Viewliner II Part 2: Dining Car Production, Delivery, Speculation

[cpotisch]

Do you think If I ride the LSL in June that there will be a Dining Car on it?

No. LSL isn't going to NYC this summer, so there really isn't anywhere easy to service a diner. With all due respect, this has been covered like 100 times.

With all due respect I think the person you’re responding to is new and probably has not read through the hundreds of posts you’re referring to.Feel free to “delete” your post

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Member since 2015. And there’s nothing wrong with not noticing that the question has been answered. I was just letting him know that this was covered.

 

[CraigDK]

TR, can you give us a hint as to when 680[20-22] are coming?

If my memory is decent, TR seems to post hints about 2 weeks out... But I suppose that could change...

 

[kdeschner]

Sorry, I´m still trying to figure my way around this site. Sorry!

 

[jis]

Do you think If I ride the LSL in June that there will be a Dining Car on it?

No. LSL isn't going to NYC this summer, so there really isn't anywhere easy to service a diner. With all due respect, this has been covered like 100 times.

However, it is worth pointing out that this is the collective speculation here at AU. There is no official word this way or that from Amtrak on this matter.

 

[Ziv]

I think we are looking at 6 additional diners, then 10 bag-dorms (?) and then 25 sleepers, generally arriving about 2 per month. It will be interesting to see the impact of the bag-dorms but I really am looking forward to seeing new sleeper cars delivered. CAF has been ridiculously slow but they are delivering cars. I wish that Amtrak could re-negotiate the existing deal, perhaps giving CAF a better price to compensate for the lost sub-contractors that were supposed to allow CAF to deliver the cars at the lower, original, prices. CAF claims that given their present sub-contractors, CAF will lose $40Mn on this deal. It is probably too late to do so, but if Amtrak offered them more for an additional 20 sleepers, I wonder if there is a way to profitably use them on the Easter LD trains. From what I have read here though, it sounds like they have already laid off the people that built the VLII shells and would need to re-hire the welders and techs to build more, which won't happen. Or so my memory leads me to believe.

"CAF and Amtrak agreed in June 2014 to change the order to include 70 baggage cars, 25 diners, 10 baggage-dormitory cars and 25 sleepers. The last cars in the order were given a new delivery due date of no later than April 2016."

Amtrak 2/1/2016

 

[cpotisch]

Sorry, I´m still trying to figure my way around this site. Sorry!

Don't apologize. I shouldn't have been so snide. Especially since I’ve made that kind of mistake multiple times.

 

[jis]

CAF has been continuously manufacturing other cars for transit etc. I would be surprised if they simply laid off everyone that was working on VLIIs and then went and hired a different set for their other car orders.

 

[Dutchrailnut]

there is still 10 more dinners to be delivered.

 

[cpotisch]

there is still 10 more dinners to be delivered.

Including the ones Thirdrail indicated are coming up soon, there are nine left.

 

[AmtrakBlue]

68000 Albany

68001 Annapolis

68002 Atlanta

68003 Augusta

68004 Baton Rouge

68005 Boston

68006 Charleston

68007 Columbia

68008 Columbus

68009 Concord

68010 Dover

68011 Frankfort

68012 Harrisburg

68013 Hartford

8400 Indianapolis

68014 Jackson

68015 Lansing

68016 Madison

68017 Montgomery

68018 Montpelier

68019 Nashville

68020 Providence

68021 Raleigh

68022 Richmond

68023 Springfield

68024 Tallahassee

 

[cpotisch]

So I guess diners will probably be finished by September.

We sure won’t be seeing those sleepers until well into 2019.

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[west point]

Wonder how Amtrak will route new V-2s during the Empire connection shutdown ?,

 

[Thirdrail7]

TR, can you give us a hint as to when 680[20-22] are coming?

Next week. Same bat time, same bat channel, same bat formation.

Wonder how Amtrak will route new V-2s during the Empire connection shutdown ?,

Via the B&A.

 

[neroden]

Seriously, if they can service an Amfleet II cafe in Boston, they can service a Viewliner Diner in Boston. They're both train cars, for god's sake, it's not like one of them is a horse and the other is an emu. :sigh:

 

[cpotisch]

Seriously, if they can service an Amfleet II cafe in Boston, they can service a Viewliner Diner in Boston. They're both train cars, for god's sake, it's not like one of them is a horse and the other is an emu. :sigh:

Not necessarily. Even assuming they use it as a diner-lite, Boston might not have the staff and commissary in place to stock the car.

 

[Just-Thinking-51]

Stuff the crew and supplies in the back of a truck and drive it up to Boston....

Ok lack of leadership, need to pick where the train is going, and then adjust the rest of the support systems. Sure the cost of each option is needed, and I am sure that the sticking point, but the time to make the call is fast approaching.

 

[Thirdrail7]

There's a difference between servicing and maintaining. If one of the views came in with flat spots or shells that wouldn't turn, now you have to change the wheels. Not ever car is built the same so they don't lift the same. They also may not have the actual wheels and associated rigging in place for a "one off" car and that's not something that you're "stuffing in the back of a truck."

That's why railroads have "designated repair facilities."

 

[Just-Thinking-51]

Mobile repair truck. Replace a wheel or a complete RR truck with traction motors. Use by Amtrak and Freight railroads across the country. In-House or Contractors.

Last check Boston did not have a drop table, any wheel type replacements need a outside crane.

Ever solution has issues that need to be addressed, you start by picking the end points and go from there.

 

[Thirdrail7]

Mobile repair truck. Replace a wheel or a complete RR truck with traction motors. Use by Amtrak and Freight railroads across the country. In-House or Contractors.

Last check Boston did not have a drop table, any wheel type replacements need a outside crane.

Ever solution has issues that need to be addressed, you start by picking the end points and go from there.

Indeed...every issue probably has a solution that can be overcome if you have enough money and resources to commit to it. You're now talking about bringing in a crane (which if its mobile and does not meet in house specifications, you now need to remove portions of the catenary) trucking people (because if you've never used the car and aren't qualified,,,,remember, it is a federal rule that personnel must be qualified on the equipment to execute inspections and repairs) and equipment from 100's of miles away, putting them in hotels, paying them to repair a one off move.

Again, this is why there are 'designated repair" facilities. They have the tools, parts and qualified personnel to make necessary repairs. While the procedures used above HAVE been done (I'm thinking of an electric that was trapped in CHI), a more common practice is to obtain a waiver from the FRA to move the car with defect to a designated repair facility.

This is what they did with the equipment from CAYCE.

 

[GBNorman]

OK; it certainly appears some loose ends are being tied up with the obviously first hand knowledge Mr. Third Rail is willing to share at this topic.

It further appears that Mr. Nerode's want of his bacon and eggs aboard the Lake Shore should override any benefit from operational efficiency during the "Son of Summer From Hell".

On the "flip", Amtrak could find themselves on the wrong end of a "why do you have eighteen (or more) cars sitting around when you only need eight to cover the trains you use them on?" from some Critter responding to a constituent who remembers "the good old days" and that Amtrak should continue to offer same.

All told, the "Gunnmen" discontinued through BOS-CHI service in the name of operational efficiency. It was restored under Boardman. I highly doubt if that restoration was initiated by Amtrak in the name of a service attraction. There certainly appear to be "political heavies" from up that way prepared to lean where need be. Towards that same end, had those "heavies" not been there, the electrification might never been done and NHV-BOS could have been relegated to "important connection to the NHV-WAS Corridor" standing.

 

[jis]

At the end of the day the equation is pretty simple. The heavies provide money and things happen. They don't provide money and try to substitute with hot air, then either things don;t happen or some Peter is robbed to pay Paul.

If someone actually tries to put the financial house in order they are almost universally hated, since inevitably much pain has to be inflicted in a situation where at best one can barely rbeak even overall.

 

[Lonestar648]

We are now mid-April should we be expecting two VII released from CAF, it has been about 6 weeks and if I remember correctly the last ones were late February.

 

[cpotisch]

We are now mid-April should we be expecting two VII released from CAF, it has been about 6 weeks and if I remember correctly the last ones were late February.

As Thirdrail said, we are expecting three more V-IIs, cars 68020-22, next week. The last two were delivered Feb. 27, so they're well overdue.

 

[Lonestar648]

I do apologize, I don't know how, but I missed reading Thirdrail's important update.

 

[Walt]

On the "flip", Amtrak could find themselves on the wrong end of a "why do you have eighteen (or more) cars sitting around when you only need eight to cover the trains you use them on?" from some Critter responding to a constituent who remembers "the good old days" and that Amtrak should continue to offer same.

I would find it easy to defend this, by simply pointing out that these unused dinning cars were ordered, what, 10 years ago and based on the needs back then. A need that included supporting the Silver Star.

Though, I personally look at the VL II diner order as being basically a lifetime buy. These are probably the very last diners that Amtrak will ever buy, and any of them that go into unused storage are simply waiting for their turn to serve sometime in the future.