A fairly loud noise woke me at 2:45 am this morning. Sounded like someone was using a cordless drill in the room! Sat up and tried to figure out where and which direction and then heard a train whistle heading south of the house - and a little ways away. But the hum was intense and I listened for several minutes to it moving the same direction as the whistle. It finally died away with the train sounds.
Could this be a DPU at the end - and a bad turbo-charger? Atmospheric conditions have been excellent these past few days and the trains run right through the bedroom, rather than 14 blocks away.
Either the turbocharger or dynamic braking, Sis. I know that you don’t often get to hear d/b in your neighborhood, but it’s a very distinctive sound. Then again, so is a bad turbocharger!
Well, if they are that loud 14 blocks away in a closed up house, I can see people really having a fit about train noise! They think whistles are loud!!!
My guess is a Turbo if it was an EMD unit. Because it has a LOUD whine or some call it a scream doesn’t mean it is a bad turbo. For example Soo 6010’s turbo screamed from when it was new to the day it left the property.
The EOT turbines do make a little noise, but I’ve never heard one like you describe, BUT there proably is at least one out there as Big Jim says.
Having reread your original post, SJ, I got to thinking: a line south of your house–isn’t that the one behind your breakfast spot, where those coal trains are now traveling to get to Nebraska City? Forget the dynamics; I’m with the Boomer in thinking that it was an EMD turbocharger (an EOT would make a shriller whistle, not as loud, and you’ve probably heard that). Your train was probably loads–they sometimes howl like that when they’re going all out.
I have never heard anything like that before in the house, but Carl is right - they are heading south and it is uphill in that area (climbing out of the hole that Lincoln sits in). Granted it was quiet, but it still had to have been incredibly loud for me to wake up out of a sound sleep. Just wondered if it maybe needed attention, but sounds like it was just a normal business-as-usual.