Charger winter problems?

[DSS&A]

I am see posts on different websites stating that Amtrak is having winter operating problems with the Chargers. Does anyone have reliable information about this? The Annual AASHTO meeting is this month and there may be information presented at that meeting.

 

[me_little_me]

I have the same problem with my chargers. They don't charge the batteries as fast.

Oh! You mean Charger engines? Whoops!

 

[jiml]

I am see posts on different websites stating that Amtrak is having winter operating problems with the Chargers. Does anyone have reliable information about this? The Annual AASHTO meeting is this month and there may be information presented at that meeting.

While not necessarily reliable, there has been some video documentation on YouTube that may factor into the question. This recent video shows an extra Charger being ferried from Chicago to Carbondale to replace an inoperative one:



and the Galesburg railcam recently had a Charger-led Amtrak train towed by a freight locomotive. Neither would be a surprise with P-42's, but a little unusual with new engines.

 

[Cal]

Okay, let's say they are having issues. What would Amtrak do to fix this? What would this mean for future long distance chargers (which I am against -_-)?

 

[railiner]

I am not technically inclined when it comes to motive power, but I always wondered about what appears to be an open panel on each side of the engine. Would the weather not breach the key parts of the body?

I am not 'technically inclined', either, but recall years ago, many electric locomotives, and EMU cars had difficulty operating, especially in fine, powdered snow conditions...
For most of them, a 'fix' of some sort was devised, I believe relating to revising air intakes, but not sure....

 

[Steve4031]

What's strange is that versions of these engines operate in Austria, Switzerland, and Germany where there is snow and there apparently was no problem. But in the US there are problems. My uneducated guess is that the practices for maintaining the engines are different in Europe than in the US.

 

[Qapla]

Or, so-called "safety" features keep them from working properly ...

 

[neroden]

All the complaints are on trips out of Chicago.

Amtrak Chicago Maintenance has a long, documented history of failing to fix reported faults in passenger cars, and even of claiming they've fixed them without doing any work.

I can put two and two together. The problem isn't the locomotives.

 

[TheMalahat]

All the complaints are on trips out of Chicago.

Amtrak Chicago Maintenance has a long, documented history of failing to fix reported faults in passenger cars, and even of claiming they've fixed them without doing any work.

I can put two and two together. The problem isn't the locomotives.

I find myself scratching my head here too as a distant observer, and someone no where near Chicago - thus, unaware of any historical issues.

But there are Chargers running a few places that seem to not have these issues. Maybe on Brightline we would not know because the trains are so small one must be able to go offline and service not be disrupted. But there doesn't seem to be similar stories out of California, or, have I maybe missed them? The Cascade units also seemed fine? That I actually live near albeit service has been so minimal on account of Covid.

 

[Cal]

All the complaints are on trips out of Chicago.

Amtrak Chicago Maintenance has a long, documented history of failing to fix reported faults in passenger cars, and even of claiming they've fixed them without doing any work.

I can put two and two together. The problem isn't the locomotives.

And Chicago is one of their biggest facilities too- That's really not great.

 

[joelkfla]

I find myself scratching my head here too as a distant observer, and someone no where near Chicago - thus, unaware of any historical issues.

But there are Chargers running a few places that seem to not have these issues. Maybe on Brightline we would not know because the trains are so small one must be able to go offline and service not be disrupted. But there doesn't seem to be similar stories out of California, or, have I maybe missed them? The Cascade units also seemed fine? That I actually live near albeit service has been so minimal on account of Covid.

It doesn't snow in South & Central Florida.

 

[sitzplatz17]

It doesn't snow in South & Central Florida.

But it does snow in Maryland and the PNW and I haven’t heard of too many Charger failures recently on MARC or the Cascades service. But I guess we’ll see what happens with today’s Cascades run since we’re getting quite the dump of snow here today!

 

[sttom]

The average winter temperature in Chicago is generally colder than the average winter temperatures in the Pacific Northwest. It snows in Washington and Oregon, but its not polar vortex cold. Vienna is also not Chicago levels of cold either. Questionable maintenance may also be a play, but the cold will also play into the reliability of equipment. I know when I lived in Nevada, buses would have problems when it got below 25 degrees. The buses were reasonably maintained and they still wouldn't start all the time.

 

[TheMalahat]

It doesn't snow in South & Central Florida.

Fair point, but, these Chicago-base issues seem to extend back to mild weather, don't they? In about a year Via will provide us with a direct comparison !