The Wire is Icy- both pans up

Yesterday I completed my KC-CHI-SBD drive, and I noticed at Gary there was a train running with both pans up. I've heard this is so one pan scrapes the ice off the wire and the other collects juice. It's the first time I've ever seen this is in the modern (post 1981) era.

Quite common this time of year on the NEC. AEM-7's routinely ran that way, as did GG-1's. Not only did the lead pantograph scrape off the icicles, it also picked up juice. And even with both pantographs up, you saw lots of sparking. But they RAN even when aircraft were grounded.

Pennsy, I hear from Dutch Rail Nut (MNCR engineer) that the front pan is isolated to prevent some kind of arc or flashover possible when toasters run both-pan-up.

On another note, the wire is still icy enough to warrant two pans up, only on the lead car, though. I've got a video I'll post tomorrow when my connection is better. I had to collect my sister at the SB Airport off an evening train, so I pulled into the business park and let the dog run around while I taped the inbound train.

Per my promises, here is the video. You can see one of the family dogs running around at the end. I shot this from the airport industrial park just east of the station.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDvF2smOBAM

The South Shore, with enough advance notice, will also routinely run "icebreaker" trains - call a crew in early, take out a 2 to 4 car set with all pans up and make a run east and/or west in advance of the start of the service day. If conditions are bad enough, the consist might go to 6 cars, so that the train doesn't get stuck in a section with no carbons actually touching the wire. In the *most* extreme cases, the cars are dragged with the pans up by the NICTD 1000 or one of the South Shore Freight locos.

Friday was truly a test for myself as a trainee engineer,due to the weather conditions. (Lots of arcing pans there!) It looked like someone coated the pans with cake icing, by the time we made it into the shops we only had one car out of the four still pulling power. It took me 4 1/2 hours to get from South Bend to Chicago on Train 12, (later train 112 and even later as train 212) We ended up getting to Chicago on Train 14's time.

Ryan

do the cars have power connections between them so one loses power its picked up by the next car?

dinwitty wrote:do the cars have power connections between them so one loses power its picked up by the next car?

Unfortunately not. If the pantograph is not touching the wire, the car is unpowered.

I seem to recall that FRA outlawed power bus between coupled cars about 20-30 years back, and that Amtrak Metroliner MU's ran with a waiver. The last regular service power bus equipped MU's that weren't semi-permanently coupled were Reading blueliner MU's or GN freight motors. Hence the drag effect on cars with iced-over pans.

Tadman wrote:I seem to recall that FRA outlawed power bus between coupled cars about 20-30 years back, and that Amtrak Metroliner MU's ran with a waiver. The last regular service power bus equipped MU's that weren't semi-permanently coupled were Reading blueliner MU's or GN freight motors. Hence the drag effect on cars with iced-over pans.

I don't think the Metros ever had a waiver - they always were married pairs, the non cab end had a pan/jumper. They *did* outlaw the Reading setup, and frankly, I don't know any place that would allow such a thing today...

Maybe this is a question for a different forum, but I always though the Metro MU's were not permanently coupled - I've seen trains of them with odd numbers of cars coupled together.

if they do have power connecting, they still should be able to function singly.

Probably cars out of service and they couldnt make a married pair.

Frugality assumes.....

8-D