing/hearing more westbound trains in the past few months with a set of rear helpers, usually two units and mostly on coal trains. The only notable grade I'm aware of on this line is on the transition from the prairie to the Mississippi River valley in and around Belleville, IL. Westbounds would be descending this grade. The rest of the line is located on the flat Illinois prairie, with no notable grades to speak of. I'm curious about the uptick in the use of helpers, particularly on the westbounds.

When these trains go east loaded they encounter some pretty good grades between Princeton, IN and Louisville, not to mention grades on the NS between Danville and Oakdale, TN on the CNO&TP. It much easier to just leave the trains DP's for the empty trip - in fact, this is done almost everywhere where distributed power coal train operate, including on BNSF and UP.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/02/13 09:30 by Rathole.

I do not know that line at all except, at least in SOU days, on the north side of the Ohio River (N Albany IN?) off the big bridge over the Ohio this line used make a loop under itself to go west on the SOU. There is also probably a decent grade getting out of the Ohio River Valley onto the plains of Southern IL. In any case, use of DPU's or manned helpers provides much better train control in adverse grade/curve combinations and bad weather the engineer has much more precise train control. Even on the flatlands, a DPU especially in bad weather helps control the train better, If a conductor has to walk a train he can find a place to warm up (or cool off) and have some amenities before he has to walk it back. The Western railroads have known this for years, the Eastern lines are catching up. Now we are getting DPUs in Delaware of all places, and they come over Amtrak's high speed NEC, with 86 trains going at least 110mph versus 26 per day in the sixties, a few allowed 100 but most at 80. DPU's were predicted by John Kneiling in the 1960s in his Trains magazine column. The technology caught up with the prediction in the early 1990s.

John Kneiling: Is he still alive?

Rathole Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> When these trains go east loaded they encounter
> some pretty good grades between Princeton, IN and
> Louisville, not to mention grades on the NS
> between Danville and Oakdale, TN on the CNO&TP.
> It much easier to just leave the trains DP's for
> the empty trip - in fact, this is done almost
> everywhere where distributed power coal train
> operate, including on BNSF and UP.

In the 1970s, Southern used to run a heavy, long train 111 eastward (southbound) out of East St. Louis, Illinois (Coapman Yard) with mid-train remote-control units - they weren't known as DPUs at the time. The units themselves (typically two SD40s, if memory serves) did not have onboard Locotrol units as today. Instead, Southern had a converted boxcar with the Locotrol equipment cut into the consist with the midtrain units. The train's westward (northbound) counterpart, train 112, did the same coming from Louisville.

As noted, the line from East St. Louis to Louisville has its share of grades. The first, Belleville Hill, begins right out of Coapman as the Southern follows the ex-IC on a fairly long, curving grade up out of the Mississippi River floodplain onto the level of the flat Illinois prairie at Belleville, Illinois. Further east through southern Indiana, the line then has both curvature and a sawtooth profile with some moderate grades which once again made the midtrain power useful. Descending to New Albany and Louisville down the stiff grade of Edwardsville Hill into the Ohio River valley again made useful the midtrain power's dynamic braking, as well as making for faster response on the airbrakes. For train 112 coming the other way, the midtrain power was just as useful coming up Edwardsville Hill. In fact, my understanding was that Southern instituted the practice of the midtrain power primarily to cope with that grade, more than for the grades enroute or near East St. Louis.

In any case, 111 was always a monster of a train. I have a very vivid memory of watching it being made up at Coapman, and the midtrain power and Locotrol car being cut in on a warm summer's evening in the late 1970's. A number of us from the St. Louis Chapter NRHS had spent the early evening hours preparing the train for a Southern 4510 steam excursion that coming weekend. While we cleaned the train (including sweeping out more cinders from the previous trip than I had ever seen to that point in my life from open-window cars and the open-side car "Lookout Mountain"), 111 was being made up a couple of tracks away from us in Coapman Yard. We finished our work and were ready to head home when we were advised that 111 was going to make its double for departure, and we should wait until the grade crossing to exit the yard was cleared. So we all repaired to the midtrain baggage car, opened the doors on the north side of the train, and watched as the midtrain units were cut in right opposite our location, and the train was doubled over for departure. Listening to those midtrain units notch up as 111 departed very smoothly and with surprisingly little slack action was something I have never forgotten. It was the first time this flatlander boy had ever seen midtrain power of any kind, much less remote-controlled - and it was fascinating. After the train left, we closed up, and headed for our cars. We all left Coapman by the same route as a caravan, escorted by a couple of Southern special agents. Even in those days, when things were better than today, that part of East St. Louis was a tough part of town.

I guess the only real surprise to me is that NS has apparently only recently started to use DPU's on this line. Sure, today's locomotives are more substantially powerful than the SD40s and '45s that used to be common on that line during those midtrain-power days. But the grades are the same over to Louisville (not to mention going beyond Danville on the Rathole), and the advantages of having power distributed through the train remain the same. And the few times I have seen 111 in recent times, it is still a substantial train, if not perhaps the monster of old. In the fundamentals, some things really don't change that much.

MC
Columbia, Missouri



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/03/13 16:20 by ironmtn.

NS used those midtrain slave units with the radio boxcars on 111-112 well into the 1990s. They were a distinguishing feature for those trains on the Rathole when I went down there for multiple foam visits between 1993 and 1996.

Lets not forget the steep grade just east of Centrailia. You can go to the county road crossing just east of town and see the top of the eastbounds engine before you see the crew and plow!

I appreciate the info and discussion. I've been hearing the rear train DPUs a few times a day for the past few months. It's possible they've been there longer and I just haven't noticed. Every so often I'll glance out the window to look, and they're on a WB coal train. I have seen a few double stacks with a single rear DPU, but those are hit and miss. I may be mistaken, but there does seem to be more coal traffic over the past year than what I remember before (I moved here in January 2010).