Phil
In memoriam
RIP 23-Oct-2018
Posts: 9,473
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Post by Phil on May 31, 2008 12:32:59 GMT
Seeing L11 at Epping last week jogged someting in my mind I've never been sure of: what's the difference between ballast locos and pilot locos? Both are ex DMs of various types and both are (usually) painted yellow.
So : does 'ballast' refer to the weight of the loco (as in the heavyweight Class 37s) or the type of train hauled? : do they have totally different couplers or do both types carry both? : can one type substitute for the other if necessary?
All my reference books refer to both, but none of them makes clear the exact differences between them and I realize I'm now curious.
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Post by stanmorek on May 31, 2008 13:10:31 GMT
So : does 'ballast' refer to the weight of the loco (as in the heavyweight Class 37s) or the type of train hauled? Not being from the train side this probably isn't the answer you're looking for but from a P-way perspective 'ballast' referred to the type of train hauled just like a 'scrap' train. It wasn't necessary to have ballast hoppers either. The smaller maintenance jobs used GP wagons carrying bagged ballast that were unloaded by hand. Then there was also the hauled cranes.
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Ben
fotopic... whats that?
Posts: 4,282
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Post by Ben on May 31, 2008 14:58:35 GMT
Could it be that pilot locos have passenger stock couplers whereas ballast locos have ward couplers for use with the rest of the engineering fleet? The old 38ts weedkilling train didnt use wedgelocks I'm sure, and that was a ballast unit.
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towerman
My status is now now widower
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Post by towerman on Jun 4, 2008 1:54:22 GMT
Basically pilot motor cars were used to ferry units/cars around,ballast motor cars were used on engineers trains.
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