GEC's Layout Progress

[Green_Elite_Cab]

Proto Amfleet I rolling Problems

Well I took the train to the club and tested it yesterday. The graphite powder was largely a success. The E60 was able to haul the full 7 car consist up "the hill", the club's steepest prolonged grade (4%) with no problem (initially), and it was able to maintain a high speed typical of a Northeast Corridor train through out the majority of the layout out.

The main issue was that excess graphite appears to be falling from the cars. This may have caused reduced performance on the "the Hill", but cleaning the track improved things. I ran the club's cleaning train around to make sure it was cleaned up, and I will return with more cleaning blocks to be sure. a wheel cleaning seems to be in order as well.

One thing I'll need to do is probably apply some more bullfrog snot to the wheels of the E60. An earlier application didn't hold up well, but it may also have been shredded up by the extreme resistance of the amfleet cars without the graphite. I might put it on the center wheels of both trucks, so that there is plenty of grip. This should eliminate future issues with the E60s and the somewhat uncooperative Amfleet cars.

The whole consist. It includes one "will be" Amclub car (decals for these common types were not included for some reason), 1 Amcafe and 5 coaches, spread out in typical NEC fashion with the club car up front, and the Amcafe in the middle of the coaches. Of course, not all trains had this arrangement, but many did.



There were a few opportunities for "palindrome" road numbers, so I went for it

Coach 21012



AmCafe 20002



So far, #968 has been my "experimental" unit, and when I figure out how to get every bit of performance out of this one, I'll apply those changes to 955, 960, and 972. So far, I've added a little over two ounces of weight and some traction to the wheels, and these engines were already fairly capable themselves.

As much as I love GG1s, its nice to have a "different" Amtrak electric to haul these trains. In reality, the E60 was definitely appearing more frequently than GG1s by the end of the 1970s, and were only cut back as AEM7s started bumping them only 5 or 6 years later.