It comes as no surprise to me that UP 844 is back together and back in service now, and successfully completed her shakedown trip to Greely last week. Us locals are being treated to three days of pure bliss once again later this month when she does her traditional thing with the Cheyenne Frontier Days Special. MUCHO BUENO SABOR.

THANK YOU UNCLE PETE

You might want to look a little deeper into that before crowing, Sammy.

It did not even leave the confines of the shop area last week, much less go anywhere near Greeley. It WAS planned to make the run, but they could not get the air system and cab signal systems to work correctly, so about 1:30 PM they cancelled the trip.

Unless, of course, you have some photos.

Maybe it's serious, but it doesn't sound like it. Air systems have been around for over a century, that's likely an easy fix. My guess is the cab signal system will be worked out, too.

Remember the big expensive stuff is the same big expensive stuff as before, and that seems to have come together.

Make like Sgt. Oddball, and channel some positive waves, man!

Are you still sitting at Greeley waiting for her? Hope you brought provisions.
844 with its streaming Trains Magazine videographer and UP brass from Omaha sat on the lead most of the day and then scrubbed the trip.
Keep a stiff upper lip.

Its pretty obvious that someone has never actually worked on a 1472 day inspection. These machines, especially the modern ones, need a lot of TLC to work right. They seldom work as expected when assembled and adjusted to "spec". I have been involved in one rebuild and all I can say is be prepared for something to go wrong, break, be out of adjustment, or not work at all. It is called testing for a reason.

Hi,



Anyone have a Sherman? Drive it out of a tunnel (i.e. C&TS has two).

Doug vV

Agreed, at least in principle. What compounds this one is the fact the locomotive was
only 9 years out of it's previous 1,472. This one was done as a matter of convenience, rather than necessity, with the goal of re-starting the clock so the nest 1,472 would not fall in 2019, which is the 150th of the Golden Spike.

Further, a great deal of, well, odd work was done, especially odd for a locomotive not even 2/3 of the way through it's 15-year cycle, and with a firebox and staybolts and braces also only 9 years old.

I'm glad they clogged past all them issues and just grinded on to bring the gal back. IRM 1630 coming back to steam hasnt been without little wobbly things going on but she's goin..

I think we all know it ain't going to be much longer. Us locals are delighted, and we're rooting for Ed and the team. We're still grateful to Uncle Pete, too.

VIVA UP 844 !!!!

According to today's TRAINS newswire (7/12/16), 844 made a test run from Cheyenne to the Greely subdivision as a shakedown run before the Cheyenne Frontier Days excursion on July 23.

Don't know if this will be visible or not--it's from Facebook, and sometimes the settings may not be as public as they should be--but here's the big girl at speed:

https://www.facebook.com/ben.norman.169 ... 593891327/

.... and ran it to Greeley and back to Cheyenne yesterday...

Official statement from the UP:

http://www.up.com/aboutup/community/ins ... 3-2016.htm

Cock-a Doodle-DOOOoooooooooo..............

The first US steam locomotive to be re-qualified to a contemporary quality management system