hey everyone. i’m new to the site, and everything to do with trains in general. my boyfriend got me started on it. i’m interested but know absolutely nothing. as i make my way around the site, i’m going to have a lot of questions, so i’d appreciate it if everyone could help me out a little. but please bear with me as i ask the stupidest questions, cause like i said, i know nothing.
but anyways… first question… what’s a b unit?
Thanks
~lauren
Well I guess I might as well be the first to welcome you to the forum. [#welcome] Ok, a B-Unit is a locomotive that has no cab and is used with a A-unit which is ussually a locomotive of the same model but has a cab. This system was mostly used in the 50’s and 60’s on the EMD (I know you know what that is (just so you guys know im that boyfriend she is talking about so I know she knows that)) F and E series. You will see the term A-B-A or A-B-B-A alot that means a A unit leading with a B in the middle and an A trailing or in the A-B-B-A case an A unit in front and two B’s in the middle with an A trailing. Here are some pictures of a A or B unit. Click on the links. And there are no stupid questions and everyone here will back me up on that. [:)]
http://railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=181725
This is an A-unit EMD F3 to be specific
http://railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=168416
This is an B-unit once again an F3
Mike
Thanks mike, that helped.
i’ve got another question! wow, that didn’t take long…
ok, what is an amtrak train?
thanks again for the help
~Lauren
Amtrak is the current passenger carrier in the US.
Ok, Amtrak, Amtrak is a passenger railroad in the US. Amtrak was created in the 70’s when declining passenger travel by rail was killing the freight railroads. This was all in the era of the fall of PRR, NYC, RDG (Reading RR), PC, NH and several other railroads. The government in an attempt to take the cost of maintaining passenger equipment, and hopefully keep the railroads running, funded the a railroad that would take over all passenger travel in US. The government funded Amtrak I believe like Conrail, until they had their first revenue year. Now there are Amtrak trains that visit our neck of the woods in Sandusky two trains stop there and then move on to Toledo and Chicago. You asked me on AIM about the Acela, the Acela is Amtraks latest electic train, it is fairly high speed and work around DC and several other citys. Here is link to a picture of it. If you have more questions about it just ask I am not to into Amtrak but lots of other people are so I’m sure they can answer your questions better.
http://railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=182898
This is the Acela
Mike
First Welcome lwHSH to this great site.[#welcome] Hum, Mike is your boyfriend? Seems you two need to talk a little more. Feel free to post but just seems a liitle odd you dont ask Mike?
Welcome again Cuda Ken
thanks for the welcome!
and i did ask him, but he told me to post it on here too so i could get answers from other people too. and he answered both of my questions on here anyway. and i’m talking to him on aol right now anyway, so actually we talk quite a lot.
~Lauren
Well, see I hardly see myself as a expert, I’m still learning alot myself, I am trying to teach her what I know but you guys on here know alot more then I do right now so I figured the forums would be a great learning tool.That should make it alot less odd. And I forgot that B-unit stands for Booster Unit, I knew it stands for something, that is a better way to put it too.
Mike
Well, at least one of you models a good fallen flag. Nice to have you here.
Hi Lauren, welcome to the forum.
And just to set the record straight, the only stupid question is the one you didn’t ask. We were all beginners at one point, so don’t worry about it. Ask all of your questions and we’ll do our best to field them!
Thanks pcarrell!
[#welcome][#welcome]
What knowledge are you looking to develop? Model RR? Railroads in general? Railfanning? Any combination?
The thing is that it will take time to build up knowledge. You might want so specialise… or not.
Over time you will also discover that while looking at one concept you have picked up other bits of information.
Here’s a pic of both B (one) and A (five) units… unusually the B unit appears to be leading - assuming the train is moving towards us…
http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=130070
That’s actully an EMD GP30B followed by an EMD GP30[A] and four other EMDs.
After the F units from Electro Motive Division of General Motors (GM) B unit production became so limited that the use of the “A” Suffix was dropped for normal purposes with cab units. The class designation was taken to assume an A/cabbed unit.
GPs or Geeps are four axle units. GP = General Purpose… the marketing teams way of telling the customer they could buy the locos to replace any steam loco type.
http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=125454
The near loco here is a GP60B the GP 60s were the last standard production 4 axle and last B units. The beast it’s with is a 6 axle modern thing with a wide/safety cab.
The most common EMD 6 axle was the SD40-2. This is what they should look like…
http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=49884
http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=161484
SD = Special Duties
What does “A-unit” stand for?
That is a good question.
truthfully, i’m not sure exactly what all i want to know about. just kinda all of it in general… yeah, i know it’s going to take time, but i like just picking up bits of information here and there, eventually it will hopefully all make sense to me.
Thanks everyone for your help
And i want to know what a A unit stands for too…
~Lauren
"A"lways in front? [:D]
It just refers to the lead unit. Such as A is the first letter of the alphabet. In General it’s the locomotive with the controls.
[#welcome] to the forum lwHSH.
I have a video for you of a Amtrak train coming through a Pennsylvania town.
http://www.sd45.com/SandPatch2003/pages/015amtrak.html
The video is at the bottom of the picture. The locomotives on the train are GE Genesis AMD-103s. Most of the train consists of bilevel passenger cars and a few baggage cars on the end
Happy railroading[(-D]
James
Lauren, just so you know a Fallen Flag, is a railroad that is no longer operating, like if they consolidated, or just went broke. Just wondering who is the maker of the PRR steam you have in that picture, I like that. Mike
…and the other one’s in 'B’ack.
ok, i was going to ask about the fallen flag earlier, but i forgot. thanks for clearing that up mike.