The United States has been officially on the metric system since 1876. We’re smart when it comes to common sense, too…
Well, the US military has used the metric system (with some exceptions) since the First World War. The army and Marines were using French military maps plus heavy weapons like artillery, so it was easier that way.
An exception that I’m aware of is the Navy, metric doesn’t work for marine applications, knots work. Also, the Air Force measures airspeed in knots and altitude in feet. And the Marines still use the traditional firing lines on rifle ranges, 200 yard, 300 yard, and 600 yard.
The Train-X (which the X-Plorer/Ploder locomotive pulled) was an articulated guided axle arrangement in the style of the later United Aircraft/Pullman Standard TurboTrain, the second-generation and later Talgo along with the Iron Highway freight intermodal. I am not remembering the title of the book about Train-X, although it is buried somewhere in the next room, but I read that the Train-X end cars were rough riding and that the train conductors tried to not seat passengers in them.
The TurboTrain avoided the rough riding of un-steered single axles in the end cars by having a conventional 2-axle truck (bogie) under each of the end-car domes. Mid-generation Talgos had some kind of steering from the drawbar or coupler to the locomotive – don’t know what they did for the bob-tailed Talgo observation car. More recent Talgos steered the end axles with a pushrod arrangement that extrapolated the
“Sheboygan sausages?” Say what? Never heard of them. I wonder if the 3-axle German passenger cars were a result of trying to make a 2 axle car ride more comfortably. I have a few of the 3-axle jobbies on my N scale layout and I did see them in 1-1 scale myself in Stuttgart in 1974. They were quite common back then.
You are referring to the Umbauwagen (rebuilt coaches), class C3gy(e) etc.? They were rebuilds of old, mostly wooden-bodied coaches, both 4 and 6-wheeled, using the underframes only, with new steel bodies in various configurations. The last ones ran until the mid 80s but some are still seen in work trains and museum stock.
“Sheboygan sausages?” I’ve never heard of them either, but let’s get down to what’s really important here.
Are they good to eat? [dinner]
Yes, several types.
“Mention my name in Sheboygan, it’s the greatest little town in the world.”
Wow. They sure don’t write 'em like that anymore!
Maybe they shouldn’t?
Do you suppose that Beatrice Kay went to the Sheboygan Conservatory of Music along with Sugar Kowalcyk, Josephine and Daphne? You get time off for good behavior.
The Johnsonville Fashion Show from Sheboygan
I rode the Aerotrain several times when from Pittsburgh to Philly and it was very “bouncy”. Of course, the track in those long ago days wasn’t what it is now but I suspect even today it would be considered a rough ride.
The story as I (perhaps defectively) understood it was that GM became rapidly aware how defective their assumptions, and their suspension arrangements, actually were for operation on typical deflicted jointed rail of the Fifties. Apparently they redesigned the arrangements on one car, which was run out and added to one of the consists (I don’t remember which one, but it’s documented) and this had a superior ride to the others.
I have asked around and apparently the technical details of the modifications are past the edge of history – I got around to finding out about this comparatively late, as I’d always assumed the Aerotrain was a hopeless dog, and couldn’t find anyone with the right combination of savvy, memory, and interest.
The “initial” problem with any air-suspended rail vehicle is that the primary suspension requirements are very stringent (it must ensure that the wheel remains within no greater than 1/2" from the rail at any time, for example) but the secondary suspension arrangements must be relatively soft and yet not overcompliant … or underdamped.
This was one of the problems with the original ‘Micheline’ approach of using a pneumatic-tyre analogue on jointed rail, either as the ‘riding surface’ with a flange for guidance or as the original Michelin idea of the tread curving under load and the sidewalls effectively providing the guidance. (Ignore the issues with frogs and switches, tread and carcass damage, etc. for now.) It’s a nifty idea until you skimp on the secondary suspension the way you can on a road vehicle. So the logical thing is to abstract some of the compliant functions of the ‘tire’ to the secondary suspension, as the buses do to preserve the cheap running and long tread life from trucklike inflation pressures while avoiding the need to provide Bostrom seats for the passengers.
One problem with the Aerotrain, though, was that the carbodies were too light to provide a
I rode it from Philadelphia to Altoona. I believe it was 1957. If I remember correctly, I took a connecting train from NYC to Philly, where I got the Aerotrain.
I have the same recollection of the ride as you. It rode like a tin can.
When the rubber met the rail.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKMjo6q03yU
Would pneumatic tires smooth the ride and make Americans love passenger trains again?
And then there’s the Bugatti railcar. Steel wheels, but it was powered by four straight-eight engines intended for the Type 41 Bugatti Royale automobiles. They only built 7 of the cars and had a lot of engines left over because very few people could afford a Royale. So they built these.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pI53ispQRlM
ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QV4wy7rGt8
Here is the Royale in the Henry Ford museum in Dearborn. I’ve seen it myself, it’s gigantic- I also have a model of it that I built probably 50 years ago.
Beautiful car, no doubt about it.
That second video’s interesting, not just for the Bugatti Railcar but for the “Then and Now” aspect of that rail line.