Sorry if this has already been posted, the search function not working.
My question is confusing, so I’ll just give an example:
A local turn, starting in a yard, heading to the destination, and returning, reaches its target town. If there’s no runaround for the train, would the engines push the cars from the back as it returns to the original yard or would the railroad asign other engines to pull from the front and leave the stuck engines behind?
(The town in question has loco servicing facilities)
Well, first off, it’s highly unlikely if the town had engine servicing facilities that it wouldn’t have a run-around track so the engine could go around the cars and pull from the other end, and (if before the 1980’s) put the caboose on the other end. A diesel can go a long ways without needing fuel, a steam engine might require water after a while but a water tank can be anywhere along the line.
But then if the line was so long that they needed to refuel or get water, they wouldn’t want to push a string of cars from the rear for miles and miles to get back to the yard.
There is an operation that I see going to and from work sometimes where a train runs from CP’s Pig’s Eye yard in St.Paul a few miles down the Mississippi to an oil refinery. It has two engines in front (usually Soo GP’s) and an old Soo caboose on the rear when going down. Coming back they use the caboose as a “shoving platform”, the engines are now pushing from the rear and a guy stands on the rear platform of the caboose (which is now going forwards) with a radio talking to the engineer to let him know the track is clear etc.
But that’s only going a few miles, not far enough to require refueling.
I understand that some local freights now have an engine on either end…one pulling the train, the other idling. When they reach the end of the branch (or where it’s more convenient for switching) the crew puts the ‘lead’ engine in idle and go back and use the other one.
It would be very rare that train would go any significant distance without a run around some place. It is not uncommon for trains to shove back a couple miles, using a caboose to protect the shove. If its over 4 or 5 miles then there probably is a run around.
There are some shortlines that have very short runs, who rather than spend the money to build a runaround, use two engines. There are also case where some locals run with an engine on both ends, but its a very expensive way to operate and has certain risks to it.
That’s what is done on some line down here where there’s no turn around or run around track at the other end. Both locos are pushing, one driven and the other radio controlled. At the end of the line the crew changes ends go back the other way. These few examples are however few and far between.
It would depend on how the turnouts were facing. For facing-point turnouts, the cars would be placed in front of the locomotive, and for trailing-point turnouts the cars would be placed behind the locomotive.
Several prototype railroads, faced with the same problem, maintain ‘push platforms,’ frequently gutted cabooses (cabeese?) with plated-over windows. Such moves typically operate with the locomotive on the downhill or ‘toward the junction’ end of the train. Also typically, if there is any place along the route with a run-around, the train will run locomotive forward until it reaches the last place where it can run around, then push from there.
Pushing moves involving freight equipment are often speed-restricted. Passenger push-in, pull-out schedules, operating with equipment specifically adapted for the purpose, usually operate at track speed in both directions.
Even on the small branch near me they have frequent run arounds and passing sidings. They just push to one of these and then swap ends. No cabeese, so they drop the conductor off at any crossings with a radio to guide the train.
I used to ride Amtrak from Latrobe to Pittsburgh now and again. It was a short haul train, that didn’t go past the Burgh. The train would wye somewhere east of there, at a junction near old Pitcairn Yard, I think, and then back a few miles into the station, slowly, with the radio-wielding conductor standing in the rear (now front) vestibule of the train.
If you browse the Denver Public Library archives enough, you’ll occasionally come upon pictures of peddler freights or branchline trains puffing merrily along with one or two cars ahead of the engine, probably destined for some facing-point siding somewhere. You’ll also see shortline steam running tender-first at the head of a train, the engine being run around but not turned. This is IIRC one reason a lot of rinky-dink outfits used light 2-6-2 and 2-8-2 locos, with a pilot truck either way…better reverse tracking.
Some northeastern line (was it the B&A?) had 2-6-6 or 2-6-4 suburban tanks designed to run this way, and I think the CNJ had some 2-6-2 side tanks, ditto. One or the other of these may even have run push-pull, but I may be conflating this with some British line that ran steam-powered push-pull commuter trains. I’m not sure how they kept it from being a very bad idea.
It would be very rare that train would go any significant distance without a run around some place. It is not uncommon for trains to shove back a couple miles, using a caboose to protect the shove. If its over 4 or 5 miles then there probably is a run around.
Dave,Some locals back for several miles.Also mine runs can back several miles to the load out.
When I worked on the Chessie there was a mine that was 12 miles up a hollow…We made a reverse move to serve this load out…There was no run arounds and very little head room to do our work.
Also in the steam era it was not uncommon for a local or mine run to return tender first.
FWIW, every train arriving at the St Louis Union Station backed into the platforms. The platform tracks were all stub ended, approached over a puzzle palace that included TWO triple-track wyes.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - with back-in, back-out staging)
To be honest, you may need to re-think your track plan then. I can confirm it wouldn’t be the first time someone built themselves into a corner and had to tear out track and scenery and start over. [:I]
A single track line with no place wide enough to add a second track to run around the train, but with an engine servicing area at the end, really isn’t that realistic and isn’t using space that well. Unless the branch is miles and miles long, the engine service area would be back at the yard, not the end of this isolated branch…and if it was that long, they’d build a runaround track at the end or near the end.
I’d suggest taking a look at some John Armstrong track planning books, or Kalmbach’s “102 Realistic Track Plans”. You will find plenty of good ideas there. [:)]
I’d have to agree with Stix, if the targeted town has engine facilities , it would realistically at least have a run around track. If nothing else maybe You can move the service facilities some where else, it’s Your RR ,but that’s one idea.
A favorite of mine in the KC area is the BNSF switcher that works Lenexa KS, diesel often in the middle, cars on both ends with waycars (pushing platforms). Quite a sight as you drive along I-35. Of course this train does a lot of industrial switching.
If your runaround is just too short, you can run around the train in sections, as long as you have somewhere to put the section you just ran around while you go and get the next one.
If the town is large enough to have a permanently stationed switcher, that could take the train away to let the engine escape. Granted, any town this big would probably have a double-ended siding somewhere, but I’m sure there’s some way to rationalize it.
You can also build a runaround or wye somewhere else on the layout, and tell yourself that it represents another such element a quarter mile or so from your terminal. My railroad is an oval plan with a single fairly long passing track, which represents two runarounds, depending on which of the towns I am working in.
I also find it just a little strange that this terminus of this spur–it must be a long spur if it has servicing facilities–doesn’t have some kind of runaround facilities. It has to serve some kind of industrial purpose and that is going to require a trailing point switch unless, of course, you are planning on pushing your train all the way out to the end of the line. All you have to do to create a double ended side track–a runaround track–is install a switch running off of your switching spur and connect it back to the mainline–and that doesn’t take a h**luva lot of room.
I might mention here that Bruce Chubb, on his old Sunset Valley had an operation wherre he had to place a car ahead of his locomotive and shove it–something to the tune of 18 smiles, I believe–to the next town where there was only a facing point siding. His operating department had established specific rules regarding consist length and speed restrictions for this operation. Any cars picked up at this location had to be shoved to the next siding where they could be switched back behind the locomotive. I will admit one thing: it did make for some operating interest.
Let’s go with your scenerio however–there is no double ended side track off of the main and all switching, therefore, is going to have to be done on trailing point spurs. A shove–always a dangerous operation and which generates most of the derailments in the daily course of events; flat cars are the worst–is going to, therefore, be required to get your train back to your yard. All railroads have rules governing this operation; these rules usually specify how many, how far, and how fast. Even if your railroad allows long-distance shoves if your train length exceeds allowable limits then you are going to have to park some of it on one of those trailing point side tracks and make two trips. That could be expensive and a strong motivation for the installation of a double end
On a short extension part of my narrow shelf layout that ends with several stub end yard tracks next to next main line, there was no room for a run-around track. So what I do is drop the cars on the main line, run the switcher into the yard, reline the switch for the main track and push the cars past the switch. This so when the switcher comes out of the yard it will be against the caboose. Might call it sort of a Dutch Drop on the prototype. Okay, not exactly prototype, but it works.
You could cheat a little bit by having the single line track extend beyond the end of the scenicked part of the layout and ‘fiddle’ (hand switch) the engine to the other end, with the explanation that the run around track was located in the next town.
Otherwise to save space you could try using a run-around track where one end ends off-layout and use an tranverser or transfer table instead of a switch at that end.
BTW if length is the problem, not width, you could make two trips with short cuts of cars to fit the runaround track. Back in the sixties the dead-end branch I lived next to in Richfield MN had a lot of cars some days, going to a couple of lumber yards and a concrete/stone dealer (this is back when home construction was booming). The line went maybe 10 miles and ended at a runaround with a couple of tracks branching off to the businesses. The train crew would leave some cars farther down the line at a siding and run down to the end of the line and switch the ones they brought and bring the empties back, then drop those cars off and bring the next cut and switch them out, then bring them back and couple them to the other cars and head back south.
(This was on the MN&S High Line, which has been covered in Model Railroad Planning under current operator Progressive Rail.)
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