Re: C&TS - October, 1982

When we got to Antonito Gary met us to supervise dragging 495 out of her berth of many years. There is an insanely sharp curve coming off the loop switch into the display track. “Sharp” as in “you do not want to put the engine through that curve”. How 495 was going to get through that when pulled her back was going to be interesting. She got in there, we assumed she will come out. To keep the 488 out of that curve, we used the passenger train as idlers to reach into the spur. We ran 488 around the loop, tied back into the train and shoved it back around the loop and into the display track. As 463’s tender had no front coupler, we set it out on the loop and then went back in and tied on to the whole thing to pull 495 out. The shop gang came over a few days ago and poured oil into everything possible to assist in moving her, but 495 was parked in a position that would not allow the main rods to be dropped, so except for the valve gear, 495 was all still together.

We had the air hooked up to the passenger train, but not the freight cars. Russ eased the slack back and stretched the train. He had laid sand down as we came in, so we had plenty of traction. Two of the new passenger cars were wrapped through the bad curve. As he eased back , draft gear groaned, stretched and ………BANG. The train went into emergency…

Remember the brake pipe problem in the new cars? Putting them through that curve and pulling hard on them was something they could not handle. The brake pipe was hard against the back of a wheel set, A hard pull simply snapped the brake pipe clean in two…… We thought we had yanked the drawbar out of something. We collected our wits, cut out the air to the car, and tried again. 488 eased back, Russ gave her more throttle, 488 made a couple of quarter slips and slowing started back…..with 495 sliding.

Then there was a loud “POP” and 495 began to roll. She amazingly walked through that nasty curve and out into the loop. The sun was just about to set in the west as we see 495 about to clear the switch on the loop. You can see 463’s tender already pulled out as well and the 6500 class flat with the SG idler car loaded on the deck.



We set her out on the loop, put the freight cars and idler car back, stuffed 463’s tank back on top, pulled the train back around the loop, set it out, put 495 over to a side track, spotted so the main rods could come off, tied 488, and went home. Tied up at 900pm 11 ½ hrs on duty.
The next day the shop guys came over to fix the broken brake pipe and begin to rig 495 to be hauled dead in tow to Chama. They checked all the grease cellars, pulled all the rods off and attempted to make the air brakes functional. Unfortunately, there were too many rusted through air pipes to make the air brakes work. So, a long air hose was brought over to run around 495 on her trip to Chama.

The final weekend of the 1982 season was a big one. I drove to Antonito and fired 488 for Dale Martinez for the first time. At Osier, George and I took 488 and 21 cars on to Chama. The next day, George and I ran 489 as the helper, assisting 488 with 21 cars up the hill. Here we see the last train of the season up at Cumbres.



After cutting 489 off and stopping in the siding, 488 gets a roll on the train and heads for Osier.





After taking 489 home and tying up at 230pm, I drove back to Cumbres to catch 487 working the 21 car train home. Here she is coming into the yard at Cumbres.