Texas Track Car
Must be the '90's...
...judging by the four axle quartet on the point of this hotshot. For Warbonnet Wednesday, we have Santa Fe 517 and friends westbound at the east end of Lubbock with what is likely an HOBA well in hand slowing to navigate Restricted Limits through the "Hub City." This end of town is dominated by cotton warehouses, as the water tower suggests and despite the city's size and importance, it's wasn't a crew change until recently. This crew is just getting started with their trip to Clovis, having boarded the train in nearby Slaton. Flashing forward to today, you're most likely to find the likes of the first two units, a Dash 8-40BW and a GP60M, in local or roadswitcher service. Good luck finding a cabless GP60B like the third unit and the fourth unit, a standard cab Dash 8-40B is probably in a deadline somewhere. Someone probably has a roster closer at hand than I do, so in full disclosure, the fourth unit may have been disposed of by now. Anyhoo, this recalls those heady days of yore when high-horsepower four-motor units were the steeds of choice for intermodal traffic because theoretically, they accelerate faster. With that 500 as a leader, two thoughts come to mind: 1) I'm not to sure I've ever seen a GE spool up quickly, and 2) Todays GE ES44C4's are supposed to accelerate faster since they have four traction motors spread over six axles. On that point, I'll refer you back to the first thought. Gotta admit though, regardless of their relative merit, four axle units sure looked good in this application.
Must be the '90's...
...judging by the four axle quartet on the point of this hotshot. For Warbonnet Wednesday, we have Santa Fe 517 and friends westbound at the east end of Lubbock with what is likely an HOBA well in hand slowing to navigate Restricted Limits through the "Hub City." This end of town is dominated by cotton warehouses, as the water tower suggests and despite the city's size and importance, it's wasn't a crew change until recently. This crew is just getting started with their trip to Clovis, having boarded the train in nearby Slaton. Flashing forward to today, you're most likely to find the likes of the first two units, a Dash 8-40BW and a GP60M, in local or roadswitcher service. Good luck finding a cabless GP60B like the third unit and the fourth unit, a standard cab Dash 8-40B is probably in a deadline somewhere. Someone probably has a roster closer at hand than I do, so in full disclosure, the fourth unit may have been disposed of by now. Anyhoo, this recalls those heady days of yore when high-horsepower four-motor units were the steeds of choice for intermodal traffic because theoretically, they accelerate faster. With that 500 as a leader, two thoughts come to mind: 1) I'm not to sure I've ever seen a GE spool up quickly, and 2) Todays GE ES44C4's are supposed to accelerate faster since they have four traction motors spread over six axles. On that point, I'll refer you back to the first thought. Gotta admit though, regardless of their relative merit, four axle units sure looked good in this application.