let's welcome our new member firewood truck
his location reads charm city
Baltimore area if my memory serves me correct for nick names of cities

 

Welcome to the Chapter firewood!

 

Thanks for the 'welcome' ! Charm City is B-mo's nick name although most people call it 'harm city' among other things...

 

hey could not respond to your message--earlier you need 25 posts to get messages and post in the classifieds--sorry
we all have rules~~~~~~~

 

it's all good!

 

I work down in Baltimore in the Norfolk Southern rail yard, across from the John Hopkins Bayview campus...any close to you?

 

Not really, but I think I know the yard you are talking about. Whenever I go through the old harbor tunnel you can see a big yard with a big repair facility close to the tunnel thru-way, then there's some track that is at the same level as the roadway on the right, I've seen some of those gi-normous UP SD80MAC with the flying flag paint jobs.

 

If you're seeing the UP units, that's on the CSX side. But we ain't too far off. Two yards basically right next to each other, so if you see any black engines with a big horse on the side, that's Norfolk Southern.

 

I used to be into model trains for a long time (not anymore) so it's always neat to see the 1:1 modern diesels, I really get amazed at the AC3300 units, those things are BIG !

 

I was a bit of a model railroader myself. So I hired on with the railroad, and that killed whatever time I had for that. Still interested in it, but between a lack of space and playing with the cars it has taken the back burner.

They can be quite impressive close up. 4000 horsepower, 200 tons a pop generally. The SD80MACs are NS's largest, and they run 5000 horses...neat stuff.

 

what brand of locos do the engineers prefer, the EMD or GE units? I got out of the model trains because it was basically a 'lone wolf' type of hobby. The RC vehicles is much more of a social thing, I belong to a club where we have monthly GTG's and compete with our rock crawlers and 'scale' rigs which are more like a very detailed scale model but are also RC, like the 1/6th scale jeep in my avatar pic.

 

The EMDs are better pullers, but the GEs are more comfortable for the crew. If I had to pick one though, I like the EMD SD70M...



Model railroading can be more social, just gotta join a forum or a local club. I was a member of the Sykesville & Patapsco model railroad club for a few years, until I hired on with Norfolk Southern and sold my soul to the railroad...