jeez are all of you guys conrail haters?! seriously wth?
Well as stated I’m not, but at least they come up with some interesting nicknames.
let me ask you something befor i respond with my reasons…
you a railroader or not…
csx engineer
I would have to agree with csxengineer. I have been in a few connies and a freind took me on a few rides on them and he just hates them. I also do not like them and freinds in the south do not like them as well. There are many othere reasons I do not like them but, I would probably say something I shouldn’t.
I also did not appeciate (not) Awesome’s comment about painting the last C&O SD40 into Conrail paint, so random and pointless. I would rather see it in YN3 than Confail paint.
Kevin
Kevin:
I just write my opinion… you don’t need to agree with it. Keep in mind is just a forum. We all write opinions. Don’t take it personal… Life is too short. [C=:-)]
Javier
They get bend of out shape when we talk about CONRAIL… Can you explain to me why the hate us?
no one said anything about hateing you per say… just that your fanatic defence of a railroad that you dont know much about other then reading books and watching the trains go by is a bit over the top… being a train buff you dont get to see what we that do work for the carriers see is the behind the seans and talk that goes on between crews of differnt roads… you see a nice engin or a track that looks like its in nice shape…we crews see the junk and beat up condition of the cabs and the bandaids that are put on things just to get it out of the door… its nice to be loyal to something…but some of you gonrail nuts dont know what it was like for us crews to get our hands on them bright blue engins you all hold so near and dear… the uncomfortable toad stool seats for 211 miles… blue cemical crappers that smelled and if you tried to use them turned anything that came in conact with the seat blue even if you used a “butt gasket”…the realy pain in the but radios that had the up and down rocker switches to change the radio channels insted of the keypads for push button use… HTDs that the distance counters didnt work…even the newer power was in bad shape… the seat arm rests where defomaed to the point that the metal suport would poke you and to prevent getting hurt on a metal bur or courner…the shop just wraped the whole arm rest in ductap… from a crew standpoint them nice blue engins are nothing but nice blue piles of junk… that is why we “hate” conrail as you put it… or at least why i dont care for there engins and call them junk at any chance i get… becouse from my point of view…they are all gonrail junk and need to be gone from the csx rosters too…
csx engineer
Sounds like csx should up
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So
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no one said anything about hateing you per say… just that your fanatic defence of a railroad that you dont know much about other then reading books and watching the trains go by is a bit over the top… being a train buff you dont get to see what we that do work for the carriers see is the behind the seans and talk that goes on between crews of differnt roads… you see a nice engin or a track that looks like its in nice shape…we crews see the junk and beat up condition of the cabs and the bandaids that are put on things just to get it out of the door… its nice to be loyal to something…but some of you gonrail nuts dont know what it was like for us crews to get our hands on them bright blue engins you all hold so near and dear… the uncomfortable toad stool seats for 211 miles… blue cemical crappers that smelled and if you tried to use them turned anything that came in conact with the seat blue even if you used a “butt gasket”…the realy pain in the but radios that had the up and down rocker switches to change the radio channels insted of the keypads for push button use… HTDs that the distance counters didnt work…even the newer power was in bad shape… the seat arm rests where defomaed to the point that the metal suport would poke you and to prevent getting hurt on a metal bur or courner…the shop just wraped the whole arm rest in ductap… from a crew standpoint them nice blue engins are nothing but nice blue piles of junk… that is why we “hate” conrail as you put it… or at least why i dont care for there engins and call them junk at any chance i get… becouse from my point of view…they are all gonrail junk and need to be gone from the csx rosters too…
csx engineer&n
csxengineer isn’t the only one with experience to write that a lot of modern stuff is crap. I find it disappointing, especially with all the modern technology, but won’t argue with someone with personal experience. I only know Conrail from being my local railroad and making something out of a lot of bankrupts, but most of us admired it for what it was.
On a similar note, if the railroads that got Conrail equipment found it to be in deplorable condition, can anyone imagine what they felt like when they got all the Penn Central stuff?
Its a shame, to call Sd80mac’s crap, and all conrail junk? HE is comparing it with new locomotives, you can’t do that, the stuff is 10+ years older then some new fangled Sd70m-2 or ACe’s.
Tjsingle
Being from the northeast, I too, am somewhat a fan of Conrail, and disappointed to see their demise, but in this case, I agree with CSXengineer98 and Oskar. Conrail served it’s point and was successful for it’s era. Granted, it did make toast out of alot of useful railroad trackage, such as the Erie Railroad mainline, the former Pennsylvania Railroad Columbus Line, and several more I can think of. It was still a nice railroad, all in all, for the railfans. Railroaders absolutely despised Conrail.
What CSXengineer98 is trying to say about the power being junk, is that it is torn up, and worn out inside, pretty much held together by duct tape and is very uncomfortable. He is an engineer, so he knows what it is like to operate a Conrail unit. You just see them go by. I have been in several ex Conrail units that now belong to CSX, and I too, was not overly impressed. I have never been in a C40-8W or anything like that, but have been in a ex Conrail SD40-2, GP38-2 and GP40-2, off the top of my head.
As for the quality of the locomotives, from what I hear, Conrail did not do a good job maintaining their power, and they did not stay up to par with other railroad’s C40-8W’s, SD60I’s and such. The SD80MAC units stayed in fairly good health, as they were pretty new when Conrail was divided among NS and CSX. The C40-8W’s are terrible to run for 12 hours. I have seen photos from inside them. Same applies for the ex Conrail SD60I units. What’s that? Photos? Alright, here you go.
http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=201069&nseq=1
http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=109453&nseq=5
And that is just two examples. The chair in the second photo looks real (un)comfortable. In the first photo, do I need to explain what the problem is? Also, notice the amount of Conrail units that shoot flames? Not good maintenance.
We are not Conrail haters. Like I explained, I am a Conrail fan myself, and do not mind seeing the CSX 7300-series and such pass
SD40-2’s are so yesterday. Glad I no longer have to deal with that junk.
oh my god, those cabs are horrid, maybe they should get a good cleaning! jeez, talk about heavy use, I didn’t know it was that bad.
tjsingle
Dunno about Confail, but the Crash National SD40-2’s were so beat up, on more than one occasion I had hood doors fly off at track speed, they never pulled right, and the units that happened to have DB, the DB never worked. The SD40-2’s sucked, give me a pair of ES44DC’s anyday!
Wake up and smell the coffee. If you are going to sale your car or house. Are you going to put money unto the place? NO! Right! [banghead] Conrail did what it need to be done in order to sale their railroad.
Conrail didn’t “sale” their railroad. NS and CSX basically lobbied the federal goverment to take over operations of the RR.
Conrail had already been privatized so it was indeed a sale. The Feds were involved for the usual antitrust reasons.
I stand corrected. My Conrail history is a little fuzzy, it’s been awhile since I’ve broken out my books. I think it was privitized in 86 or 87 and then NS and CSX bought it in the 90’s.