Images Of 3751 On The Road To Canyon Rails 2002Welcome to the image gallery! This gallery consists of images taken while 3751 has been on the road. This is part one of the image gallery's Canyon Rails 2002 trip to the Grand Canyon, this is an image intensive page and will take some time to load, please be patient.
I’m rolling slowly in traffic on the 5 freeway north into Los Angeles. It’s 5:30 am on August 19th and it is so foggy that it’s like rain – I’m running the windshield wipers. I am reminding myself to enjoy the cold wet fog now, because in just a few hours the environmental conditions will be the opposite – unbearably hot, and dry.
I am physically driving into LA but I am mentally checking a long list of items – iced coolers, full gas tank, complete schedule, maps & radio, food, phone, I even have a box of donuts for the crew - (Warren is always hungry).
At this point the organization has completed literally years of work and we are about to embark on a magical event that will take us to northern Arizona. For some it will be more like a time machine in a magical event pushing us back in time – to a different world. For a year and a half the organization has toiled over getting the '51 up to date with the new FRA regulations. Before the FRA work was done, preparations for an Amtrak inspection were taking place for this trip. The mechanical department of the org has been humming along at near capacity since June of last year. Key members, and especially the org CMO Bob Kittel have been slaving away often 5 days a week to get the engine together. But now everyone has completed their tasks and have checked and double - checked their work. Now, it’s time to roll.
I arrive at the engineless compound at 6:00am and find some of the crew waiting in the drizzle for shuttles to be taken to the depot. Two 10 passenger vans were leased as support vehicles to move crew members and merchandisers where needed. These two vans will leapfrog in front of the engine to set up merchandising tents with free information and fund raising items the public may purchase - shirts, caps and pins. The movements of these two support vehicles are coordinated by Fred Hill and his wife Judy. They will also stock the vans nightly from the tool car, drive crew members to their hotels, to dinner, to the train. They will drive to and sell SBRHS items in some of the most remote & inhospitable places between here and there.
The compound is filling up with volunteer’s cars and trucks and resembles a used car lot. It’s still drizzling and cool as the last few stragglers make it to the compound to catch the last shuttle to the depot. I see Warren has found the dougnuts as I lock the gate to the compound. This makes me smile inside and out as the last shuttle disappeared into the fog.
The first engine crew (Bill Stetler/Scott Baker) had a crew call of 2:00am last night. They coupled the auxiliary to the ‘51 around 2:30am and then were switched out of the Amtrak yard and up to Union Station. They had behind them 53,000 gallons of water and 7,100 gallons of oil (burner fuel, PS400). Got her bags packed and she’s ready to work. At 8:00am the engine crews were changed to reflect the engineer/fireman of the departing train (Mike Thornton/Bill Stetler).
The train actually left Union Station a tad late, at 10:20am - Amtrak’s train 14 (Coast Starlight and also late) was crossing in front of the Canyon Rails Limited and prevented it from leaving on time. The Canyon Rails Limited met Metrolinks 317 at Claremont, then zipped on into San Bernardino at 11:24am.
On the way into San Berdoo one of 3751’s air pumps was running away, it blew the air reseviors safety several times. When the train stopped in San Bernardino one part of the crew went off to lube the rods while a second group investigated the air pump. The problem was quickly found to be a cracked copper line that connects the air resevior pump to the governor. A new copper line was made on the spot and was replaced before the rods were done being lubricated.
While all this was happening on the ground, Gene Wood was handing ice up to the 'Pony Express' and the mayor of San Bernardino hopped into the cab for a quick photo op before we were off again. Bob Kittel called this a quick 20 minute stop, and he couldn’t believe how many people were on the platform waiting for the train when she came in – said he’s never seen so many people at San Bernardino before. As the train left San Bernardino some of the SBRHS crew threw down SBRHS hats and t-shirts to the kids and fans on the platform, this ritual was performed at almost every stop along the inbound and outbound trips.
The run up the pass started off uneventful but things quickly changed. One of the brake shoes on the ‘Lets Roll’ tender was dragging and set off a hot box detector. Three crew members got down and located the wheel and decided to cut the auxiliary’s brakes out – there wasn’t a problem doing this as the train was long enough and there were two Genesis units in the consist to add dynamics if needed to stop the train. We were stopped here for 15 minutes before we were on the move again.
Shortly after that problem was resolved on the main, private car ‘Pine Tree State’ blew a brake line and sent the train into emergency stop just east of the I-15 under crossing. Pat Egan and some help got down and fixed the pipe & fitting problem in 15 minutes with some tools from the SBRHS tool car, “Pony Express”, owned by Stan Garner.
The train then was on the move again and passed Cajon Summit at 2:55pm doing track speed to Hesperia where it was stopped for a signal briefly. This is where young Will Stetler caught the eye of a certain young lady on the ground who was coaxed into visually pleasuring his eyes with some naked body parts. Then the signal went clear, and the relationship was over as the 51 dashed off to Barstow, arriving there at 4:45pm.
In Barstow a full service was done in the 105 degree heat; lubed the rods, filled the lubricators and watered. We were also experiencing a bit of foaming in the boiler. This was expected though, because we were using a new product in the boiler water called Terlyn. The purpose of the treatment was to clean the boiler of phosphates and scale, which it did beautifully. The train left Barstow at 6:00pm.
The crew commented that they would see people in the oddest places taking their photographs and video of the train. The train would come around a bend and there would be 30 guys with tripods on a rock outcropping, or hill out in the middle of nowhere. Strange, but it made the crew feel good knowing these guys would wait all day in 110 degrees for this locomotive.
Running from Barstow to Ludlow was uneventful, mostly run at track speed as the sun was setting in a sky full of dust and haze. I chose to photograph the train at Ludlow, from the location in the above image. I had found the spot and set up my tripod, beach chair and fixed myself a snack. About 30 minutes later my liquid lunch is interupted by the distinct crackle of rental car tires on railroad ballast, looks like I won't be lonely. The stranger walked up to my location and introduced himself as Tom Kelcec (who I had corresponded with - but never met in person), and we talked for a while in the heat while he set up his 2 tripod's on the same little hillock I am set up on. 20 minutes later here comes Tom Gildersleeve and party. A little later came Gordon Glatenburg, and after that Elrond Lawrence tumbled by with some friends and set up. Now we are a whole hill of tripods, and cameras and video cameras waiting. The afternoon light was really hazy and full of particulates as we waited. Then just before the excursion train passed us, a westbound rolled through and blocked what would have been a beautiful shot. All of us were robbed! We all quietly packed up and made dust for Siberia. Oh my *&6%^_+?<!@#$><@#$#@!#.
At Siberia another service was done, the rods were lubed and engine crews changed (Fred Perry/Phil Kauke with George Clous there watching). While servicing here one of the alemite guns used for rod lubrication went south & died. The result was that it took twice as long to complete the service stop with only one gun to use.
Got into Needles at 11:00 where the service crew did a full service and watering. Warren Peterson and Bill Bondie hooked up the water treatment plant and filled both tenders. The alimite gun would plague us all week. First Dave Whitehead, then Bob Kittel and Bill Stetler worked on it - and finally Scott Baker and Wolf Fengler had at it and got it working.
During this service it was detected that the cleaning chemistry in the boiler had lifted a large piece of scale off of the boiler and because of the foaming it had worked it’s way into the drypipe and lodged itself under one of the poppet valves in the throttle preventing it from closing. This could have potentially been a big problem, and ended the trip – but Bill Stetler and Bob Kittel were in conference for about a whole minute and decided the best way to clear it was to yank open the throttle a couple of times and see if it doesn’t just work itself free. It did. The servicing crew was finished at 2:00am.
It was decided Monday night that the train would not leave Needles until 11:00am on Tuesday; this gave the riders some extra rack time seeing as they had two hours of buses to get to and from hotels in Laughlin and the train in Needles. The crew appreciated this too!
