I recently stopped by New Hope caught #40 in action. She looks great. They are running steam weekends. The run 6 or 7 trips so #40 is trying to earn her keep.

Does anyone know if at one point #40 had blind drivers on one or two axles? I seem to remember that she did. If so why did they make the switch?

By the way. Also at New Hope: 1533 is still behind the enginehouse on a piece of panel track. The 4-8-4 and the 9 are down at the end of the line.

Wasn't the NdeM 4-8-4 in the enginehouse, being worked on? Now it's outside with poor old #9? Has work been suspended on #3028?

Disclaimer: I fired #9 many times (and ran her a few times) back in the late 70s-- she was a good and strong little engine, and it's sad to see her on the Internet, in pieces and for sale.

Howard,

I very well may have been on a train you fired. My dad and I rode the N H & I many times. We would take the ride down to the run around, ride the trolleys and then come back.

I remember riding on the platform of the last car with #9 pulling us back to New Hope. It was fun to watch her waddle and see the air pumps on the pilot deck work etc.... I guess a was 14-16 yo at the time.

Yes, 4-8-4 seems to be stored at present. I don't recall if the stack was capped, but it probably was.

Howard,

The 4-8-4 #3028 was moved out of the shop in order to make room for the #1430 parlor car which is currently being restored and should be operating on the rails this summer. The amount of metal work done to the #1430 is considerable and the car is currently in a gray primer coat.

Mike
(Ron's son)

If N.H.&I. is no longer interested in #3028 would someone else like to have it?I would like to see it in Chattanooga,Nashville,or perhaps even Oak Ridge,Tenn transformed in to a similar class of 4-8-4 owned by the N.C.&St.L. Railway.I think there is still an NC&STL Vanderbilt tender in existance to mate with the 4-8-4.

The engine is not owned by the Railroad that I am aware of. If I recall correctly, the stipulation of the original lease was that the engine was to be restored to operation within 10 years of its 1994 arrival on the property.

Seeing as how the owners no longer have the engine house (Colonie Shops) they stored it in, I believe there is some leeway on the lease agreement.

I don't think 40 was built with a blind set. It's a very small framed loco.

I'd rather see the locomotive restored as an NdeM locomotive, not used to "recreate" something that it never was. I was lucky enough to have seen the NdeM 4-8-4s in regular service so I have a soft spot for them.

The only disguised locomotive that looked decent, IMHO, was NKP 765 when it was transformed into C&O 2765. RDG 2102's make-over in D&H 302 was a mess as was CPR 1278 as D&H 653. The poor old T-hogs have suffered more than any other class of locomotives at the hands of those who were not happy with them being themselves. If you want to make a locomotive into a new image, as the Grand Canyon did with their engines, well, okay, but don't try to modify it to represent something that it wasn't/isn't. It is like making a '69 Plymouth Roadrunner into a '57 Chevy. It just ain't right!

Don C.

Thank you for suggesting that this gorgeous machine should be respected and restored for what she really is. I doubt there would be too many happy faces if somebody were to take one of those N,C,& StL engines and turn her into a fake Mexican engine, for instance.

While I'm on my soapbox, it rubs me decidedly the wrong way to see IRCA or Mexican narrow gauge engines fixed up to be fake Colorado engines. Of course, there's nothing I can do about it, because I'm outnumbered and outspent.

And you can be sure that many former Q employees, and Burlington enthusiasts are sickened by the spectacle of our 4960 being turned into a monument to the modern day mechanical geniuses of the Grand Canyon Railroad. She may run very well for their purposes, but her heritage and history has been forever obliterated.

Well Don, the problem with the makeover of NKP 765 into C&O 2765 was that the sand box and steam dome were in the wrong places! Better that they had labelled the Nickel Plate Berk as C&O 2790 (the next number beyond the 2789, which was the last C&O Kanawha built).

I think that the best "makeover" might have been the UP Challenger labelled as a Clinchfield 4-6-6-4.

Les Beckman (Hoosier Valley Railroad Museum/North Judson, lndiana/home of C&O 2-8-4 #2789)

WELL SAID BROTHER!

Les

As we all know beauty is truly in the eye of the beholder. IMHO any of the aformentioned engines are far more attractive under steam vs. inactive almost no matter how extensively they're cosmetically altered (even the hugely unpopular 2100) to please thier cuirrent master(s).
Just my own feelings.
Ross Rowland

I would have to agree that I'd rather see an engine modified and in service than see one unmodified but dead. There should be exceptions - such as extraordinarily rare or historical pieces. In the case of the Grand Canyon and the #4960, it was a (dismantled) piece of equipment that they acquired and made into something useful for their operation. Especially in their case it's less of a matter of restoration to some past appearance as much as making it do what they wanted it to do and look like they want it to look today. They'll probably do the same with the #539. It's their engine now - why shouldn't they make it look the way they want it to look? If the owner of the RR was a Burlington fan the #4960 may not have been modified so much. Or, if a museum or historical society had acquired the engine they could have restored it just like it was. I, for one, think in a general sense it looks much better now than it did as the Burlington had it configured.
Same thing with the narrow gauge engines from Central America that came to Colorado. They weren't purchased to recreate a Central American RR in Colorado - they were acquired to try and recreate the look and feel of a Colorado narrow gauge railroad! They just happened to be what was available and the owners modified them to fit their preferences. Even the ex-Westside Shays that wound up in Colorado were modified over the years but at the owners request they kept their overall Westside "look". This was because this was what the owner wanted. It all comes down to: if you have the wherewithal to acquire a locomotive or any piece of equipment, you are entitled to do whatever you want with it. Museums or other historical entities have different goals and will restore equipment with different priorities. A private owner will do what he wants according to his vision and the depth of his pockets.

Phil Johnson

There is for sure nothing wrong with cosmetic alterations, makeovers, Thomas Tank engine, Robbie Knievel jumping over the Texas State RR, fun festiviries, etc, so long as nobody gets hurt. It attracts new interest. money, participation, and it certainly is best for the movement as a whole to accomadate as many divergernt tastes and interests as possible.

Just to be clear on this, the NdeM 4-8-4 and train of heavyweights on display in Mexico City was recently cleaned up and repainted in a very attractive historicly incorrect color scheme featuring logos for TFM. There were any number of complaints about this, even though nobody had been trying to fix this equipment up and repaint it in the original colors. When I pointed this out online, and further suggested that we should be thanking the TFM for doing this, I was deluged with nasty emails, and I also recieved a little support. My reasoning was that paint is temporary, but decay is permanant, and that if we tried being nice to the railroad, maybe they could be persuaded to let us operate that train someday.

However, my own feelings are that I'd much rather see a cold Burlington O1a in recognizable form, rather than making money steaming for a tourist hauler. You see, I think the guys in West B that designed those engines in the first place knew a thing or two about what they were doing. Why else would she be able to work longer and harder in rougher conditions when the Q had her than she does now, even with those simple appliances and little stubby tender??? She should be forever preserved as a monument to the men who made her and ran her all those years, and who got great results with simple technology.

There's plenty of engines going to scrap in China right now, which would make great starting points for such a tourist line modification project. Dozens and dozens are still in daily use, or preserved as what they really are, so there would be no reason not to alter one of the many more that aren't. Or, why not just design and build a brand new engine, instead of having to go back and correct all the mistakes made by ignorant railroaders back in the steam age??

Rhil, of course I didn't mean you and Lindsey, or the Birminghams in Cripple Creek. Both operations always respected the heritage of their equipment. Painting your name on the tender and putting an engine to good use isn't the same thing as trying to turn it into something it ain't.

But getting back to 3028, it's been in New Hope for 13 years now. What are the prospects of it ever actually running?