Next month we are taking Amtrak to CA. DC to Chicago on Floridian. Night in Chicago hotel. Chicago to Sacramento on Zephyr. Three nights in Sacramento hotel. Zephyr to Chicago, night in hotel. Chicago to Staunton VA (where we live) on Cardinal.
Six nights on trains, five in hotels. Three roomettes; and one bedroom, Sacramento-Chicago. Really looking forward to it!
My experience of using a scanner on the Crescent was disappointing because all I ever heard was signal-calling and defect detectors. Should I expect more interesting radio traffic on the trains I mentioned above?
My wife and I rode the Zephyr from Sacramento to Chicago a couple years ago. Hopefully you will be sufficiently on time so that you can go through the Rockies during daylight. Scenery wise, it was best part of the trip by far.
It sounds like you were suckered into buying a junk scanner, possibly a Radio Shack one. You need (ALL YOU NEED!) is a scanner with a sensitivity of 0.3, the LOWER the number the better. Most in the last 35 years had a sensitivity of 0.4 and were basically junk. Some old Regencies had a sensitivity of 0.015 and were super! Some old Radio Shacks had 1.5 (bad, bad, bad)!
Hope you are able to find a good sensitivity scanner in a field of junk!
My nephew and I made that trip back in 2003. I really enjoyed it. When you get off the train in Sacramento you’re within walking distance of ‘Old Sacramento’ and the California State Railroad Museum. A worthwhile visit.
If you can program your scanner to sample only the frequencies actually in use in the area you are passing through, you should catch more traffic. If you scan the whole spectrum you will likely miss many short transmissions. Some roads use special channels for dispatcher communications. Amtrak may use their own channels for the onboard crew.
Mark Vinski
We went from Ottumwa to Emeryville and back on the Zephyr about 8 years ago. I took my scanner, but didn’t hear a whole lot. Most road channel chatter was west of Salt Lake City.
Outside of the terminal areas (Omaha, Lincoln, Denver) east of Salt Lake City there isn’t a lot of freight traffic. Trains run by signal indication in most places, so there isn’t always a lot of radio traffic. Unless there’s problems or track work requiring clearance through the work limits.
Even around the terminals, much of the action can happen on other channels in use. I did hear at one of UP’s crew changes how an oversized manifest was going to run out of time short of where the outbound crew couldn’t reach them. That the Zephyr was going to be stuck for a while. It was late and I went to bed. I didn’t wait to see how long we were stuck.
I have a Uniden BC125AT. It’s decent, but kinda clunky to input channels. I usually just scan all AAR frequencies. But as Mark says, you can miss some short transmissions.
By the way, does a scanner need to hear the start of a transmission to latch on to it, or will it go to one it comes upon already in progress (which I think it will?)? And how long does it take to scan all AAR frequencies in Service mode? 3-4 seconds?
It appears the Uniden BC125AT is one of the better models, and the web lists the sensitivity of your scanner at the higher end of the frequencies (452-460) as 0.3. Railroads typically use the 160-161 range. The shells of the Amtrak cars you were riding may have blocked most of the frequencies from reaching your scanner.
Others here are right, scanners with most channels blocked out is preferred, with just a few of your favorite ones active.
When I tried programming an individual frequency, the darn BC125AT is so damn complicated, I got to a point where I felt I was maybe never going to be able to get back to the Service Bank 5 (Railroads). So I gave up. If you can guide me through it, that would be great. But I have to be able to always get back to Service Bank 5, which is my go-to mode.
Remember - the operative channels change as you move from one territory to another in progress across a railroad. Channels get assigned so as to prevent ‘walk over’ by competing interests on a channel in a geographic area.
In the Baltimore area, for example, two different Train Dispatchers serve specific parts of the territory and have separate channels to conduct business without interfering with each other. Throw on top of that Amtrak, NS and the Canton Railroad all having radio communication interests in the area, and each has their own sets of channels.
In the neighborhood of 2010, CSX at least (and I believe all carriers) changed from analog radio signals to digital radio signals.
Perhaps it may be wise to find a friend or trusted neighbor that can set you on the road to successful programing. We all have a smart side and a stupid side. A friend or trusted neighbor may be all we need.
Instead of a traditional hotel in Sacramento, stay on the Delta King–a steamboat run as a hotel and the sister boat of the laid-up Delta Queen. Iy is in walking distance of the Amtrak station and fronts the Orr museum.
