--- In [email protected], "raisinone" <raisin...@...> wrote:
>
> --- In [email protected], "Bill Lane" <bill@> wrote:
> >
> > I will put a motor decoder only in the tender to
> > run the back up light if it is necessary.
> > Bill Lane
> >
>
> Bill:
> They make single function decoders for situations like this - might be
> a tick less expensive. OTOH, I really don't know what the common RR
> practice was for tender lights? My guess is it is only we "model
> railroad toads" that think a tender must have a reverse light that
> operates like an automobile!
>
> Jim K.
______________________________________________________
Jim:
A headlight on a tender would serve the same purpose as a rear
headlight on a diesel locomotive - to light the way when the
locomotive is in the lead, but running backwards. This was a lot more
prevalent than most modelers realize.
In fact, at least one derailment in Iowa occurred with a detouring
passenger train where the tender was leading and picked a switch
point. The reason the tender was leading was because the locomotive
had to run around the train to get on the host railroad where there
were no turning facilities.
Other than that, prohibitions for running tender first had more to do
with visibility (switch engines did it all the time) and the fact that
the engineer had to be twisted like a pretzel to operate the
locomotive and still watch where he was going, much like "progressive"
desktop controls on a modern wide cab diesel.
The apex of twentieth century diesel locomotive design, at least in my
opinion as having first hand experience where visibility is concerned,
would be the early switch engines and early road-switcher diesels. The
designers obviously took into account the people who would be working
on and around them.
Bob Nicholson
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