What's in your work train consist?

Hey Mark,

Here is my work train (C&NW ish).

Wow, you have the stuff to repair the tracks as well.  Never thought about that.  Thanks!

Here are some of my Wreck Crane cars. I also did another set of work train cars in UP MOW green.

Work trains could be almost anything you want. Depends on the job to be done. If you are cleaning track then I got  you covered.

Here is my work train.

Usually a Lionel work caboose, either 6419, or 6119, a crane car, postwar remake of the  2460, a gondola, a flat car, and an extension searchlight car, and either steam or diesel motor power. Sometimes I throw in a DL&W boxcar.

A postwar Lionel searchlight car would be a nice addition. And maybe a depressed center cable car?

Lots of work going on in my layout. We have cranes, lights, subway cars to transport workers, ballast, chemicals, etc. running on multiple work trains -

Several years ago I worked up a weed spraying consist.

COOL consist! :-)

Great topic,

Straphanger - love those K-Line Plymouths. But you may not want it pulling your track cleaning car. Those little engines are not the best to stress test. Ask me how I know.

Paul

I have a small "work train" that consists of a Burro crane, a couple of flat trailers and a ballast trailer:

I also have a "wreck train" with a gondola, crane, boom tender, track panel car, kitchen car and a bunk car:

Tom

K-Line Foreman Car

K-Line Santa Fe flat car with scale wheel sets.

Pecos River factory MOW silver over revenue car.

Modified Williams heavyweight observation car.

John

I have a few work trains. First I have a Lionel Lines work train that serves most of the lines running on my rails. It is a six unit train headed up by a 243 2-4-2 steam engine with whistling tender, ATSF flat with rails, a 6812 track maintenance car, a 6827 flat with a bulldozer, and a crane car.  I also have the Lionel Lines Wreck Recovery set.  It's got a combo, crane. flat with rails and a flat with generator and wheels. Then I have an Alaska work train set from K-line.  An 8 unit set headed up by K-line's S2, a boxcar, a gondola with LCL containers, a searchlight car, a flat with rails, a flat with wheels, a crane and a crane tender.  I've added two Lionel bunk cars and a MTH rounded roof boxcar with a generator to power the searchlight.

@Railrunnin posted:

Great topic,

Straphanger - love those K-Line Plymouths. But you may not want it pulling your track cleaning car. Those little engines are not the best to stress test. Ask me how I know.

Paul

Thanks for letting me know, Paul. I’ve been playing with fire and letting that little switcher also pull some of my heavy subway cars.  In light of your experience, i’m going to ease up a bit going forward. It’s one of my favorite little trains and I’d hate to lose it.

My work train cars are currently in storage because they are the wrong color  Most models of PRR work train cars available are painted yellow.  This is okay if you model the PRR after 1954 or so.  My layout time frame is 1949, when all PRR work train cars were gray.  I plan to repaint all the yellow cars to gray someday, but that is a low priority right now.

What I have so far are:  Crane, crane tender, gondola, kitchen car, tool car, bunk car, hopper (2), snow plows (2).  Need more bunk cars, tank car, and some flat cars with different types of loads.

The consists vary but they always have a crane and a work caboose

ca 1954

ca 1956

@Mark Holmgren 110217 posted:

I don't know anything about real trains, so I'm curious to hear what everyone here runs in their work train consists.  I run a crane and crane tender, bunk car, gondola with junk load, and a caboose.  I want to add a kitchen car to this at some point.  I usually use a road switcher to pull it.  Is this a reasonable facsimile of a real-life consist?  Should everything be railroad-branded to the railroad you are modeling?

What do you run?

Reasonable back in mid last century. Now work/wreck trains are far and few between.

Mark if you are interested in knowing what it was like to be a crew member on a work train you might want to consider the following:

Call the Big Hook

In the book Dougherty describes his promotions to fireman, engineer, and road foreman and uses the narrative to gradually introduce the reader to the issues of train wrecks, the many ways they can occur and the ways and means the mechanical department deals with them. The train wrecks, their aftermath and the clean-up efforts include descriptions of historical Rio Grande wrecks and wrecks the author personally worked on during his tenure as head of the repair crews.

In the Ditch

The book is a description of railroading from the perspective of the Pacific Great Eastern’s Wrecking Foreman (Mr. Stathers) and his crew.
For each wreck Mr. Stathers first paints a vivid word picture for the reader which gives a background description of the area where the wreck occurred, the circumstances leading up to the wreck, a description of how he and his crew got to the wreck site, and what they found when they got there.

He follows this narrative with interesting descriptions of how the wrecking crew went about their on-site work. His descriptions of the cleanup are very detailed and are often accompanied by drawings and pictures.

Hey that’s a great idea, thanks for the book suggestions.

And thank you to all for posting so many great consists and ideas.  I appreciate it and learned a lot from this thread!

StrapHanger,

What engine is that #821 NCTA?