Saturday, September 23, 2017

the inverted locomotives of the Southern Pacific


Because of tunnels and "snow galleries" that protected the locomotives from snow. But it was quickly realized that when ordinary locomotives went through these tunnels the smoke, soot, cinders and heat flies back and enters the control area, blinding the engineer, and that's never a good thing.

The space in the tunnel is small, and as the steam engines became more powerful, the smoke became more daunting . And soon the locomotive engineers began to suffocate from this smoke it was a real threat to people's lives.

And then the South Pacific leadership had an idea to move the car forward. In 1911 the Baldwin plant in Philadelphia got the first orders for the "Inverted" locomotives.

With this arrangement of the cabin the visibility was excellent, and smoke was no longer a problem for the crew.






https://guriny.livejournal.com/426804.html
http://anyskin.tumblr.com/post/115282856552/historicaltimes-cab-forward-ac-12-steam-engine#notes

the Tractors Gone Wild calendar donated $47,000 to causes like St. Jude's and the American Family Children's Hospital.


"[The calendar is] just a bunch of girlfriends and a bunch of local tractors," says Joleen Schreiber/Westphal. She started making the calendar in 2007 when a radio station challenged listeners to create something that reminded them of Wisconsin. Since then, it's taken off. They sell nearly 2,000 editions each year. The women have even gotten requests to send calendars internationally.

Nine years ago Westphal heard a radio station campaign asking for listeners to send in photos that depict what Wisconsin is all about. She got together with some friends and posed in front of a John Deere tractor.

Westphal, an operations manager at Eagle Valley Ag Service in Prairie du Sac, took the idea and made it her own. She and her friends found it wasn’t hard to find tractors of all makes, models and ages to pose with.


"[I'll miss] the memories, how close we've gotten with each other," says Amy Orvis, featured as July 2016. "As well as meeting all the different farmers and the great stories and the experience." "You go to the farm. You meet the farmers. You hear all about their tractor. It's the greatest thing. It doesn't matter what weather it is, you go out and you take a picture with the tractor," says Cathy Jo Schreiber featured as January 2016. "It's usually a big gathering. We're talking they get their neighbors and the friends over, and they're asking questions and talking to you and making fun of you, and it's all great."

The hard work has paid off though. The women say they have donated $47,000 to causes like St. Jude's and the American Family Children's Hospital.

"When it's freezing, I'm like, I'm doing this for the children!" says Amy.







https://oldcamo.tumblr.com/image/165574116305
https://www.facebook.com/Tractors-Gone-Wild-175172382502932
http://www.wkow.com/story/31240957/2016/02/Wednesday/2016-is-the-final-ride-for-southern-wisconsins-tractors-gone-wild-calendar
http://www.wiscnews.com/saukprairieeagle/news/local/article_05230ab9-4856-560c-addc-9399183fcc82.html

from the pin up grand master artist, Gil Elvgren


check out the car in the background


1975

Read about his remarkable career, from pinups, to Coca Cola advertising, etc http://www.gilelvgren.com/GE/elvgrenBio.html

https://gmgallery.tumblr.com/tagged/gil-elvgren

Anyone remember what car company this is?


For the life of me I don't get why people keep asking me to identify stuff, I made it clear, I don't have answers that I keep to myself, if I've ever learned it, I've posted it. 

30,000 posts are on this blog, and whatever there's a question about is either posted, or I don't know it. 

how the landslide at Big Sur hwy 1 is going so far... slow. Not going to be opened until next summer at the earliest


these images were recorded last week




if they were smart, they'd blow up the shoulders, extend some clear space at both sides of the slide area, and then push all the dirt to the coast, then put the new freeway in the middle of the coast to cliff cleared space. That would be the most they can probably afford to do to prevent a repeat of the narrowest part of Hwy 1 getting closed by another landslide.

But it turns out, that of course some eviromentalists already had a law passed that prevented such common sense logical solutions, and instead the half a mountain of material has to be moved offsite.

See, the 1983 landslide that happened here wasn't enough "learn from history or be doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past" when it took a year to clear the only North South highway for hours of less time spent on the road. Nope, so they are going to pay twice to make this area passable. And this second time, it's costing double the amount to fix, instead of shoving it all towards the beach.

When you’re facing a “once in a lifetime” mudslide, it’s not a bad idea to hire John Madonna, son of Alex Madonna — whose name is on both the famed Madonna Inn and the Alex Madonna Memorial Highway in San Luis Obispo, a contractor who can call on two lifetimes’ worth of experience in road-building.

“It’s interesting to see how things have evolved,” he said. “Back in 1983 and ’84, they pushed 3 million cubic yards (of earth) into the ocean. It took nearly a year, and there were nearly 30 bulldozers pushing.”

There would be even more earth to move this time — 5 million cubic yards (or 8 million tons), Madonna said, so the process at Mud Creek would take even longer. That he only has 20 employees has a lot to do with the timeline also. But even if he wanted to, he couldn’t simply push all that earth into the ocean. The Coast Highway Management Plan adopted in 1998, which seeks to preserve the coastline, wouldn’t allow it.

The slide brought down “8 million tons in five minutes” May 20, Madonna said. Half of those 5 million cubic yards that rumbled down the mountain in May are sitting directly on top of the old highway, Madonna said, which helps explain why digging down to the old road isn’t a viable option. Caltrans has opted instead to build an entirely new road — Madonna said it will be 2,000 feet of asphalt — over the top of the body of the slide instead.

http://www.sanluisobispo.com/news/local/article173889766.html

Greenpeace activists boarded a ship arriving in Britain on Thursday to stop the delivery of more than 1,000 Volkswagen cars from Germany


Greenpeace said its volunteers had boarded the ship in the Thames Estuary in an attempt to stop it unloading at the port of Sheerness in the southeast of England.

Two Greenpeace activists were still on board, having unfurled a banner with the words “Ditch Diesel” alongside an image of a young girl suffering from a respiratory illness, a spokesman for the environmental pressure group said.

Other protesters had earlier broken into a vehicle park at Sheerness to stick labels on engines and attempt to immobilize cars by taking the keys, Greenpeace said.

Most have now left but two remain on site, holding several thousand car keys, and will remain there until the ship returns to Germany, a spokesman said.

The carmaker also said that the majority of the roughly 1,200 cars on the boarded vessel were petrol rather than diesel models and that its vehicles meet stringent European regulations.

“Diesel cars are toxic – so we’re here to block VW imports on behalf of all of the children who are the most acutely affected by the health impacts,” 38-year-old Janet Barker, who took part in the protest, said in a statement

http://gcaptain.com/greenpeace-activists-scale-car-carrier-in-thames-estuary/

Phillips 66 has taken advantage of the U.S. Department of Homeland Securities’ temporary Jones Act waiver applying to tankers in response to fuel shortages in the southeast United States in the wake of Hurricanes Harvey and Irma,

Phillips 66 is believed to be the first company known to use the administration’s limited Jones Act waiver.

The waiver was first approved by DHS acting secretary Elaine Duke on September 8 in response to severe disruptions in the oil supply system resulting from Hurricanes Harvey and Irma. It is specifically tailored to the transportation of refined petroleum products, including gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel in hurricane-affected areas.

The Jones Act requires that cargo shipped between points in the U.S. be transported on vessels that are built in the United States and owned and crewed by American citizens. However, the temporary waiver allows oil and gas companies to use foreign-flagged vessels to move petroleum cargoes within the stated areas.

News of Phillips 66’s charter comes as U.S-flagged Jones Act tankers descend on Florida ports to relieve gasoline and diesel fuel shortages since the voluntary mass-evacuation of Florida ahead of Hurricane Irma. The shortages have been compounded by closed ports following the storm, as well as clogged roadways that led to the Florida Highway Patrol to start providing tanker truck escorts, not to mention remnant supply issues due to Hurricane Harvey in late August.

http://gcaptain.com/phillips-66-uses-jones-act-waiver-to-charter-foreign-flagged-tanker/