Train porn

Closer to home,this has always been my favourite Steam loco.:)



And not to leave the Diesels out,the classic 121's.

Here are some smaller (though no less impressive IMO) Harz Mountain Narrow Gauge (1m) loks.

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Train from Wernigerode to the summit of the Brocken arriving at Wernigerode West station. Your's truly in shot.

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Lok stops half way up the ascent to take on water and allow descending train to pass. Chance to stretch the legs. Snow getting progressively deeper as we climb. At the top it will be 6 foot deep in places.

The Harz railways are run as a business-and a freight carrying business at that! The trains that connect the various towns in the region are used by locals all year, with steam traction on much of the network. The "special" trains like the one pictured include those trains that run to the summit of the Brocken, East Germany's highest peak and for many years during the cold war a total no go zone as it was used by the soviets to eavesdrop on western military communications.

It's well worth a trip for anyone interested in trains.

Here are some pics from last weekend on the lovely island of Rügen and its 26km long narrow gauge line. The narrow gauge network on Rügen used to be much more extensive nut the majority was closed by the DR in 1969.

There also exists standard gauge DB lines on the island which connect via a causeway to the network on the mainland. Interchange between the two networks is possible at the town of Putbus.

The system is run for profit, which it mostly generates from tourist ticket sales (single tickets are proportionally much more expensive than monthly ones, so local people can use the line to commute but the railway can stay open with the revenue from tourists)

The lok which hauled our train was a 1953 built unit. She was built in the LOWA Lokomotiv Plant Karl Marx in Babelsberg (nr. Berlin) which was previously an Orrenstein & Koppel factory before the GDR came into existence and nationalised all such plants.


Being watered here before the off from Göhren. I didn't want to subject my GF to the entire 52km round trip as it takes 2 hours+ so we just went about halfway and back.


The return journey-loks are not turned and I saw no sign of turntables at the Göhren terminus to I presume they have never been turned on this system.


The sign means (very loosely translated) "if you get hit by soot/sparks etc. it's your problem!" The health and safety mania one sees in the UK and Ireland is not yet very evident in Germany-thank God. You can stick your head out the window all you want-if your head gets chopped off by a pole it's your problem lol.


Lok running around her train at Göhren terminus.

Judgement Day wrote: »

Some very old porn for steamengine and all the other posters here old enough to remember the Clogher Valley Railway in its heyday.

On an RPSI special the other week, I was speaking to a man who recalled travelling on the Clogher Valley line pre war. As lines went, it was well and truly a basket case but ironically enough it's poor state indirectly led to the adoption of diesel in Ireland so it played it's part in progress.

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

the comparison with the planes really shows how obscenely big US stuff is :eek:

That's what's is called the loading gauge. It's the width of the infrastructure which in turn allows wider carriages, wagons, loco's and, of course, cargo. Impressive as it is, not every route in the US would be able to handle a load like that.

I'd love to know what speed that train would be allowed to run at

CIE wrote: »

The fuselage of the Boeing 737 is only 12' 4" wide. Might be considered wide for most AAR clearances, but it really isn't too wide given that most of their track centres in the midwest and certain eastern railways are that wide (now you know why most of the passenger platforms outside the northeastern USA have stayed low-level). The USA's "double-stack" container trains can reach up to 21 feet above the rail head, and new regulations now require a 23-foot overhead clearance (even for OHLE; just one reason why they don't electrify too much over there, i.e. aside from cost).Probably track speed (most freight railways have a maximum speed of 79 mph, due to federal regulations, although some allow 90 mph if they can afford to install cab signalling out of pocket and go up to the next "track class"). The heaviest empty weight of the "next-gen" Boeing 737 is in the 22-tonne range, and that by itself is way lighter than a single double-stack car (those have loadings of 22 tonnes per axle); and you've only got the empty fuselages there on that train.

They don't appear to be secured down though so on that basis it would be unlikely that they would be allowed do high speeds.