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otisdog

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Everything posted by otisdog

  1. I was there in August....the Timken Bearing factory is still open. What blew me away was the yard sales - people where selling everything . Furniture, beds, cars, snow blowers, everything. Was really sad to see.
  2. So the 100 proof is 10 dollars? Out here 1920 is $53 @ Total...so I figure $14 bucks is a fair price for the 100 proof.
  3. Costco (California) has a OF combo pack - 100 proof & 1920 for $67.00
  4. Actually, this one didn't have a badge....
  5. agreed....
  6. Would be a very rare skillet....they're cast.
  7. Please excuse my constitutional ignorance - does not the Senate vote on the outcome of the impeachment trial? If so, I wouldn't characterize the involvement as "doing nothing".
  8. And jurors don't do anything?
  9. Wrong demographic. All in the Family.
  10. I went to the LA County fair after the restoration of 4014 was announced but before any activity had commenced on her. 4014 was one of many large engines on display at the Rail Giants museum. There were a few people looking at the engine at the time. Going up the wooden staircase to the cab, I saw and met a gentleman in the engineers seat. This was Paul. Paul had taken it upon himself to keep the running gear , including bearings, lubricated over the previous decades. It was his work that made 4014 such a good candidate for restoration. There were other Big Boys around the country that had boilers in better shape, but the running gear of 4014 was in the best shape of all the remaining locos. Paul spent about an hour explaining all the gauges, dials, valves and levers to me. Let me stick my head in the massive fire box, which had lights illuminated inside. When I mentioned how bittersweet the locomotive leaving his care must be, a tear welled up in his eye and he got quite emotional. I tried to cheer him up by pointing out how many people would get to see the huge locomotive run, and he nodded in acknowledgment, but his lips were tight, not smiling. It was an amazing experience for me. Weird, the room got a bit dusty as I typed this.
  11. Wow! Best yet....awesome backlighting of the cab.
  12. The second shot is great....
  13. Joshua Tree would be a haul. It's not very scenic, and would be populated by rock climbers that have been driven from the Sierra by the weather. Plus, 29 Palms is a shithole. Surprised it didn't make Honorable Mention in 'the worst city' thread. The Monarch ain't a bad base for day trips along the coast. Go north to Newport, rent a bike and ride the bike path on the boardwalk. 22 miles roundtrip, usually with a decent wind blowing down coast in the afternoon. Take the ferry to Balboa Island for the heck of it....
  14. No power cars back in the steam days. Steam was piped through the train to provide heat and hot water, and power was generated by the method TwiceHorn states above. Dynamo was belt driven off of the axle.
  15. Big Boy has two steam generators (dynamos), but they only supply enough power to cover the on board comms and the running / headlights. The power for the rest of the train comes from a power car, which is a converted baggage car with a diesel powered electric generator. There have been two different power cars used on this trip.
  16. Interesting that the engineer ignored the standard safety protocol at the beginning of MFEU93's "pulling away" video above. There is a 'blue flag' marker hanging on the window sill towards the front. The blue flag denotes that the engine is being attended to by various service people, and each of the service people hangs their personal service ID on the marker to show that they are working on the engine. As the individual completes his job, he removes his ID from the blue flag. Once there are no more ID's hanging on the blue flag, it is removed. Once it is removed, the train can begin its movement. But in this instance, the engineer removes the flag whilst there are at least two ID's visible on it. This is a serious protocol violation, and would at least result in a suspension in the "real" world of train employment. The steam program isn't supposed to be an exception.
  17. Nope. This BigBoy has only been running since around June. Prior to that they last ran in the late '50's. What you probably saw was UP 3985, a 4-6-6-4, which looks similar but has 2 less driving axles. Parts of 3985 were canniblized to make 4014 functional, including the tender. Rumor has it that 3985 will never run again.
  18. 05 was pretty good....
  19. So....you do know that you can read twitter without being on twitter?
  20. You are correct - and I did get some bad info....from a forest service ranger, of all people.
  21. mmm......national forests not so. Need to stay in "official" campsites inside the forest, generally. Some exceptions exist. BLM land is a go, though. Only restriction on BLM land is how close you can camp to the water. Fire permits often necessary, also. Lots more BLM land than federal forests, but it is generally not as nice as the later.
  22. Well, he's into the rookies now. They're new at this.
  23. Throwing items at moving vehicles is illegal. I live on a cul-de-sac that has 7 houses on each side. People turn onto it, go to the end, and frustratedly whip a u-turn and fly back towards the outlet. I keep a soccer ball handy, and kick it into the street in front of the speeding vehicle. Two of the cars have left on flatbeds, after they had folded a front wheel under the car after skidding into and bouncing off of the curb. Bummer.
  24. Note: The above ramble was composed while watching the Dodgers whoop on the Nats whilst consuming suds and brown water.
  25. Yes, there's something magical about steam engines. Carson & Colorado #18* was sitting in the park just off of Hwy. 395 at Independence, California. I had driven past it hundreds of times as I drove up to the Sierras, to go skiing, fishing or biking in my stomping grounds. Every 5 years or so, another coat of paint was added. Then walls, of sorts, appeared around the loco, as well as a fund raising sign. Then it dissappeared. 3 to 4 years later it was steamed up. I was incredulous. Having no track to run it on, they hauled it up 395 to the Laws railroad museum, just out side of Bishop. They had a bit of track there, and they let it stretch it's legs, a bit. Back to Independence it went, to sit in it's metal shed. Then a coal fired loco of the Durango & Silverton sparked a fire in Colorado. Despite how much cash the local tourist railroad contributed to the local economy, there was rumblings of shutting the railroad down. The railroad committed to converting some of the coal burners to oil burners, which don't spew the cinders that are associated with the coal burners. C&C 18 was trucked to Colorado so the Durango & Silverton engineers could learn the ways of a oil burning locomotive. Spent the summer there, but it's back in Independence now. Never thought it would run again, much less on the D&S. Sorry for the OT. I'll probably head out to the desert, spend the night in Afton canyon, and watch Big Boy chug through the next day. * The Carson & Colorado was purchased by the Southern Pacific, and #18 is lettered for that railroad.
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