NKP 765 & 757 - Wright's Little Watchman

The device does indeed exist and is present on the 765. I did not know the device had a proper name ("Wrights Little Watchman".) I guess I'll have to read the article and see how that name came to be.

Just to clarify on what George posted above, if the pony truck derails it opens a valve in the air brake system that applies the brakes on the entire train (not just the locomotive) in emergency. An "Emergency" application of the brakes occurs when the air in the brake pipe is quickly exhausted to atmosphere. When that happens, the brakes on the locomotive and every car in the train are applied at maximum braking effort to get the train stopped as quickly as possible.

George, is this an on-line publication? If so, can you provide a link?

Yes, and the 765 still had her's when she was first restored, during the mid to late 1970s time frame. I remember the first time she ever moved under her own power, at the restoration site there in Fort Wayne (not the nice building they have now). There was about a half to 3/4 of a mile of straight track, then a pretty sharp curve into the industrial park track which paralleled the N&W (former NKP) main line. Everyone got a chance at the throttle, as 765 ran forwards and backwards. Finally Dick Yager told me to run her, as he wanted to be down on the ground for my full throttle start. When everyone was ready, I let her have it, and accelerated down the straight track, knowing that if necessary, she might enter the curve a bit before stopping. Sure enough, just as I was stopping the big girl, the pony truck enter the sharp curve and the automatic air brake went into emergency. Unable to recover the automatic, I simply bailed it off and backed back up to the "shop site". Dick Yager knew exactly what had happened, and reached under the front end and reset the little device.

I'm sure that 765 still has that little "Watchman" device.

Originally Posted by OGR Webmaster:

http://www.rrmuseumpa.org/memb.../0410%20Milepost.pdf

Hope I did this right.  To my surprise, the publication is available on-line.

George

Hot Water, no demerits can be assessed for incurring a penalty brake application, due to the time limit for discipline having expired.  (I escaped a lot of demerits myself by laying low for 15 days.)  I enjoyed the story.

We tripped the Little Watchman the day we moved the "767" out of downtown in 1974.  The day after moving it across Fourth Street, it was towed by a PC diesel and as we went through a dip in the track in the middle of Clinton Street - we came to an abrupt halt.  Our veteran Nickel Plate carman took a minute or two to remember what was going on - he looked under pilot beam and then closed the shutoff valve - and off we went to West Wayne followed by a trip where it was towed backwards over the 1955 Elevated track and to her new home east of New Haven.