Well, NO, I am a retired rail worker of 40 years service. SLSF, BN, BNSF, KCS, CSX and FEC. Most of my service in Track as a officer. Roadmaster The Gas Electrics are before my time. Started in 1970 William Jackson
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In answer to your question, I called them "Gas Electrics", but that is just me. Local people around here called Trains 11 and 12, the "dinky" (sorry, suburban folks) or the "peanut". They always were assigned gas electric cars. The only people I ever heard call motor cars, "put puts", were little kids or their ill-informed parents. Sure they had nick names (most things do) but if someone was serious i.e. a working railroader, they were motor cars.
Putt Putt is a good term along with "popper" "One Lunger" "Twin" These referred and differentiate to the one or two cylinder car's M-19 Later the term "Motor Car" was used for the "Onan" type cars "MT-19-A" The bigger "Gang Cars" were known as the "A" cars for the "A-5" These had Ford Pinto engines and could really be termed a speeder. They would really move, close to 40 MPH or better. "Trailer" "Push Cart" and "People Mover" was used for the carts used behind the main car. A "People Mover" had to have brakes to be considered to load workers on it. (Just legally Now) Their is many types of cars and all of them, had many names. Kinda like me, I've been called by many names. William Jackson
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The track maintenance foreman at York
Neb, Mr. Shifferling, always called them put-puts. He lived just
across the tracks from us. His son and I were in the same grade in
high school so I got to go along with him and his dad out on the
line when no one was looking. Great fun.
Noel Crawford
On 1/13/2014 11:09 AM, William Barber wrote:
Pete and John,
While motor car may have been the official name, these
vehicle had all sorts of nick names, some not so gracious,
used by real railroads. Among them were putt-putt,
track-maintenance car, crew car, jigger, trike, quad,
trolley or inspection car. I personally know that some Q
railroaders around Chicago called them putt putts.
Now, if
you call those machines motor cars, what do you call a
gas electric car such as no. 9844 or 9845? Those were
also called motor cars as well as doodlebugs, etc.
It's
just semantics and local vernacular. Until the
railfans coined it, I never heard of a diesel
locomotive consist referred to as a lash up and I
worked many years for a company that built some of
them.
Bill
Barber
Gravois
Mills, MO
Sun Jan 12, 2014
4:15 am (PST) . Posted by:
Oiling
track bars, etc. was a standard maintenance issue.
The Fairmont Motor
Company made/sold equipment for this task.
Basically a tank mounted on a
speeder trailer, pulled by a Fairmont speeder. Had
a pump and wands for
spraying oil. See attached photos. From the photos
Bill shared, it appears
the CB&Q just did it on a bigger scale.
Doug Harding
http://www.iowacentralrr.org/org
Sun Jan 12, 2014
7:16 am (PST) . Posted by:
Just
a couple of comments, I want to make. I realize
most on the list are not railroaders, but I never
heard a real life railroader (at least a M of W
railroader) refer to a motor car as a "speeder"
nor did I ever hear a push car called a "speeder
trailer" . Some may have but not to me. This
is not anything in the way of a correction as we
all know what you are talking about. It is just my
observation as one who was around when there were
a lot of motor cars in use. And before you say,
that I used the term in BB #35, that was added by
someone else.
On Sunday, January 12, 2014 6:16 AM, Douglas
Harding < doug.harding@iowacentralrr.org>
wrote:
Oiling track bars, etc. was a standard maintenance
issue. The Fairmont Motor Company made/sold
equipment for this task. Basically a tank mounted
on a speeder trailer, pulled by a Fairmont
speeder. Had a pump and wands for spraying oil.
See attached photos. From the photos Bill shared,
it appears the CB&Q just did it on a bigger
scale.
Doug Harding
http://www.iowacentralrr.org/org
Sun Jan 12, 2014
8:00 am (PST) . Posted by:
John—I
agree with you on the "motor car" term. Used to
work in the Chicago and North Western' s
Engineering Department and they were called motor
cars there. The things were long gone by the time
I started in 1978 but there were still motor car
houses (the official name for the buildings) along
the right-of-way. Also, a friend in the
engineering office started with the CNW in 1969
and said they did have motor cars then, and that's
what he called them, including the Soo Line
versions that they were using into the 1980s (I
saw one of the Soo units in action at Eau Claire,
Wisc. while I was restaking the CNW-SOO diamond).
When I was working on the tie gang in 1983 the
little trailer cars ("push cars") that were
formerly pulled by motor cars (and later by
hi-rail trucks or track machines) were called
"dumpies. " Our tamper pulled a dumpy loaded
with replacement tie plates, and one of my tasks
was to load plates at the beginning of the day,
and then peddle them as needed. Some of the
existing plates were cracked or bent so they
needed to be replaced. And, some plates just got
lost in the weeds when the old ties were removed!
Kurt Hayek
Kurt Hayek
Sun Jan 12, 2014
6:56 pm (PST) . Posted by:
John
Just before I read your message, below, I was
sitting here thinking about asking what you and I
could do about these continuing references to a
MOTOR CAR as a speeder...Like you I never ever
heard the term "speeder" used before I came to the
"railfan world
Guys, please for the sake of us old guys ie John
an Pete...could we please refer to any of what is
known in real railroad parlance as a Track car by
it's proper term. These things are MOTOR
CARS....The term "Speeder" marks you out as a
railfan without a knowledge of "real railroading. ...
Pete
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