You said it prompter![:D][^] I used to get nagged on for running Big Boys, Challengers, and Northerns on my 5x9 layout, but did that stop me? No way! If I can run a 4-8-8-4 around an 18" radius, no doubt a 4-8-8-2 will do it.
Carmichael isn’t exactly “cab-forward country”, it’s quite flat out there, despite what Central Pacific told the government auditors, who told them that everything east of Arcade Creek was “mountainous country” and thus paid the higher mountain rate for railroad construction.
I suppose they did run around between Sacramento and Roseville, where they were serviced, but they weren’t exactly needed to pull grades at those elevations.
prompter: Okay, so you’re no newcomer to the hobby–but things like running articulateds on 18" are a fairly newcomer-oriented question. Nobody is demanding that you build a 20’x40’ layout. But you did solicit opinions, and opinions were given.
Me, I just like small locomotives. That’s why I have 12" radius curves on my layout, although there is a distinct lack of articulateds.
BUYING that large an engine to run on 18"R curves is like someone buying one of those 50’s - 60’s Cadillac’s so long that one can’t get the garage door down - and to think about it - probably for the same reasons.
Jetrock–actually ‘cab-forward’ country began at Roseville, and when they were running, Carmichael was just a ranch in the boondocks. However, during WWII and Korea, cab-forwards could be seen almost anywhere in California, even between Sacramento and Oakland. the main reason they lasted so long between Roseville and Sparks is that early cab diesels had trouble ‘breathing’ in the abrupt elevation changes on the Hill (7000’ in 82 miles). SP was pretty frugal about their locomotives, they ran the very last miles out of their steam between 1953-56, and you could almost find anything anywhere, cab-forwards included.
Tom
That was something I noticed about the turntable at the old Sacramento shops–it wasn’t big enough to turn a cab-forward!
You’ve seen the Roseville Carnegie library/museum’s Roseville Yard layout, right? Quite impressive and worth the trip…
Don Gibson: Not a bad analogy…kind of like those folks who live and work in big cities and buy a giant SUV, and then complain because it’s so hard to park it!
Jetrock–MY favorite is all of the people who are now moving to Roseville and complaining about the noise the trains make. And then they look at you strangely when you explain that historically, Roseville wouldn’t exist for them to move to now if it HADN’T been for the trains in the first place! Oh well—
Tom [:-,]
Now that irks me–I moved downtown because I WANTED to hear trains! It’s kind of like the folks who move out to the foothills in farm country, and then complain because they don’t like the smell of cows.
Although train-phobia doesn’t begin at the Placer County Line…the city of West Sacramento is going to tear up the old Sacramento Northern mainline south of the Port of Sacramento, and their former mayor compared the track near the riverfront to the Berlin Wall. I suppose for some reason yuppies just don’t get the connection between railroads, industry and JOBS…
Personally, I was hoping that the old SN tracks could be preserved and used for something really cool, like a “Clarksburg Wine Train” tourist line–I missed the “Last Train to Clarksburg” in '99 and would love to give those rails a ride!