On Tuesday, September 25th (between 10:30 PM Monday night and 2:30 AM Tuesday morning), Amtrak conducted high speed rail test trials on the NEC between New Brunswick, NJ and Trenton. The highest speeds were achieved by Princeton Junction, NJ where the CURRENT record from 1967 still remains.

The tests went in a series of incremental steps (so I've heard) starting out at 135 mph (current speed along this portion of the Corridor) and worked their way up to the neighborhood of 160+ mph. The FRA requires running speeds of 5 mph higher then anticipated in service speeds which are expected to be 160 mph in a few years time after rebuilding and replacing of the catenary supports and wires.

Sadly - in regards to modern journalism and, yes, preservation of historic fact, the majority of the papers around the country got their facts wrong and stated that Amtrak was out to break the current speed record for a production built train set in the US which stands at 170.8 mph and was set way back in 1967 on Dec 20th by the United Aircraft Turbo Train built by Sikorsky and Pullman. Many papers are quoting the current unidentified record at 165 mph...

Here's a photo from that night - unconfirmed sources state the speed reached was 160 mph though 169.2 mph on a follow up test between Wilmington, DE and Perryville, MD. Further tests were scheduled - including runs in RI and MA. Wonder if the record from my favorite Turbotrain will be matched or beaten after nearly 45 years?

Acela run expected to match U.S. rail speed record of 165 mph
http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2012-0 ... t-corridor

Acela High Speed Test Run

The Speed Record Plaque at Princeton Junction Station

The UA Turbo - 1967 170.8 mph Record Holder

/Mitch


PS - Yes, the NYC Jet Powered RDC was recorded as 184 mph but never carried paying passengers nor was it ever likely expected to (at least not with the jet engines attached!)

NYC Jet Engined RDC

I'm a jes' gonna leave this lyin' here.....



The guy who took this photo informed me that the supposed Turboliner record of 170.8 has been "unofficially" shattered at least once by Acela equipment, but that not enough documentation was available to make it official. And besides, if they try to make it official, someone ends up in the proverbial "hot water." The runs the other night didn't, as far as I was told, break 170.8, but as my source told me, "That was two Turbo cabs and one car! We ran with a full [whole] train! Let us run an Acela with just the power cars and the track geometry car, and we'll bust that easily!"

Lol - As some who loves those beautiful high domed see through the front window Turbo Trains, I covet that officially documented record and protect it religiously! There's something to be said (good and bad) about an American designed and built train that holds a country's speed record well over 30 years - if not 40 plus years!

Here's a photo by a friend - Donald Haskel:


So - the UA Turbo Train is just that much more special - for now!

/Mitch

Those "railfan" seats in the front row were worth the ticket. It was fun with the catenary just overhead in the East River Tunnel!

I wonder what the engineer thought of being watched every second of the run!

The only time I was able to get one of those seats on a CN turbo, the train was pulled by an FP-9 due to a turbine failure. It was still an interesting ride from Toronto to Kingston, though, being "up close and personal" with an F running like a bat out of... well, you know where.

It's a shame VIA had totally trashed the last Turbos by the time John Corby of NMST (now CSTM) was invited to view them with an eye toward preservation. I believe John saved some parts, but the trains themselves were too far gone.

Steve Hunter

From NJ.com...

"Amtrak train looks to break U.S. speed record in Northeast Corridor test"

"The actual speed attained by the train was not available last night.

“It definitely would be the highest speed recorded in the U.S.,” Amtrak spokesman Cliff Cole said earlier."

Interesting photo - that station must have been whizzing by the Acela a quite a high rate of speed!

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2012/0 ... eed_r.html



/Mitch

Acela: Two stock locos, six regular cars (including the food car), and the track geometry car (10003).

UA Turbo: Two stock locos, one car.

And yet, one holds an official record and was does not : D

/Mitch

Acela or Turbo Train? There was nothing like riding an express train of MP-54s.

And, like the Audi TT Quattro, BMW 325i, or the like versus the drag racer, one is fast, practical, earns its keep, and lasts, and one is just fast for the sake of being fast and doesn't last long. >;-)

It's OK to love an American designed and built retro rocket, Mr Mitchell.

If you want to compare apples to apples - compare your drag racer to the NYC jet powered RDC. As for the UA Turbo Train and the Acela - both were in use doing the same job and, I might add, on a good portion of the same route! The Turbo's were in service for longer then the Acela's have been in service, lol. They also could be found in 7 car sets in Canada.

Tell you what - you tell your buddy (probably my buddy, as well, lol) that next test he can leave 7 cars behind and just use the two power cars and the geometry car!

/Mitch

United Aircraft Turbos:
Tested 1967 on Corridor, Entered U.S. passenger service 1968, withdrawn from Amtrak September 1976 (see Trains, May 1977, p. 18).

Acela: Tested 2000, entered service December 2000, still in service 2012, expected to remain in service until at least 2022.

Don't fret. It's a well-known fact that the more impractical a piece of railroad equipment is, the more railfans are attracted to it. Observe the attraction to locomotives from long-dead builders, steam-turbines, gas-turbines, "Big Boys," etc. Compare the efforts to save a couple damaged Alco PAs versus the mainstay of American railroading for decades, the SD40-2.

Acela: Tested 2000, entered service December 2000, still in service 2012, expected to remain in service until at least 2022.[/quote]

The UA Turbos ran in Canada as late as 1982, and Wiki, since I don't have a "handy" alternate source available states they were in service in the US until 1980. My pics are from 1982.



Aw, shux, just call me Howard Roark.


The Acela ran a few more tests last night into Thursday morning - they were flying!
May very well have broken the US record this morning... 10-11-12.

/Mitch

With a handy bit of "Photoshopping" to plant a New Haven track scene in front of a CN/VIA TurboTrain, if that's the case with your photo attached earlier. The photo historian in me would say, instantly, that someone mis-captioned a 1972 photo as "1982". We photo archivists see that all the time. The famous "Is this Lincoln at Hanover Junction, Pa. changing trains to Gettysburg?" photo lay for decades unnoticed in the Archives files because someone in the 19th century labeled it "Hanover Jct., Va.".

I'm looking at both my own hand-annotated Diesel Spotter's Guide Update (1979, Pinkepank & Marre), my Amtrak roster notes, and the loose-ring binder notebooks of Barry Hollingsworth, a Baltimore loco spotter and photographer who was a contributor to Extra 2200 South. All three adamantly say the same thing: The Amtrak UA Turbo locos and car sets, which include a pair of power units sold by CN to Amtrak in 1974 (a second pair was destroyed in a collision pre-delivery to Amtrak), were sold to Naporano Iron & Metal in New Jersey for scrap in early 1981; the VIA units were sold for scrap in early 1984 (See May 1984 Trains, p. 13). It appears Amtrak hastened the retirement of their TurboTrains after the spectacular ignition of one in service on June 10, 1976 at Waterford, Connecticut (page 19, Nov. 1976 Trains, opposite a photo on page 18 of the Swedish demonstrator Rc-4 electric being wheeled off a ship for delivery for tests on the Corridor).

"WIKIPEDIA IS ACCURATE!!" (citation needed)