On a recent trip to Madison WI, I stopped by there yard there, like we do every month when we visit Madison. I was supprised to see the WSOR weed spraying consist sitting in the yard. I Took some pictures below. There were three total units in the consist. (all pictures look better if you click on them)
This is the power of the consist. It is the WSOR’s only remaining yard switcher, An SW1200 #1202. They used to have one other SW1200, but I pretty sure they sold that, and an NW2 which I know they sold.
This is the sprayer itself, designated WSOR-X002. The chemicals come out of the end nearest to us. One man rides on top of the Steel tank on the platform, giving car counts to the nearest crossing, obsticle, ect. to the engineer , and two men ride down below him turning the spray on and off and checking for obsticles right next to the right of way. You’ll see better what I mean in a few days when I get my in action pictures posted.
And this is the tank car that stores the chemicals. It took them about three total days to do 54 miles of track, and I don’t think they went back to the yard at night, so they needed a good supply of chemicals. This car, designated WSOR- X002, is specifically used for this train.
Like I said, I’ll post more pictures in a few days of the train in action here in town. Enjoy!
Here’s those other pics I promised, thanks to Nora for hosting them.
This is the only picture I have of them actually spraying, and this was when we first got there, so I wasn’t in a very good position or I would have had a better picture. This shows where the spray comes out of fairly well.
This shows the position of the men, but I had my angle wrong again.
Hope you enjoy these too. The WSOR locals in town so I got to get going, see ya.
I do not know if the methods for application of the chemicals has changed in the 12 years since I was on the CNW, but as an engineer I hated to be the first train to traverse a piece of track that had been treated by the weed sprayer. The chemicals made the rail very slippery. On a freight train, the chemicals would cause considerable wheel slip; on a passenger train the wheel slip would be a problem, with the additional difficulty in the ability to stop a passenger train going 70mph. If the brakes were applied to hard, the wheels would instantly pick up; when that happens not only do you miss the station stop, but there was a real risk of flattening the wheels of the train. And should there be an actual emergency situation that required a quick stop…forget it, that train ain’t stopping.
Glad everybody liked them. I didn’t see much blowing of the chemicals at all, as there wasn’t any real wind.
Good luck Larry. I’ve tried that several times and I’ve never had an ansewer yet with that part of the site. I’ve even tried sending it to the Webmasters e-mail direct, but he never responds. We’ll see though.
And Zardoz, you’ll be happy to know, (we’ll not neccesarily you but the crew is happy) that the local didn’t come up this way untill almost 36 hours after he finnished spraying. There isn’t really any other trains on the line, and there hasn’t been a Rock train (ballast train) on the the line in a few days. I could see where that would become a problem on heavily traversed lines.
