Passenger Trains > Helpers on the "Coast Starlate"--how common?

Pulled up this shot I made on August 16, 2015 on a very late northbound Coast Starlight with power problems. UP helpers to the rescue over Cuesta Pass. How common is this?

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It only happened when there was an engine breakdown on 14 south of  SLO, and no other Amtk engine s around they could grab.  I can only think of 3 or 4 times in the last 15 years

With the shorter trains these days, they might be able to make the hill with 1 engine now.    a 12 car train was too much for 1 engine...they tried it..lol

In this case, its a 12 car train with at least 2 PV's.   IIRC,  over 14 cars, they amtk would put a 3rd engine on 14.   
I think once or twice Amtk arranged for helpers over cuesta ahead of time, as they knew they had a long train but only 2 engines.

Cant happen these days with no helpers at SLO anymore. 
There's UP power down at Guadalupe, but no crews qualified north of SLO, AFAIK

 



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 10/21/20 17:17 by pdt.

Helpers Happen.
It isn’t terribly unusual on the 11/14, or any other LD train for that matter.
But a 2 unit helper IS noteworthy. I can’t say I’ve seen that before.
SR

Now, San Luis Obispo usually has a pair of locomotives available for helping freight up Custa Grade- so it’s possible that what we’re seeing is the “Home Guard” giving 14 a helping hand up the hill, and then the pair cutting off at Santa Margarita.

Helpers Help.

 

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Whenever it happened, heck- we were always happy to have the helpers helping!
SR

There should have been three PVs on that trip, Tioga Pass, Pacific Sands, and Silver Splendor.  I believe the destination was Spokane.  If helpers were needed due to issues with one of the Amtrak engines, it would be faster and easier to add the two engine set that used to be in SLO than to split them apart to just take one over the hill. Since they are arranged back to back, there would be a cab at the front no matter which direction they were going. 

While I wasn't on this particular trip, I was on one a few years earlier with six PVs where the UP engines were taken off on the other side of the hill at Santa Margarita where they returned to SLO as the Starlight continued north.  Two of the PVs were dropped off at Salinas. Helpers were again added in Klamath Falls for the rest of the leg to Portland.

On that trip Amtrak knew a third engine would be needed.  But they didn't have an engine to spare in LA because some extra Surfliners were running that day.  So off we went with just two, a full Starlight consist, and six PVs.  The train had to go into LAUPT engine first so that all of the Amtrak cars would fit on the platform.  All but one of the PVs hung off the end.  The train had to back out of LAUPT before heading north, which took time, of course.

Here's an interesting one from 3/21/2005...

SD40-2 (FURX 8110) leading the southbound Coast Starlight at Oakland.

Take Care,
Alex Ramos 

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Fwiw....I live 20 miles from cuesta grade, and right oin the coast line, and have a scanner on all the time.   These are unquestionably the SLO helpers, which were there up until about 2 years ago when UP closed the SLO crew base and the helpers left.  There have not been any helpers at SLO for about 2 yaers now.

This is totally different than when a UP or BNSF engine is added to cover for a dead engine in the consist.   

We've had just a few times over that last 15 years, that one of the engines on Amtk 14 went dead enroute, and what they did was add the SLO manned helpers just to get over the hill, cut them off at santa margarita , and then run with 1 unit to OAK, where they could add another amtk engine.

As stated by the picture taker....14 had power problems, and this is the SLO manned helpers assisting 14 over the hill. The helpers cut off at Santa Margarita, and headed back to SLO.

Sorry for confusion if anyone here thought these units were added for the run froim LAX to OAK or north of there.  These are the manned SLO helpers, just helping amtk over the hill.

Having a Freight unit added to an amtrak train when an amtk unit fails...not too unusual.

Manned helpers assisting Amtk 14 over cuesta pass....very unusual.  Like i say...its happened just a handful of times in the 15 years I've been here.

And yes, the helpers were almost always back to back, cause the helper district is 15 miles, and running light 15 miles LHF with no ditch lights on the long end...is a very long ride. Once in a while they would change out the helpers and screw up and end of with both units pointed the same way...in which case they usually swapped out with a unit that was on a road freight...i mean back when we had road freights on the coast.

Any questions?  I havent lived here forever, but i can tell u whats been going on for the last 15 years around here



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/21/20 22:40 by pdt.

The main reason for the helpers at San Luis Obispo from around mid 1999 to December 2018 was to assist the loaded oil cans up Cuesta grade in power and in dynamics down the grade from Santa Margarita to San Luis Obispo.  When the oil cans weren't using the helpers the engines could be put to other uses like helping Amtrak.  When the oil cans stopped running in late December 2018 the reason for the helpers was gone and in early 2019 when UP quit running empty auto racks and bare tables down the coast line the crew base at San Luis Obispo was closed.  

Some years ago (unfortunately I don't remember how long, but probably ten years or more) I was on 14 when it stalled going up Cuesta.  It was already late out of SLO, and the previous crew reported that one of the engines was acting up.  The engineer, nevertheless, decided to try Cuesta without calling on the helpers.  I can remember eating dinner (I said it was already late) while we were stalled, seeing the helpers go by, feeling them hook up and then moving to the crest at a good speed instead of the previous crawl.  As I remember, the helpers came off at Santa Margarita.  We would definitely have saved time if we'd had the helpers from the beginning.  I suspect (but do not know) that the engineer decided to try without helpers because he didn't want to be responsible for requiring Amtrak to pay for them unnecessarily; this way showed that they were necessary, and the train was already pretty late.

DGOLDE Wrote:
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> The main reason for the helpers at San Luis Obispo
> from around mid 1999 to December 2018 was to
> assist the loaded oil cans up Cuesta grade in
> power and in dynamics down the grade from Santa
> Margarita to San Luis Obispo.  When the oil cans
> weren't using the helpers the engines could be put
> to other uses like helping Amtrak.  When the oil
> cans stopped running in late December 2018 the
> reason for the helpers was gone and in early 2019
> when UP quit running empty auto racks and bare
> tables down the coast line the crew base at San
> Luis Obispo was closed.  

Back before 2008 when we had regular road freights on the coast (DORV, WCPT, etc,) The helpers got a good workout.   These trains were 5 days a week, while the Oil cans were maybe twice a week.   They we also used to help stalled trains on the hill (for a while we had about 1 a month), and during the last track maintenance blitz, they were used to move cars of ties and supplies anywhere between guadalupe and paso robles

Now at Paso Robles we are down to 1 train a day. 1 amtk 6 days a week, and the local 1 day a week..  Pretty sad.  

bobs Wrote:
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> There should have been three PVs on that trip,
> Tioga Pass, Pacific Sands, and Silver Splendor. 
> I believe the destination was Spokane. 

There were two on this particular August 16, 2015 trip. Tioga Pass was deadheading to Oakland for an an Oakland-Chicago charter. The ex-CZ dome was, if I recall, deadheading to Oakland after a charter in Southern California.

I should have been more specific in my post. We picked up the UP helpers at San Luis Obispo and dropped them at Santa Margarita. Over the years I have photographed countless borrowed freight units on the point of Amtrak but this was the first time I'd seen freight units as mountain helpers, dropped after the climb was over.

I was on the northbound star light that lost an engine a few years back. To get over the grade they turned off the hep

Posted from Android

Yes, that would have been back in the F40 era. The prime mover on the F40 also provided the HEP, so the idea was to reduce some of the load on the diesel. The theory being all it’s energy could be devoted to traction.
I’m not entirely sure if this really worked, but I was on several trips where the crew tried it.
SR

BoilingMan Wrote:
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> Yes, that would have been back in the F40 era.
> The prime mover on the F40 also provided the HEP,
> so the idea was to reduce some of the load on the
> diesel. The theory being all it’s energy could
> be devoted to traction.
> I’m not entirely sure if this really worked, but
> I was on several trips where the crew tried it.
> SR

HEP at max load will "use" up to 700 HP on an F40. So a 3000HP engine becomes a 2300HP engine when in HEP mode.

Alco251 Wrote:
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> bobs Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > There should have been three PVs on that trip,
> > Tioga Pass, Pacific Sands, and Silver
> Splendor. 
> > I believe the destination was Spokane. 
>
> There were two on this particular August 16, 2015
> trip. Tioga Pass was deadheading to Oakland for an
> an Oakland-Chicago charter. The ex-CZ dome was, if
> I recall, deadheading to Oakland after a charter
> in Southern California.
>
> I should have been more specific in my post. We
> picked up the UP helpers at San Luis Obispo and
> dropped them at Santa Margarita. Over the years I
> have photographed countless borrowed freight units
> on the point of Amtrak but this was the first time
> I'd seen freight units as mountain helpers,
> dropped after the climb was over.

The Amtrak power in this case was a P42 leading, plus a P32 (8-32BWM) trailing. The P42 died and we barely made it up the grade south of Guadalupe with only the P32 providing power. Once in San Luis Obispo, we sat for qutie a while for the helper crew to be called. With the helpers, we made good time up Cuesta Grade. Once they cut off at Santa Margarita, the run is largely downhill all the way to Salinas. We managed at times to hit 40 mph and arrived into Oakland well after midnight, where the train took further delays in swapping out the locomotive. Tioga Pass returned southbound a couple of days later with a tour group.