Very cool. No crowds at all where we were. You could walk right up to the track. in hindsight, we could have taken better pictures if we had backed up a little to across the street.

We'd be satisfied with the lousy pictures.

It is an amazing piece of machinery! RMD

quote:

Originally posted by 229DAK:
We'd be satisfied with the lousy pictures.

Yes! C'mon Melissa.

I’m still not managing the imbed link!

Cool pictures! I hope you don't mind.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_Pacific_Big_Boy

Wheel arrangement is 4-8-8-4, i.e., 4 leading unpowered wheels, 2 sets of 8 driving wheels, 4 trailing unpowered wheels, per the Whyte Notation (has its own article).

Its total length with the "trucks" on each end is ~132 feet.

Its total weight is ~595 tons. The article is not clear whether this includes the weight of the ~25,000 gallons of water (100 tons) and the 28 tons of coal.

Twenty-five were built from 1941-44 - the height of World War II.

I've been around alot of loud stuff in my 43 years, but hearing that thing's whistle is the loudest I ever heard. I could feel the ground shaking from it.

Union Pacific really did a good job getting one back and getting it running again.

When we saw it in Utah, my niece stood too close to one of the drive wheels while I took her picture. When she stepped away toward me, her hair had a glop of grease in it. She was not pleased lol.

There’s nothing like the sound of a steam whisle as that engine pulls through the canyon.

Largest fire tube steam boiler ever built.

Majestic and powerful.

Recently saw a Jay Leno episode on Big Boy. Video may have been posted here, I can’t remember.
You can find it on YouTube; there’s lots of history and detailed info about it that’s fun.

Loudest thing I’ve ever heard was F14s on the cats. Full zone 5 afterburner with an unlimited climb. 2 westpacs on the USS Kitty Hawk. Working the flight deck was the most fascinating job I ever had.

I've seen the Yellowstone locomotives on static display, but never in motion. The Big Boy rolling down the tracks has to be an awesome sight.

It was impresssive, the drive whaeels were huge.

That is three times the weight of a modern diesel locomotive. Amazing.

Nice!

All of that engineering done without computers, too.

It was beautiful, and the earth does shake. We could hear the horn and bells a long time before it got to us. When we were little we lived a couple of blocks from where the pictures were made. Daddy used to walk us over there to put coins on the rails, so Sis put a quarter down yesterday and picked it up before we left. The best local pictures I’ve seen were made close to downtown with our historic Morrison Mills in the background. (Corn-Kits).