Cass Scenic Railroad

mSummers

mSummers

Member
Today I attended a photo charter at the Cass Scenic Railroad. ; Cass has the largest collection of geared logging locomotives in the world and currently has 6 that are operational. ; Along with the help of the dedicated volunteers of the Mountain State Railroad & Logging Historical Association, they are currently working on rebuilding a 7th steam engine. ;

Here's the first runby of the morning:

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... more to come
 
Thanks Poly.

The second runby of the day was the 3 train race. ; Think drag racing only with geared steam locomotives. ; Although a drag racing shay is sort of an oxymoron[nb]The top speed for a Shay locomotive is a whopping 12mph. ; [/nb]

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"mSummers" said:
The top speed for a Shay locomotive is a whopping 12mph.
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Yeah, but I bet it sounded like 100 mph! ; :)

Beautiful shots, Michael.
 
Continuing up the line, former Western Maryland Shay #6, aka "Big Six"[nb]Big Six was built in 1945 for the Western Maryland railroad. ; After being used for only 4 years, #6 was then stored and eventually donated to the Baltimore & Ohio Museum in Baltimore, MD, where it remained until 1981 when it was acquired by Cass in a trade for Cass Shay #1 and an 0-4-0 porter. ; Big six was the last Shay ever built and the largest still in operation, weighing in at 162 tons.[/nb] approaches the Back Mountain Road grade crossing:

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Further up the line, #6 pushes a flatcar into the first switchback:

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Great shots!! ; Have thought about going to Cass in the past, just never made it up there. ; Maybe I need to keep that one on the list of places to visit.
 
thanks guys! ;

Here's a couple more. ;

Before the first runbys of the morning, we were allowed to walk around the yard and watch them get the shay's ready. ; Here's fireman Amy shining the number plate on #11:

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To save time, they coupled the two trains together on one of the long runs between photo locations. ; This one was taken from the end of an open "cinder" car while we were backing down the hill:

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More great shots, Michael. ; I especially like the one of Amy. ; Too often we focus on the hardware and forget all of the dedicated volunteers who make it all possible.
 
Thanks guys! ; I'll try to post a couple more this week.

"PolynesianMedic" said:
I like that last shot a lot, probably aren't too many of those floating around.
Click to expand...
Actually I can't take credit for the idea. ; I saw a similar shot that someone else took on another photo charter and tried it myself, so there's at least one other one out there. ; Anyway, its not that hard to do... you just have to hold real still for 1/10s ; ;)
 
Here's a couple more...

Big Six running in reverse shoving the log train uphill past Gum Field toward the second switchback:

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Big Six somewhere farther up the line (note to self... take better notes next time...):

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