[PRCo] Re: Pittsburgh MU Car Operation

[Schneider Fred]

Without plugging this monitor into the other computer and pulling up  
the route cards, I'm not sure what route 44 took to get dawntahn in  
that period either.   Some of those hilltop routes alternated between  
tunnel, Arlington, and South 18th.    Remember too that a 5000 and a  
5100 was a 25 mph car in those days ... probably 10 mph climbing up  
the mountain.  Of course we know that most of the low-floors were  
remotored in the early 1930s to get more spunk out of them.

They may not have been the only cars remotored either.   I remember  
being told by Dick Steinmetz that the ride up through South Hills  
Tunnel on M-1 in route to Arden in 1954 was the fastest ride he had  
ever had on a single truck car.   It stunned the shared the skit out  
of him.

We know that M-1 was a single truck car built out of a double truck  
car that was so primitive that its owner didn't want to keep it.   So  
some of the body and window sash are original.   Even the termites  
are new.

Well, you know, maybe Pittsburgh did the same thing to all their  
single truck and oldest double truck cars that Baltimore did to  
theirs .... rememember that around 1907 the industry advanced light  
years with interpole motors.   They had a lot less arcing and a lot  
less maintenance.   But they didn't come in 15 horsepower varieties  
like the original motors did.   In Baltimore's case, a lot of old  
wooden single-truck cars built in the 1890s had 15 hp motors which  
were replaced with 25 hp motors because that is what you could buy in  
1910 or 1915.   So when starting a single truck car built in  
1896-1898 at the Baltimore Streetcar Museum, you first wind up the  
hand brake as tight as you crank it, then you draw a point of power  
and ease off on the hand brake.   If you pull power with the brake  
off, you risk tossing your conductor off the back platform.   Now  
perhaps Pittsburgh remotored M-1 and its older cars????

And what about 3487?   That was built in 1905 and ran until 1953 out  
of Charleroi.  My note shows that it had Westinghouse 56 motors.    
Were they interpole motors?   If they were, is that what is on the  
car today?

Have I successfully open up a new can of worms?




On Sep 23, 2009, at 8:19 AM, Edward H. Lybarger wrote:

> Yes, but even with a 10% spares ratio it was a very aggressive  
> service.  I
> wish we had route rider numbers for that era.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: pittsburgh-railways-bounce at lists.dementia.org
> [mailto:pittsburgh-railways-bounce at lists.dementia.org] On Behalf Of
> Schneider Fred
> Sent: Tuesday, September 22, 2009 9:36 PM
> To: pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org
> Subject: [PRCo] Re: Pittsburgh MU Car Operation
>
> Remember that the number of cars in the service probably had to  
> include
> spares but they were not saying that.
>
>
> On Sep 22, 2009, at 5:18 PM, Edward H. Lybarger wrote:
>
>> No, nothing to do with all that.  13 trains doesn't give you a 6-
>> minute headway, it gives you a 4.5-minute headway.  And 15 trains on
>> 44 works out
>> to 4-minute headways.  Now put the distances into the equation.
>> It's a huge
>> amount of service on each route.
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: pittsburgh-railways-bounce at lists.dementia.org
>> [mailto:pittsburgh-railways-bounce at lists.dementia.org] On Behalf Of
>> Schneider Fred
>> Sent: Tuesday, September 22, 2009 5:05 PM
>> To: pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org
>> Subject: [PRCo] Re: Pittsburgh MU Car Operation
>>
>> Might have some'sing t'do with how developed Knoxville was at that
>> time and how undeveloped the outer end of Carrick was.
>>
>> Remember that the Liberty Tubes are what opened the whole South Hills
>> to development and they were not opened to traffic until 1924.
>>
>> On Sep 22, 2009, at 3:30 PM, Edward H. Lybarger wrote:
>>
>>> 30 cars on Knoxville?  It was only a 3.3 mile-long line!  And 15
>>> trains would provide 4-minute headways.
>>>
>>> Yet only 26 cars on Carrick, which was twice as long?
>>>
>>> Something does not compute.
>>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: pittsburgh-railways-bounce at lists.dementia.org
>>> [mailto:pittsburgh-railways-bounce at lists.dementia.org] On Behalf Of
>>> Schneider Fred
>>> Sent: Tuesday, September 22, 2009 2:11 PM
>>> To: pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org
>>> Cc: Siebert Chick; Bromley John; Holland B. James
>>> Subject: [PRCo] Pittsburgh MU Car Operation
>>>
>>> I have previously stated on this list that the Pittsburgh Railways
>>> route cards showed multiple unit car operation only for a few months
>>> after the 5000s were delivered and that the operation ended on route
>>> 88 FRANKSTOWN before the 5100s arrived.
>>>
>>> Chick Siebert told me that he had ridden on an MU train on route 82
>>> LINCOLN but the route cards did not show any such train operation.
>>>
>>> The only known picture of an MU train signed for route 82 was a
>>> publicity photo taken not on that route but on the route 63, 64, 66,
>>> 67 trunk at the east end of Frick Park.   That picture was published
>>> in a PRMA booklet.
>>>
>>> One of the problems with the above information is that there was  
>>> also
>>> a photograph floating around that shows a 5100 in train service on
>>> route 88 in East Liberty.   But according to the route cards, the
>>> service ended long before those cars were delivered.   And we know
>>> that the "Scribe de Jour"  (That's a fabulous Lybarger term) wasn't
>>> always perfect when recording the facts for the "Railways Company."
>>> So I didn't want to totally dismiss it.   When I typed the route
>>> cards into the computer, I typed what they said but my mind was  
>>> still
>>> saying, "Not everything here is correc-e-mundo."
>>>
>>> Well, guys, new facts.   If you have a copy of A. E. R. A. PROGRESS
>>> IN CARS, subtitled "Report on Committee on Essential Deatures on
>>> Modern Cars, 1926, published by the American Electric Railway
>>> Association,
>>> 292
>>> Madison Avenue, New York City, then turn to page
>>> 63 ....  and we have a contemporary published document that shows
>>> that PRC was running 160 multiple unit electric cars (5000-5099 and
>>> 5100-5159) and that they were running a base service of every 6
>>> minutes in trains on Frankstown using 34 cars, and a rush hour
>>> headway of 3 minutes using 64 cars.   Lincoln was using 30 cars in
>>> the AM and PM rush hours to provide a 6 1/2 minute headway with
>>> trains but single cars in the base.   And get this ... Carrick was
>>> using 26 cars to provide a 6 minute headway with trains in the rush
>>> hour and single cars in the base.   MU trains on Carrick?   First
>>> time that was ever documented.   Another first:  The remaining 30
>>> cars were assigned to KNOXVILLE for a 6 1/2 minute rush hour only
>>> headway in train operation.
>>>
>>> But that adds to 26 + 64 + 30 + 30  = 160 cars out of the 160 car
>>> fleet at that time.
>>>
>>> Now find me a pitchur of a train of 5000s or 5100s wending its  
>>> way up
>>> South 18th Street!!!!!!!!!!!!
>>>
>>> Separate copy to Bromley since he is off list for vacation ...
>>> maybe it will
>>> catch up to him in some hotel in die Schweiz.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>
>
>