Just curious. Last night I had a eight car train going around the track and felt like it was an accomplishment with my Frankensteinish combination of cheap 1970’s second hand equipment and temporary layout.
What is the most railcars or longest train by distance you all have ever had?
Just to get things started…
Last summer at Boothbay Railway Village, for a while, we were running an HO scale passenger train with 2 BLI E-7 diesels and 20 passenger cars. We had to discontinue this because, even though our grade was 1-1/2%, we discovered the loco wheels were slipping and we did not want that wear on the equipment.
At the Amherst Model RR show, there are often groups competing to see who can run the longest train around a modular layout; I do not remember the record; it is in the hundreds of cars - perhaps someone from the Amherst group is listening and can fill in the blank.
At the Mad City show 3 years ago, we had two engines on point (a Big Boy, and a BLI N&W A(?) with 96 cars w/ a DM&IR (2-10-2) pushing with another 40 cars behind it. All level grade. The 2 point steamers usually haul 120 ore jennies and coal cars for the two hours of assigned running. My 2-10-2 was helping push the train into the yard, as the operator was breaking up the train and I was the next operator for the slot.
On the 1970’s layout designed and mostly built by my father, which had 2% to 3% grades and 22" radius curves, I once ran two Mantua-Tyco GP-20’s (with the rubber tires) pulling 70 horn-hook coupler equipped freight cars and 3 cabooses, for a total of 73 “cars”. The challenge was starting the train slowly and smoothly–otherwise it would “stringline” to the inside of the curves just like the late 1960’s photos of the autoracks and long flat cars at Summit of Cajon Pass–prior to the re-alignment. Although I had a whole fleet of Mantua-Tyco C430’s, it was the GP-20’s that ran smoothly enough to pull that train.
In the modern era, I ran a Key Imports/Samhongsa built Rio Grande Class L-105 4-6-6-4 on a friend’s layout, featuring 2% grades and 48" minimum radius curves. It pulled 53 cars (including at least 15 much heavier than 4 oz. brass freight cars) up the 2% grades at a walk without ever stalling. That was the most impressive engine performance I’ve ever witnessed. Unfortunately the model had been mishandled by the previous owner, had some cosmetic issues I could not fix, so I ended up selling it because it didn’t meet my visual standards. In hindsight I should have paid someone to repair it…
John
'Bout the same as yours on my n scale layout, though I typically run four car trains.
As far as postwar lionel, I run about six cars at a time with my 2026, though I am thinking about a trainmaster or a turbine as I get more cars.
Let’s see to date 57 cars at a club I was a member of in the late 80s.
Locomotives: 4 Athearn GP7s.
Cars: a mixture of stock weight Athearn 40 and 50 foot cars.
Steepest grade 1.75%
Curvature 28".
Longest I pulled at home was 65 fifty foot box cars with a pair of PK E’s. Biggest problem is the tight turns. Could not make it around the layout more than 2 times before I String-lined some cars.
Normal train is around 20 to 25 cars. Can pull 45 with no string-lining.
Single engine record for myself 79 cars using a PCM Y6b at K-10 Model Trains. Y6 was not evening breathing hard.
Cuda Ken
Seeing as I only have 30 cars… 30 car train is my longest.
I think it was 43 on this layout. I always wondered how much weight or how many cars Kadee couplers could hold on a 2% climb. My longest climb is only about 30’ so I could never test for myself. Here is a video of what I tend to run.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7Tn4PrzlFI&list=PL5E7C9C3E53977DF4&index=1&feature=plpp_video
Brent
Longest train I’ve had so far is eighteen 85’ passenger cars being pulled by 1 P2K PA.
The passenger cars were a mix of Walthers & Athearn.
Gordon
In the mid 1980’s I had 32 40’ freight cars behind a kit built MDC Roundhouse 2-6-2 Prairie locomotive. I have not tried my BLI’s or P2K’s with multiple lashups for a record.
I’ve never really thought about how long of a train I could run, most of mine are around 50ish cars. On my old clubs layout we ran 86 cars once at a show.
My Yuba River Sub has 34-36" radii, and an average of 2% gradient (with a short segment of 2.4%). It also has a reverse horseshoe curve similar to Blue Canyon on the SP Donner Pass line, and the same gradient as the prototype (2.4%). The layout is 24x24’, so I limit my longest trains to 30 cars, simply for fear of ‘stringling’ a long freight into one of my deep canyons, LOL! I have a fleet of articulated steamers that can handle the 30 car trains up the grades without helpers (2 of 2-8-8-2’s, 5 of 2-8-8-4’s, 3 of 4-8-8-2’s and 3 of 4-6-6-4’s–all brass imports re-worked and re-balanced). However, I generally limit my trains to 20 or so cars. But since the track isbroken up with cuts,fills, tunnels and bridges, it’s almost impossible to view an entire train at once, so ANY train I run tends to look a lot longer than it is.
Tom
I’ve only had one sizable layout finished to the point that I could operate trains fully around it; it was a 16x19’ hollow L shaped garage layout with 15 foot sidings, 30" minimum radius curves and reverse loops at each end. I think the longest I ran on it was 25 cars, which looked pretty impressive on that layout. I haven’t been part of a club where I could try piling the cars on to see what kind of record I could make.
I did get to see something special to a Rio Grande modeler at the Timonium show last year. A guy pulled out and put together a 100 car CSDU/CSDPU coal train of 5-bay MDC and Athearn RTR (formerly MDC) Ortner hoppers, pulled by 4 D&RGW SD40T-2’s and a mid train helper with 4 more SD40T-2’s. Very impressive. I don’t think I would ever build a train that long, nor want too as I think you can get the effect of a long coal train with half that many cars although I’m probably going to stick with around 30 or 35 car train limits in the future.
I do have 36 of the Walthers 4-bay Bethlehem 100 ton coal cars which match those used the the D&RGW from the late 1960’s into the early 1990’s, which should look decent in HO scale. In addition I have 30 of the CSDU hoppers mentioned earlier, and 30 Athearn RTR Thralls coal liner gons for a UP/D&RGW Kaiser coal train, and 25 PSCX Thralls and another unit train in the making with 20 cars so far, working toward 30+.
On what remains of the old layout there is sort of “on display” a 48 car piggyback train - 50’ piggyback flats and a bay window caboose.
It can travel back and forth about three times its length as other trackage has been demolished for the reconstruction.
On several occasions, on a layout I designed for a friend, we have pulled trains in the 80-90 car range to test the pulling power of several locos.
My Broadway N&W Class A was able to pull 88 cars around that layout which includes an eight turn helix at 1.8% grade/36" radius.
His Rivarossi 2-6-6-6 was able to pull 75 cars.
My new layout is designed for freght trains in the 35-45 car range.
Sheldon
At the Amhearst show in Sprinfield, Mass, it was the Dry Hill MRR club that ran 260+ cars, including 50" & 60" box cars, 20+ stack packs, and an assortment of other cars, pulled by 8 RTR Athearn SD40-2s. The KD couplers held up just fine! The locos were controlled by the NCE DCC system
On my own 12x23 ft layout, I have run 96 40’-69’ weoghted cars with 2% grades, pulled by 4 locos; a Genesis SD70i, & 3 Kato SD40-2s powered by NCE DCC. Generally I run 40-60 cars on the main, 10-25 cars on the branch line/local.
At one of our club shows, when I was in Mobile, Al. I pulled 256 cars of various manufacturers around the club’s modular layout. This was in 1986.
I did it with a single Hobbytown PA-1 with a metal body, and an extra 2 pounds of lead stuffed into all nicks and crannies. The loco was equipped with a large Pittman 7 pole motor, more suited for O scale than HO. It was the smoothest running loco I owned at the time.
Since I’ve gone DCC, I had to change the motor out to a large can, and remove some of the weight, but the loco will still pull 175 cars with ease.
Two of these moved 44 loaded hoppers up about 20’ of 2.5% grade on an “s”-bend - total trailing weight was over 22lbs.
The two could have pulled quite a few more (one loco handled more than 30), but I ran out of “coal” for the live loads.
Four of these moved a 71 car train of various cars,(weight not recorded, but mostly NMRA RP or heavier) around the entire layout (over 100’). Most of this is on 2.5% grades, both up and down, with most of the grades on curves. Slack action was “interesting” to say the least. [swg]
Usual train length is 12 to 15 cars for mixed freight, 12 cars for coal trains, all behind steam and all doubleheaded…
Wayne
Wayne:
Some time ago you posted a video of a double-headed freight with an end-of-train pusher that I liked a lot. About how many cars was in that train? It looked to be about 30 or so.
Tom
Gee, this is just too tempting to pass up! [}:)]
Thanks for asking, Tom. For you, and for everyone else who chooses not to watch it, the train was 31 cars. There’s not much in the way of sound other than some wheel noise, as this is DC operation. [swg]
Wayne