THE 80'S PT 2

A Ford Escort, Pontiac Trans Am, Jeep Cherokee, and a Mack R series. The late 80's!

A delivery from Roadway. A classic Ford C series cab-over -produced for over three decades!

Another Ford product; an LNT9000 with a 20' MOL container.

And a pair of Kenworth K100 Aerodyne cab-overs, with unusual red wheels, waiting on trailers to pull. This model was made famous by the 80's TV show "BJ and the Bear".

A Jeep J10 pick-up sits outside the main shop. It has the "Honcho" trim package, and still looks good even though it is a decade old in this photo. The owner took good care of this truck!

A Chevy work truck, with ladder rack. The AP&W merger has just happened, but the truck still has "APRR" lettering on the door. Beside it is another Mack R, and beside that is a newer Chevy full-size Blazer.

A young Dale Williams stands next to his truck, a Chevy K10 Stepside with new rims on it. Like the Jeep J10, this truck is a decade old, but still looks good!

Briggs stands by his vehicle; a Buick Riviera. Yet another 70's classic!

Another classic is this 50' combo-door boxcar, with the large "AP" above the reporting marks. AP 24698 still has the yellow dot from the 70's, but not the ACI (Automated Car Identifier) panel. The yellow dot indicated that the car was inspected for wheel defects, a common problem in the early 70's. The ACI panel was a bar code label on the side of the car that was scanned by a track-side reader. In use from the mid 60's to the mid 70's, the panels fell victim to grime on the equipment -locomotives rarely get washed, let alone freight cars!

Next week, the soon-to-be-merged APRR tests a pair of new railroad products!
 

THE 80'S PT 1

 A look at Hillsdale in the 80's...

A classic Peterbilt 359 semi pulls a Conrail 40' trailer out of town. Note the AMC Pacer!

Another classic is the GMC motor home.

An AMC Gremlin sits in front of Dairy Queen, beside a classic hot rod, Pontiac Trans Am, and a Chevy pick-up, as another Chevy truck rolls past, along with a Ford Escort.

A Greyhound MCI MC-7 SceniCruiser rolls into town in the classic white/blue/red paint scheme introduced in the early 70's, and used for nearly four decades into the early 2000's. The MC-7 itself was introduced in 1970, and used almost as long!

A stretched Lincoln Town Car takes a newlywed couple our of town for their honeymoon. While they would love to go away to an exotic resort, there is no airport nearby, so they settled for a cabin on Youghiogheny Lake.

The mechanics normally work on old farm tractors but today, they have a much more exciting weekend project; a '72 Chevelle with a 454 big block under the hood!

The main rival bus company to Greyhound, Trailways also served Hillsdale. Here one of the company's iconic Eagle Model 10 coaches rolls into town for a stop on the way to New York City..

The famed "GO BIG RED" slogan was emblazoned across the rear, along with a very popular perk; "KIDS RIDE FREE"!

The bus leaves after dropping off a passenger. The roots of the unique Trailways design go back to the late 50's, when Continental Trailways wanted a coach to compete with rival Greyhound's SceniCruiser.. Unable to find a domestic manufacturer willing to work with them, they went to a German firm, who designed the first Eagle coaches. During the 60's, the Eagles were produced by a Belgian firm, until 1976. The Eagle Model 10, made from 1980-1987, was the first all-American made Eagle!

When Greyhound bought Trailways in 1987, they also acquired their Eagle manufacturing division. Unfortunately, Eagle was shut down in 1990 by a lengthy driver's strike at Greyhound, which ultimately forced the company into bankruptcy. After that, Eagle basically ceased to exist.

More 80's flavor to come next week!

PASSING TRAINS PT 30; EEXT97W PT 2

Ethanol Extra 97 West, aka EEXT97W is rolling through Hillsdale...

The long string of tank cars snake through Hillsdale Yard and around the curve out of town.
 

FHRX (Flint Hill Resources) 250814 is a smaller 25,000 gal car, verses the more common 30,000 gal cars in the train.

UTLX 204459 is one of the more common-sized cars in ethanol service, and is slightly larger than FHRX 250814 in front of it. It is leased by Eco Energy.

CTCX 731626 represents yet another operator of these cars. Endasa S.A. De C.V. is the owner of this reporting mark.

NATX 302816 has blue bearing caps, common to many contemporary freight cars. The NATX reporting marks used to belong to North American Freight Car, but now are owned by GE Leasing.

The "long black snake" continues through Hillsdale.

The black snake has a white tail; a string of white-with-black-bands tank cars brings up the rear. Originally built for crude oil hauling, these are now in ethanol service, due to the decline in oil shipments thanks to many domestic oil producers shutting down because of low oil prices (in 2020).

EEXT97W rolls out of town, with another BNSF hopper providing rear-end protection for the train. A sand-filled hopper with an EOT device doesn't match the nostalgia of a red caboose, but it's cheaper to maintain and a lot safer in the event of a rear end collision -no personnel on board and a load of sand to mitigate the impact!

PASSING TRAINS PT 30; EEXT97W

 EEXT97W, the unit ethanol train extra from New York City to Chicago, is rolling through Hillsdale...

BNSF run-through power is on the head-end, with a pair of Dash-9's.

4347 is painted in BNSF's "Premium Heritage" scheme.

660 is still in its as-delivered Santa Fe paint scheme, with a small BNSF "patch", orange replacement a/c unit from another unit, and lots of faded, peeling paint, along with a rusted stack.

BNSF 436754 is the head-end buffer car.

A pair of Global Ethanol tankers, leased from TILX (Trinity Leasing).

More TILX cars.

TILX 198989 shows off the blue bearing caps on its trucks.

TILX 190641 lacks the blue bearing caps.

The Dash-9's roll past downtown.

A paring shot of the power. The underframes and trucks of both units were originally silver!

The rest of the train next week.

IN THE YARDS PT 11

 

A RTTX flatcar. The RTTX reporting marks are for 89' flatcar that have three hitches, to allow for either two 45' trailers or three 28' trailers. Note the loaded centerbeam flat, awaiting delivery to Smitty Lumber.

A short string of cars headed to the paper mill in Dale City.

SSW 62630 is an ex-Golden West Service car, which has seen better days!

AP 14087 is a loaded woodchip hopper car, with the AP&W logo at the top. This car has been recently repainted.

APW 14084 is another repaint, but without the logo.

AP 4368 is now a "shoving platform" for local trains. It also provides rear-end protection for the HL06/HL07 oil trains to Snake Oil.

A pair of  M2 Bradley armored vehicles sit atop a DODX 6-wheeled flatcar. They are being moved to a reserve unit in Pennsylvania.

Unit 91101 is in town for the Fourth of July.

HAPPY 4TH OF JULY!