Bernhards Random Ramblings BACKUP

It's rare that railroad projects are documented in vast detail from the perspectives of civil engineering, economics, and social impact in a single book. "Der Tunnel" is one of the exceptions. It describes design and construction of the central element of the S-Bahn Stuttgart: The city tunnel between Hauptbahnhof (main station) and Schwabstrasse, and it's underground continuation to Vaihingen via Universität. In over 35 detail-loaded chapters the authors work through early plans and financing of the project, discuss in detail the various construction sites within the city core, including engineering challenges of constructing a tunnel in the middle of a bustling city with difficult geology. They keep the high level of detail as they discuss the concerns and engineering challenges building the Hasenbergtunnel towards Vahingen. Along the way they touch on such diverse topics as re-routing of sewers, tram lines, and car traffic; digging next to, or under, historic buildi...

These days cross-Atlantic trips are a rarity. We used the opportunity of my wife's family visit to bring along some of the items that had accumulated at my parent's house over the last 9 months. I now have plenty of stuff to read over the upcoming winter ..

The Zugschlusssignal ("end of train signal") must be mounted at the end of the last car of a train. It is made from metal and there are usually two such markers at the end of the train. Station agents and operators along the tracks observe passing trains and note the complete passing once they see the Zugschlusssignal. This marker is commonly used on freight trains, while passenger cars usually have lighted red end of train markers. Wouldn't it be interesting to include proper placement of such signal in the operations scheme of our model railroads? 

[ Untergroeningen posts ] Untergroeningen station buildings in 2004 This photo from Wikipedia nicely illustrates the building arrangement in Untergroeningen. The locomotive shed is on the left in the rear. Across the tracks is a large storage shed / barn-like structure. Track 1 is partially embedded in asphalt before the station building. There's a small outbuilding with restrooms between the station building and the shed. The station building has an integrated storage / warehouse area and loading ramp facing track 1. The challenge is what did this look like 30 years earlier? I have been contemplating how to model this ensemble. The locomotive shed with its distinctive water tower and attached tool shop in the rear needs to be represented, and I already made a partial paper mock-up for use with Auhagen parts. The shed and toilet building are pretty straightforward. I really like the tree between the two buildings. However, I've been going back and forth on the station buildin...

I received some original paperwork that came off a freight car numbered 841 3032-9 in Berlin-Lichterfelde West in the summer of 1980. According to the number range table in Stefan Carstens' book "Gueterwagen Band 1", car number 841 3 032-9 is UIC type Ichs377. It's an insulated refrigerator car (I), with meat hooks (c), heavy insulation (h), and permitted to run at speeds of up to 100 km/h (s). Deutsche Bundesbahn apparently had 29 of these cars. According to "Gueterwagen Band 2", these cars were introduced in 1956 as German class Tmehs50 with electrical heating and steam heating for use in passenger trains. In 1968, the cars were relabeled to UIC class Ichqrs377. Later, the heating connections -- (q)=electrical, (r)=steam -- were removed, and the cars became class Ichs377. The last cars went out of service in 1985. This was a common car in the 60's and 70's for transporting goods that needed to be kept frozen. I have a couple of these cars in servi...

Along the road between Snoqualmie and Snoqualmie Falls is an outside storage area where the Northwest Railway Museum keeps more artifacts that are slowly rotting away. This 2-6-6-2 was built 1928 by Baldwin and was donated to the museum in 1965. This engine pulled trains for the museum. The steam crane is almost begging for backlit photos with the hook, so here you go. This automobile box car was built for the Great Northern in 1929. The side-doors are extra-wide and the dreadnaught full steel-end doors at the A end can be opened for automobile loading, too. There existed similarly equipped box cars in Germany at roughly the same time. This 10,000 gallon riveted tank car was built in 1929 and in revenue service until 1972. Later it was used by the museum to haul waste oil for the steam locomotives from Seattle and finally retired in 1989, when rail service to Snoqualmie ended.

Generator 5 was installed in the underground cavity of plant 1 at Snoqualmie Falls in 1905. It has a generation capacity of 5600 kilowatts. It uses a Francis turbine, which is more efficient than the Pelton wheels used in the other 4 generators installed at plant 1. The water enters the turbine from the sides and then falls straight down from the center of the turbine into a draft tube. The energy of the flowing water is transferred to the shaft of the turbine in form of torque. The shaft is connected to the generator, visible in the rear in the photo at the top of this post. In 2011 the plant was modernized and generator 5 was moved from plant 1 to the hydropower museum. "Wow!" The shops building was moved here from its original site and has various artifacts and equipment that was removed from the plant's underground cavity and control room. Control panel. Knife switches.

The Snoqualmie Depot is the oldest continuously operated train station in Washington State, because the offices of the Northwest Railway Museum moved into the depot before the last BNSF offices moved out in 1975. Several artifacts are presented around the depot. The restored freight room hosts the Museum Book Store with more exhibits. The item that excited me the most here is the interlocking machine that used to be located at Black River Junction where the Northern Pacific Railroad, the Chicago, Milwaukee, & Pudget Sound Railroad, and the Pacific Coast Railroad meet, ten miles south of Seattle Union Station. This must have been a quite busy junction. The tables in the lower half show the possible routes and which levers need to be set to reverse (i.e. not normal) for that route in which sequence, so that turnouts and signals are set correctly. The various pictograms on the board are interesting, too. Even the tower location is marked. Outside the depot ALCO RSD-4 and several cars ...

The Northwest Railway Museum has a modern shed just East of downtown Snoqualmie with a small but relevant collection of artifacts and rolling stock from the days when the Great Northern, Northern Pacific, and logging companies dominated the area. This Fairbanks Moose H12-44 switcher (Engine #1) is nicely restored. It's primary duty was to haul lumber from the White River Mill to the Northern Pacific Railway at Enumclaw, WA. The caboose usually used with #1 is also in the collection of the museum and restored on the outside. Not all rolling stock is this nicely restored. However, with the large train shed building, they are at least not rotting away exposed to the elements. I liked this NP reefer, and especially the description how oranges from California were prepared for their travels north and packed in refrigerated cars. There's more information about the museum and he exhibits at trainmuseum.org .

I recently picked up the rule book DV 605 that goes with the forms I got last year . Now I can learn how to use the forms properly. ... Not surprisingly, it's a lot of text.

In this film from the 1960's, Deutsche Bundesbahn shows the various kinds of control tower technology in use at that time. Today we'd call this an infotainment film. Lots of Zeitgeist.

Eine SDR Reportage von 1964. Koestliche Moderation, und viele Details an der Strecke.

Hauptzettel for regular freight loads Hauptzettel are found in a frame on the outside of freight cars behind a wire mesh ( see this post for examples ). So far I've used examples for these forms found on the Internet. I didn't know what exact time frame they were from, but  adjusted for my needs  to guide making car cards and way bills that resemble the prototype forms. Now that I have the appendix for DV 605 from 1970 , the next time I revise way bills I can try to replicate the look of these forms as much as feasible to fit the time frame of my layout. Of course, I just finished making car cards and way bills for most cars on my layout. I'm not going to throw away that work, but rather try out the system for a while and then make adjustments as needed. Hauptzettel for preferred freight loads Hauptzettel for express freight. There are lots of variations of this form... Preferred freight where the whole car goes to the same destination freight terminal Preferred freight as ...

[ An English version of this post can be found here ] Eine weitere Ebay Auktion. Ein weiterer Stapel Altpapier. Diesmal ist es ein deutsches Gueterzugkursbuch mit dem Jahresfahrplan 1984/85. Das Gueterzugkursbuch zeigt fuer jeden Bahnhof welche Gueterzuege wann wohin fahren. Was kann man damit anfangen? Mal sehen ... Letztes Jahr habe ich einen  Artikel  geschrieben in dem ich spekuliert habe was der Richtpunktcode auf einem Hauptzettel bedeutet, den ich im Februar 1987  auf Gleis 5 in Ludwigsburg fotografiert habe . Hier ist eine Ausschnittvergroesserung des Hauptzettels von diesem Foto. Ein paar Sachen, die mir gleich auffallen: Die handschriftlichen Eintragungen oben rechts sind Gewichte fuer Wagen (19,2), Ladung (22,1), und Gesamt (41,3) in Tonnen. Unter den Gewichten ist die Wagennnummer 21 80 238 4? 831-1? . Die Nummer ist schwer zu lesen, daher muss ich fuer einige Zahlen raten. Der Wagen wurde in Neheim-Huesten mit Stueckgut beladen, und geht nach Leonberg. Der Wa...