French Lick Rail, Indiana, USA. June 2008

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LeatherDome

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A very tame explore and a good job too. After the skirmish with Fort Knox, I really didn’t need any great deals of excitement.

All this stuff is the stock of a rail museum in Indiana. The town is truly named French Lick. That requires investigation in itself as to how that came about, but it’s what its called now anyway.

Stuff on display
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Told you that’s what the place is called…
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Further back, where the average US tourist does not have the energy to tread. And seeing as you can’t drive your car to within six inches of the place, generally attendance is low.
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Good flaky rust.
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The US adopted buckeye couplings way before Europe did. I don’t remember seeing a single thing with a buffer on it.
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Ever seen the locomotive in Dumbo? Here’s the inspiration:
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Something a little more familiar, with a sort of saddle tank.
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Maybe the restoration did progress beyond paint but it’s a bit stalled right now.
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Super long and spacious carriages. Nowhere to stand or put luggage though.
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Home made.
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See how the body work is riveted steel, forming the structural members of the carriage. The US makes their truck trailers like this as well. No chassis to anything, just bodies.
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Ten push button switches + ten fuses in place + all the cable = zero pikies.
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Not really sure what this was. Load of gubbins clad in tightly bound wood. Maybe insulation for an early style air conditioning.
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This thing was made to look entirely made out of aluminimudinum, as the colonials say. Really no need for all the aluminimudinum as the weight saved is negligible, but full marks for style.
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Now this is a full air conditioning module. Form right to left; refrigerant tank, compressor, controls & gauges, the motor driving all of it, air fan, condenser.
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Yet more aluminimudinum. These people must have felt real space age.
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I doubt the US every had 1st, 2nd & 3rd class, but…
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I’ve never seen or heard of rail traction being driven from such a small traction motor, through a drive shaft and then through a crown and bevel transaxle like this. Not a successful design maybe.
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And Casey Jones never did come down the line.
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Cheers… LD.
 
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I may well be wrong but that could be a generator rather than a motor.
 
Hmm...

The carriage had a pantograph on top and alternators are normally belt driven. Having a transaxle with crown and bevel gearing inside and then a prop shaft (which is missing in this picture but you can see the saftey strap and drive flange on the axle) with all the hassle they involve is just a far too over engineered way of driving an alternator.

I’d just never seen anything like it so it caught my eye.
 
Hmm...

The carriage had a pantograph on top and alternators are normally belt driven. Having a transaxle with crown and bevel gearing inside and then a prop shaft (which is missing in this picture but you can see the saftey strap and drive flange on the axle) with all the hassle they involve is just a far too over engineered way of driving an alternator.

I’d just never seen anything like it so it caught my eye.

Makes sense. So much for my elite motor-spotting skills! :)
 

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