The movement of something like an F-7 is not that big a deal. It will require using a company that has experiance in moving large equipment for the petrochem plants as they use large vessles that are as long as 100', 20' dia., and weigh in at 250,000 lbs and up. These are moved over the road on a reg basis. We have moved three airplane bodies of the past few years 2 B-47's and one B-52 so yes it can be done. It is far easier to move the body with out the trucks and have them come in seperate loads. It will take either one very large crane with special rigging or two smaller cranes in the 140ton range each to make the lift a safe one both on to the truck and off at the other end. The cost will scare your pants off so make sure your sitting down. Just the crane rental for one crane here is $375.00 per hour 8 hr min. plus mobilization into and out of the job site which can be anywhere from $2,000.00 in and $2,000.00 out on up due to distance traveled. You will also need rigging and a rigging crew which will run arond $225.00 per hour 8 hr min. Due to the distance and the unkown of where your located the trucking is going to be somewhere in the $350/$450 per hour rate with an 8 hr min. Hope this helps and hope you have deep pockets. We just moved a caboose for a man from town to his farm about 30 mi and the cost was $15,000.00 turnkey.

Thanks all for your replies. There is a gentleman near where I live with his own private railroad on his property and it has inspired me to do the same. Track and equipment costs are easy to calculate, I just wans't sure of the logistics and cost of moving motive power and rolling stock.

Thanks, -Jason

John's numbers are quite correct for heavy moves such as locomotives but caboose moves can be done by using a heavy duty tow truck for half the above cost. I did a 75 mile move across two states with a steel caboose for less than $7.000 and never used a crane.

Quite large as in this SD70ACE:

Two F7's in Minnesota were moved 10 months ago using fairly modest-looking dollies.
See images below. These little dollies make some of the enormous rigs used for other moves look like overkill. According to an old thread, the journey was 40 miles. Can anyone guess if a simple dolly-rig like this would be safe enough for freeway travel and a cross-state journey of several hundred miles? Intuition tells me no. But I wonder what other people have seen out there.

Another good Rypn thread: Moving a locomotive & a word of caution . Feel free to bump that thread if you have something to add to it. Thanks.



Image source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2Eokg3VF-w

Makes me wonder if these were just gutted shells, the rigs look too light to be transporting them if they had their prime movers and electrical gear

In Great Britain both the heritage railroads and the commercial railroads move equipment -- cars and locomotives -- around by road. Guaranteed that the loading gauge of this equipment is smaller than we're used to.

The density and speed of traffic in Great Britain is such that "hospital" moves would not be tolerated.


The locomotives used on the Chunnel are larger than anything used elsewhere in England and they have to trucked when built or sent off-line of heavy rebuilds.

The photos that I have seen are of multi-axle trailers, like the one shown under the SD70ACE being hauled by truck in Australia.

Here's an example of what can be moved if one is willing to spend a lot of money.

This is a 31-minute silent film.

https://archive.org/details/cscrm_000015#

In 1979 a tunnel fire on the Northwestern Pacific stranded several locomotives near Eureka, CA. Locomotives were in high demand at the time, so SP decided to move four SD-9's around the burned-out tunnel at Island Mountain.

This was a very long trip over narrow mountain roads. The state would not allow them to haul them on US 101, so they used the Bell Springs Road and the Island Mountain Road for the job.

The contractor, Bigge Drayage, is one of the Bay Area's top heavy-haul movers and crane companies. Years earlier, they successfully salvaged a DC-8 which landed on the mud flats short of the runway at SFO.

Interesting. For the heavy load specialists, a locomotive should be a run of the mill job compared to some of the odd dimension loads. We'll have one heck of a load going out of Tucson by road in 2017. The primary mirror for the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope was manufactured at the University of Arizona Mirror Lab over a period of nearly 8 years. It is now being stored, awaiting completion of facilities in Chile.

Due to the dimensions of the mirror (8 meter diameter), the mirror must be loaded on a special trailer in a horizontal position. The shipping container is the largest container of it's type in the world. I have had the opportunity to personally view both the mirror and the container. When the mirror is shipped, it will be sent from the Port of Houston for logistics reasons-apparently Long Beach cannot accommodate this specific load. The load will be transported via tractor trailer via I-10. The dimension of the load will require that all eastbound lanes be closed during the transit of the mirror, which will be restricted to nighttime moves only.

Once the mirror arrives in Chile, it has to be taken by tractor trailer up a steep mountain road to the site. The mirror on that trip must be loaded at an angled position to allow it to pass through a narrow tunnel (the load dimensional limiting factor).

So while shipping a locomotive by truck is comparatively expensive for most of us, it's business as usual for large load transporters compared to oddball shipments.

Eldon, Iowa.

Contrasted with the Minnesota Zephyr F7 locos above that were moved on simple dollies, this Santa Fe diesel was moved this month on a huge centipede-like trailer.

Photos from Ottumwa Post:
http://www.ottumwaeveningpost.com/9470/ ... e-on-track

Off-topic: It's former BNSF 3822.