Re: Mainline steam is not dead
Author: Big Boy doing Little work
Date: 07-23-2019 - 08:52
Foamer w/glass half full (of beer) wrote: "I didn't see the Big Boy and don't know if I ever will see it. However, based on much of the Internet commentary about the Big Boy trips in Wyoming, Utah and the Midwest, many railway enthusiasts were thrilled to watch it in action."
All of the video I have seen, with the exception of her topping Archer Hill on the first day of this series of trips, shows her working a drifting throttle. There simply is not enough train to make her work much at all. She could handle 8-10 times that much tonnage on the prairie. The present consist would be child's play for 844, let alone 4014.
The excessive, nearly constant whistling has gotten tedious as well. It seems like Ed Dickens is suspended from the whistle cord to keep himself from falling out, as he leans way out the cab window like some Hollywood Casey Jones.
You can tell that the hero-worship of the guy has completely gone to his head.
Some of the worst of the gushing fanboy silliness comes from the so-called "professionals" at Trains Magazine.