Ed Ellis is going to work with some ancient passenger cars and long ago rebuilt locomotives.
This just provides more evidence that Amtrak’s arguements in their fleet strategy for replacing “old” Amfleet with new equipment are pretty much bunk.
If the new equipment doesn’t provide technology or design gains that improve productivity or reduce cost, there’s no reason not to just keep rebuilding what you already have.
Nothing been debunked. These cars still have to go thru the wear and tear of daily service. Ed hasn’t experienced the real costs involed of operating them daily and keeping them on the road. Thier a huge difference between daily operations and excursion equipment that sits parked for a substantial part of the year.
With that said the cars look great and I wish them well.
The coaches undergoing inspection were in daily service on the Saratoga & North Creek along with two dome cars of the same class as the one to be used in Indiana. All are in compliance with 49CFR238. Iowa Pacific is very experienced with the real costs involved of daily operation.
Have these baggage cars accumulated more or less miles than your referenced passenger cars ?
What kind of loads were carried on the Heritage baggage cars ?.
2a. The problems that the converted coach cars had when loaded is well known. The V-2 baggage seem to be built sturdier.
2b. How heavy were the loads that the owner RRs and later Amtrak express services put into the cars ? The FAA actually has a program taking in account the amount of loads for each flight. The heavier the average load ( not linear ) the more wear inspections required.
Many of these older passenger cars were removed from service before the 1950 -1980 track condition deteoriations became enormous.
Since most Heritage baggage cas did not have personel during enroute operation rough ridding cars probably did not get maintenance for any problem. As well any other enroute problems.
Not as much PM for the baggage as compared to these heritage passenger cars.
On previous coast to coast trip noted many problems with Heritage baggage.
They were in seasonal service running well below main line speeds. A little different than running at track speed on the main line on a daily basis.
But your right I can’t question thier experience. Just saying nothing been debunked. The cars have been inspected by Amtrak. Let’s give it six months to year before we can say its debunked and have a better idea of the true costs.
North Carolina seems to do fine with equipment that is of similar vintage as Iowa Pacific’s cars. The important thing is that these are in short distance corridors operating at less than NEC speeds.
The IPH cars being inspected for Indiana service regularly operated at mainline speeds on the back of Amtrak trains. They didn’t exhibit any problems then and there is no reason expect any issue outside of normal wear and tear.
As for the Indiana service the operating costs are Amtrak’s problem. The maintenance costs will be handled by IPH. The bulk of those costs are the daily inspections along with the 92 day inspections for the motive power and the 186 day inspections for the cars.
There is no substantial advance in technology or design between what Ed Ellis and NC DOT is running and the new Viewliners that would drive operation costs down or revenue up.
In fact, I’d bet Amfleet is cheaper to operate than either.
One of the biggest advantage of old vs new equipment is the initial investment. The cost of new railroad equipment, even off the shelf equipment like in Europe is very expensive. The cost of buying older equipment is a no brainer, even after the expenses of rebuilding.
No business in the world operates old equipment on a regular basis and claims to do because of efficiency. You don’t see many f units in service today, or 1953 mack trucks, or dc3 in service for the same under lining reason. All equipment eventually reach a point where it reaches it end of it economic life. Railroad coaches are no different.
With that said I enjoyed my ride on Pullman, can’t beat a 10/6 sleeper or a fine dinner. When IP takes over, it would a good ride in business class.
You don’t see them because newer techonology and better design made them obsolete. Newer stuff has capacity and efficiency gains that pay for the increment between rebuild and new.
Economic life occurs because of advancement. Why did SD70MACs replace SD40-2s for example? Only 60% of moving parts to maintain, greater traction motor life, and 20-25% less fuel and to move the same freight.
There is nothing new about Viewliners that make old Budd coaches obosolete. Same number of parts. Same material, same weight, same fuel, same number of wear surfaces, similar trucks, same airbrake system, same HVAC system, same lighting, same number of seats, etc, etc.
I venture to say thier are differences even between budd cars and the veiwliners.
Even more impotantly rail equipment continue to advance. compare the Acela to a Budd car. When it comes to rail equipment the us just lags behind. Compare the new equipment just ordered in Florida for higher speed rail between Miami and Orlando. Same moving parts much greater efficiency. Thier is the striking difference between 1950’s technology and 2015 technology. No company is going to invested in dated technology in today’s world. I can’t think of any modern rail system that has. It is what it is.
Let’s see what we got here: both are made of the same stuff (301L stainless steel), same construction with center and side sills, same shot-weld process. The only difference between in-service Budd cars and new Viewliners are LED lights and I change over to LEDs whenever they allow me to spend the money. In-service Budd cars have been converted to 480v HEP, have up-to-date HVAC and brakes. Nothing has really changed about passenger cars for over a half-century because ‘if it aint broke, don’t fix it.’
The “stuff” is the same. Trucks are a different design but the same concepts apply: a main casting with springs and equalizers. Different? Yes. Improvement? Depends who you ask. Stats? Like what?