Very nice pics! However, what is a Remote Control Caboose? Is it due to stand somewhere in a yard, with an engineer holding a remote control? In that case why in a caboose? Any input welcome! Dom
Ken, thanks for causing me to go looking for the business car and dome ..... someday after I retire... They would be great to model and wow, what a ride they would be eh? No , don't tell me you already rode on them ..... I do not want to know .... Paul
There are a lot of railroads that have remote control locos.........the advantage of the caboose, is it allows ANY locomotive in the fleet to be used remotely, not just the few engines equipped with remote. Just like when you couple multiple locos together, they are all controlled by the lead loco.....but in this case the "lead loco" is the caboose, so the operator is controlling the caboose, and the caboose is MUed to the loco. All the electronics for the remote are housed in the caboose......the air conditioners on the caboose are for the electronics, not the crew. The operator can be on the loco steps, the caboose platforn, or walking along on the ground . He carries a kingsized RC controller and can be anywhere within the range of the unit, so the loco could also be run from a yard tower, but that negates the advantage of fewer personel, since you need an operator, plus someone throwing switches, uncoupling, ect. If the loco gets out of range, the remote shuts it down.
Although not MRL, take a look at this picture. On the far right side you can see the one man crew, operating his train from on the ground. A control box on a sling around his neck:
Dom- We chased that train. And what is different, one time when he passed, he was at the normal engineer controls. Then a few miles later, he was sitting on the fireman's side using the remote box.
That really thrills me! BTW I was aware of remote controlled units: 2 years ago I shot a remote controlled FEC GP40-2 doing some switching at the border of Miami's FEC yard. (Which was very interresting for me, as nobody gave a phone call to security guards, uh, uh!) Dom
