I’m planning to drive out to Wyoming from Ohio this week to see the refurrbished Big Boy 4014 make its first powered run in almost 60 years on May 4. I put this on my bucket list as soon as I learned UP was planning to do this. I checked the UP Steam Schedule and everything seems to be go. A friend told me it passed its tests a few weeks ago. I plan on leaving Wednesday, stopping at Bailey Yard in North Platte Nebraska on the way. I plan on taking both still and video shots with my new camera. I hope to post pictures and videos when I return. I’ll be checking their website right up until I leave to make sure no problems have popped up. If anyone hears any news between now and Wednesday that might affect the scheduled run, I’d appreciate if you would post it.
I’m jealous! Yes, be sure to post a lot of videos and pictures. I never had any exposure to steam power in my childhood, so seeing stuff like this is all new. I’m really the only railfan in the family…
If you use Facebook, I’m sure there is a following on there. I don’t, but just a thought.
Mike.
There was just a video posted on YouTube showing them getting steam up. The turbogenerators were running, and the blew the whistle. It took a while to get the whistle sounding, at first it was just a big cloud of steam, but then she cleared her throat and the whistles sounded.
More insteresting though were the zoomed in shots, the steam pipe to the rear engine was not connected and the valves were not installed yet. Maybe that’s a fairly quick job, but she’s definitely not ready to roll just yet. Cab sides were still masked for painting as well. They are really pushing it to have this loco run under its own power this week.
–Randy
I lived for the first 13 years of my life within cinder distance (you older guys will know what I mean!) of the MILW, at the end of steam and I want to see the pix, too. I hope somebody posts good video on YouTube, complete with SOUND, too!
Deano
Steam was gone in the US by the time I was born, but from an early age I’ve been on various tourist railroads riding behind steam. Even some smaller stuff, like 18" gauge and 1 1/2" scale. Plenty of full size standard gauge steam locos - we are lucky to have many operating steam locos around here.
Funny thing, while Alco diesels are my favorites, I do like Baldwin switchers, abd Baldwin steam locos - probably from having a copy of Fred Westing’s Baldwin book since I was a kid, and there is a page comparing the Big Boy to the DM&IR Yellowstones which outdid the Big Boy in some characteristics.
–Randy
There was a short Brit series on how steam and coal changed everything, not only economic, but cleaning and cooking. For fellow history buffs:
While traveling between North Platte and Cheyenne you should make a short side trip to Crawford Hill. Great site for catching BNSF Powder River coal trains. There’s a ranch with access. As I recall they ask for a small donation and provide a map of the property with viewing locations.
Ray
So who was watching Jim Wrinn’s live stream last night to see 4014 move out on the main on a test trip to Greeley?
–Randy
Me & 2799 others. Exciting once the Big Boy got there. Several good videos & photos online, including from Trains live coverage.
Lots of people from my area, it seems. One of the guys invovled int he CNJ 113 project was watching from the cab of 113! I think the only oen that would have been better than that was if someone was in the cab of one of the other stuffed and mounted Big Boys watching. During one of the delays I know I mentioned seeing if I could get ot Steamtown and to that Big Boy before the live one came through. I would have lost that one, I would have been maybe halfway there. Plus the park was closed by that time.
Turned into a meme-fest for a while, XXXXX will be running before 4014 gets moving. Some peopel can;t take a joke, tellign everyone how railfanning requires patience, blah blah. Someone said it’s called rail fanning and not train fanning because most of the time you are staring at empty rails.
I’m not a huge UP fan, or even really a Big Boy fan, but even so, you must admit that was something seeing that big loco steam past. The sheer size of it is out of this world. I don;t think anyone who hasn’t seen one up close can really appreciate it - it’s just a bunch of numbers, so many tons, so many feet long. But go stand next to one. Fan or not, it is one impressively huge piece of machinery.
–Randy
I just watched a video on it running on live steam. Guess who decided to put a top quality HO model of this on his mental wish list?
Well, you have an near infinite number of options, I think there have been moore different models of Big Boys made than there were actual Big Boys. It’s probably easier to list which well known model makers DIDN’T make a Big Boy.
–Randy
[(-D] I’m beginning to know you BN, would you actually pay the price for a “top quality” model? with out kicking and screaming ? [(-D]
Just joking, OK? Just having fun. [(-D]
I’m not a steam guy, but I think a Yellowstone would be cool. Is the Big Boy bigger? I don’t even know!
Mike.
My modeling motto is “why buy what you can find cheaper elsewhere or reasonably make for yourself?”
I don’t think I’m up for the challenge of making myself a big boy model, but when the time comes to buy one, I’ll be doing a lot of research and bargain hunting to make sure I save as much money as possible.[oX)] Used doesn’t bug me, I just triple check to make sure the locomotive and sound decoder work very well and there are no details missing…
Hmmm, do we have a convert away from yellow things??? [:)]
As an NP fan in pains me to say that a Big Boy is, regrettably, bigger. [:(] [:'(]
…but, the Yellowstone came a decade earlier (30s) while the Big Boy came during WWII (40s). So the Yellowstone was the biggest until the Big Boys and Alleghenies appeared.
And the Yellowstones outperformed the Big Boy in several areas, even if the Big Boy was longer and heavier.
Big Boy may be the BIGGEST US steam loco, but they weren’t the most powerful.
–Randy
While not entirely definitive (there is the odd mistake in the information from loco-to-loco), the site
http://www.steamlocomotive.com/
has some very useful, and instructive, information about steam locomotives.
Boiler horsepower is one thing, but the weight and driver configuration is a powerful determinant of how much tractive effort a given steamer can apply to the rails. A lowly Pennsylvania “hippo” I1sa generated more tractive effort than the large Union Pacific Challengers, just as a ferinstance. The Pennsy’s Q2 was reputed to develop nearly 7500 hp. It’s tractive effort was modest compared to the Big Boy, Allegheny, Yellowstone, and the Y Mallets, but that horsepower meant it could sustain higher speeds with heavier tonnages than could a boiler producing significantly less horsepower. It was in lifting the same tonnage to 20 mph that the others came out on top, and they could sustain that speed, perhaps with some help, on the significant grades for which they were designed and on which they were used.
Yes! Let’s make that a Scale Trains “Museum Quality” Big Boy.[swg]
That would centainly fill BN’s wish for a top quality Big Boy.[:D]
Or, in a slightly larger scale?
I’ll take two!
Cheers, Ed