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Hi all, One of my other pass times besides my JP trains is volunteering at my local tramway preservation group. We are based in Whiteman Park in Perth, Western Australia. Over the last 12 months, myself and a small group of volunteers have been working on restoring a 1929 Adelaide H-Type Tram - number 372. It was gifted to us nearly 18 years ago and, for the most part, has been sitting in storage. Unfortunately not many of the volunteers were too interested in doing anything with her, or her sister tram - 371. As I grew up in Adelaide, I took the task on with one other member to get 372 back to operating condition. As we made progress, some more of the younger volunteers began to take an interest and have been helping. Our biggest issue was that during refurbishment by their operator at the time, many of the systems were upgraded. As a part of that, a (Very poorly designed) inverter was installed. This was our biggest hurdle as we could not work out why we could get it to work. Without it, none of the control systems would operate and hence, no traction power. Thankfully we were able to reach out to other preservation groups in Australia for assistance, which was invaluable. Happily for myself and the others, after I rebuilt the inverter and replaced some components (with no real previous electrical experience mind you), we got it working. And on September 25th, 372 moved under her own power for the first time in 18 years! This has been a great milestone for us, as coming up on December 8th, the new Transperth railway line which will serve the park where we are based will be officially opened. The government has, as part of the project, partially rebuilt and extended our tram line to connect with public transport at the new station. This will let people transfer onto our historic trams to travel into the park. Currently there is no transport from outside the park to the attractions within without a car. 372 will hopefully join our operative fleet soon and be able to be a part of the celebrations. This tram also has some significance, as it carried the Olympic Torch on its run through South Australia for the Sydney 2000 Games Here is a link to our website with some more images: https://www.petswa.org.au/news/adelaide-tram-372-moves-under-its-own-power-for-the-first-time-in-18-years (I am the dorky looking fat bloke in the Motorman's Cap!)

Here's an interesting scene uploaded by Schony747. A grain train stalls on a 1.9% grade and a pair of mid '60s engines, 1810hp X31 and maybe 950hp T376 come to the rescue. They fight the good fight and get the formation moving. Sanders are mentioned in the description; I don't understand if this was a power or adhesion problem. The two G class engines produce 3800hp each in their rebuilt form, resulting in 76,000 pounds of starting effort. The force on some of the couplers must be tremendous, what does it take to break a knuckle? The grade is the Warrenheip Bank. Warrenheip is immediately east of Ballarat, the setting of Dr. Blake Mysteries :). https://www.google.com/maps/@-37.5761474,143.9158802,15z https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geelong–Ballarat_railway_line https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victorian_Railways_X_class_(diesel) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victorian_Railways_T_class https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V/Line_G_class Mark please feel free to correct any errors here 🙂

Original 1980s promotional film by Commonwealth Engineering about the Australian XPT. Still one of the best-looking med/hi-speed DMU on the planet.

For anyone interested in engineering failures, the linked article may entertain. I don't think I would like to stand under any of these spans. http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/email-trail-reveals-highlevel-warnings-about-skytrain-safety-threat-20170111-gtpc6u.html In a nutshell, there are concerns over the construction methods of the elevated part of the line. The government authority in charge of roads is not allowing the builders to build over the roads until they prove it will be done safely. The builders are under pressure to avoid this delay because they will be penalised for not meeting deadlines. Competing demands?

I've always been interested in these trucks, they look cool. I infer from the text with this picture that non-steerable trucks provide less tractive effort than steerable types; I also guess that the steerables require maintenance. Are the more simple looking trucks on EMD SD locomotives, for example, also steerable using a different method? If not, does anyone know how much this reduces total tractive effort? Does this only make a difference when starting load on a curve? http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=126306 Example of SD trucks (note that maintenance crew is on a different track :)) http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=555890 Also, the class(?) lights are cool, kinda like Conrail marker lights.

http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/hurstbridge-derailing-keys-used-to-steal-train-could-have-come-from-ebay-20151110-gkvut8.html

http://www.railwaygazette.com/news/traction-rolling-stock/single-view/view/four-shortlisted-for-new-south-wales-train-contract.html

Filed in FWIW category, but somewhat interesting... http://www.businessspectator.com.au/news/2014/8/19/debt-capital-markets/high-speed-rail-may-receive-japanese-backing

http://www.bordermail.com.au/story/1415277/bite-the-bullet-japan-keen-to-introduce-its-train/?cs=7