Work train make-up

[BaltoOhioRRfan]

while I am looking for how a MOW Train is set up, i'm mostly looking to find out where specific cars were located on a train. I'm trying to find out where the heavy crane's were located on the train and derrick cars. I am in the process of doing a B&O and a C&O work train for each road, I've got cranes and derricks for both of em, C&O I only have 4 other cars for the train, a tanker, flat car with bulldozer, boom car, and a gondola,

B&O i have a tank car, gondola, RPO, Baggage, crane, derrick car.

What would be a prototypical train line up?

Thanks for any help

[PRRnTX]

Derricks and boom cars  were often found sitting on a MOW siding until called for a recovery operation. On the line, they would be an engine, some support cars (box, flats, gonds.) boom and derrick. Several of the Morning Sun Publisher's books have a few pics of wreck trains.

[PRRnTX]

Completely forgot... goto www.rr-fallenflags.org .Pennsy section & scroll down to wrecks. includes a B&O derrick

[Jim Banner]

MOW, as I am sure you know, stands for Maintenance of Way.  MOW trains are assembled depending on what job they have to do.  Removing wrecks is, fortunately, only one of many possibilities as the railway works hard to keep the trains moving.  Wrecks attract media attention so we are much more likely to see a wreck being cleaned up than we are to see ties being replaced or a few spikes hammered back in.

On the small end of things, I used to see a MOW train leaving the yard every day, all summer long, several times a week in spring and fall, and only once in a long while in the winter.  I suspect that in the summer, half of the crew of four were summer students and that one crew worked the section where our shop was.  Spring and fall, they probably consolidated two crews into one and that one crew covered two sections of track.  In the winter, they probably went out only when absolutely necessary.  How often that was probably depended on how much of the work they got done in the spring and fall, and particularly the summer before and how many of the problems could wait until the next spring and summer.  This particular train normally consisted of a speeder (a.k.a. jigger and other names) pulling a trailer of similar dimensions.  The trailer was loaded with the tools and supplies they needed for the day, based, I am guessing, on what they had observed the day before combined reports from track inspectors, train crews, etc.  This would often include two or three ties, tie tongs, shovels, crowbars, spike pullers and hammers, and always a keg of spikes and some loose tie plates and joint bars.

Sometimes the train would be accompanied by a self propelled crane which probably constituted a second section of the train, and once in a while, we would see a self propelled crane with a beat up gondola in tow.  I believe that train was used to pick up old ties that had been replaced and left by the side of the track.  And occasionally we would see an old GP-7 or GP-9 which was normally used in yard service or for local switching going down the line with a gondola but without a caboose.  This was in the days before FREDs so I am not sure how they handled the markers.  Perhaps they just used the ones on the rear of the locomotive, or perhaps being a work train, they did not need them.

Bottom line, while the Big Hook might sit on a back track and never move for months on end, its smaller cousins see a lot of use and you are much more likely to see one, with or without a gondola and/or a speeder plus trailer than you are to see a full fledged wreck train on its way to a major wreck.

Jim

[buzz]

Hi BaltoOhioRRfan
Typical MOW train mid sized locomotive and 1/2 dozen R/C ballast hoppers
same loco as above 1/2 dozen modified flat cars carrying rail.
Dependant on era may or may not have caboose in the case of steel train
caboose would be behind loco so it can be un-loaded.
If caboose era ballast train it may have a ballast plow then caboose
or caboose may be modified to be both plow and caboose.
Mow trains tend to be single function trains so a big job may require more than one train the only time you would see crew camp cars on a train is in transit.
They tend to be dropped at the closest convenient siding plugged into power  water and sewerage and not on a working train these day's where ever possible crew trains are not used and the crews put in hotels.
Most per way gangs have trucks so even the tool cars don't get much use
unless a workshop car is part of the camp
regards John

[bandmguy]

 The railroad would only use what they needed. Keeping it simple was economic.

[Doneldon]

Jim-

You are absolutely right.  I've seen lots of railroad cranes -- every road needs them nearby -- but I've never seen one under way.  Lots of speeders, mostly in the past as there are roads, using the term loosely, adjacent to most tracks so mow crews can get there by truck.  That's both quicker and safer.  However, something bothers me about seeing trucks running down the dirt roads to work on the rails.  It seems incongruous and unpleasantly ironic.  Even sad, like the trucks and roads have won and the railroads can only exist because the trucks let them.
                                                                                                    -- D

[RAM]

Few if any rialroads still have wrecking cranes.  The smaller mow cranes are still common.  How ever cranes on truck with couplers on the back are making inroads.

[Jim Banner]

This video gives some idea of what a modern MOW train uses to maintain the track.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFE8nmKpmXY

Jim

[Guilford Guy]

The railroad would only use what they needed. Keeping it simple was economic.

Kind of amusing that that railroad still uses a pair of big hooks, while almost, if not all other railroads have gotten rid of them.

http://photos.nerail.org/showpic/?2010042219135126285.jpg
It's difficult to see in this picture, but there is a bunk car, 2 tool/supplies cars, the 2 big hooks and accompanying flat cars, a couple more tool/supplies cars, and another bunk car. (They combined the 2 wreck trains for this scenario)

Old Baggage Cars, troop sleepers(converted into a boxcar in this case), and coaches are often found in MOW service. Older boxcars, flatcars, and gondolas were also fairly common.