Amtrak Acela Turboliner.

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Amtrak Railfan

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Hello I want to get information on the Acela Turboliner Train set please. Are all Acela Turboliner sets are runing from Albany NY to New York Penn Station? :) :rolleyes:
 
No, at present only two are available for service. One runs daily while the other is the backup set. Four more are in various stages of their rebuilds at the Super Steel factory. The seventh set at last report, still sits unused in Albany waiting it's turn in the factory for it's rebuild.
 
Today at Penn Station in New York NY I saw the new Acela Turboliner the Turboliner number was 2158. And I like this new Acela Turboliner Set. :)
 
It is a nice looking train. :)

One small correction though, it is not an Acela. In fact it's not even made by the same company that made the Acela Express trains.
 
Yeah Acela Expresses are Ski-Doos, or to you non snowmobilers Bombardier. The turboliner trainsets you are talking about were made by Rohr in 1975-76 and remanufactured a few years ago by Super Steel of Schentady, NY into their current forms.
 
The sound of Turboliners? I'd guess they sound pretty much like any other diesel engine.
 
battalion51 said:
The sound of Turboliners? I'd guess they sound pretty much like any other diesel engine.
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I haven't been close enough to one yet to tell. However if the new motor's that Super Steel put in is anything close to the type that were used in NJT's new SNJLRT's, you might be surprised at how quiet they are.

I was quite impressed with the minimal amount of noise generated by the SNJLRT Light Rail vehicles. B)
 
Amfleet said:
Yeah Acela Expresses are Ski-Doos, or to you non snowmobilers Bombardier.
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No wonder the Acelas do so well in the winter. :lol:
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Well they were also built in Canada, where it gets a heck of a lot colder and winter lasts longer than it does down here in the corridor area. :)
 
Maybe that explains why Tri-Rail's former Conrail GP-40's perform so badly in the heat of summer. :lol:
 
One is in service, and Im pretty sure the horn is right on the top front center on the power car above the windshield.
 
Actually at least two are on the road now. Amtrak wanted to have a reserve set before they began running revenue service with the Turboliner.
 
Maybe Alan would know the answer to this:

I heard throught he grapevine that the State of NY (who owns the Turboliner sets) was less than thrilled with the Super-Steel rebuilds and took a long time to accept the first set back. I wonder if the length of time it is taking to get these sets rebuilt is as a result of some contractual battling between SS and the State of NY.
 
tp49 said:
Maybe Alan would know the answer to this:
I heard throught he grapevine that the State of NY (who owns the Turboliner sets) was less than thrilled with the Super-Steel rebuilds and took a long time to accept the first set back. I wonder if the length of time it is taking to get these sets rebuilt is as a result of some contractual battling between SS and the State of NY.
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Actually it was Amtrak that was less than thrilled. The State of NY had no problems with the rebuilds, it was Amtrak that sent it back. Much of what Amtrak wanted originally made sense.

Amtrak however then delayed accepting the first set, after the fixes were made, because it obligated them to spend money they don't have.

Now at present there are indeed two rebuilt sets on Amtrak property. One runs in service, while the other is a spare. The third set is due very soon. Last I heard however, the fourth and the fifth set are a long way off. Reason, Amtrak doesn't have the money to pay for something that Super Steel needs. I can't at the moment remember what that was, but I'll try to find the story tomorrow.
 
Amtrak had agreed to pay for some infrastructure improvements on the Empire line in exchange for New York State paying for the rebuilding of the Turboliner fleet. New York fulfilled its end of the deal: Amtrak reneged. Amtrak tried to cover themselves by not accepting the rebuilds on very shaky grounds, thus saying their side of the obligation was moot. New York State was none too pleased with that, and when Amtrak finally realized they needed New York’s political backing in DC, the trains began running.

Of course, Amtrak is still in default for its side of the deal, but we can all hold our breath for Amtrak to fund anything now. I wonder how many miles of track improvements those hundreds of now idle Roadrailers and MHC’s could have funded? The key word here is “Priorities”, and Amtrak’s sad execution of that concept under Warrington.
 
Well the MHC's were purchased back in the 80's, and have made Amtrak money for nearly 15 years before their demise. Some of the RoadRailers are still in service (mainly 400000 and 410000 series) on mail routes, and will probably be sold to Triple Crown or CN.
 
I know that it makes at least one late night run, as a buddy of mine now runs them three times a week.
 
Well last I knew, one set was held in reserve. The other set covered train #250 the 9:00 AM departure from Albany to NYP. On it's return it covers #251 at 12:45 PM.

I've not heard of any changes to that schedule, since those assignments were made in August.
 
Sorry for the confusion, the Turbo does run as you said. My buddy is on a relief job, and said to me Friday "I don't hgave to run no damn AC-DM's anymore." Well, he was wrong, he only runs them once a week, and runs AC-DM's five trips a week. So sorry if anyone got confused like me. :huh:
 
battalion51 said:
Sorry for the confusion, the Turbo does run as you said. My buddy is on a relief job, and said to me Friday "I don't hgave to run no damn AC-DM's anymore." Well, he was wrong, he only runs them once a week, and runs AC-DM's five trips a week. So sorry if anyone got confused like me. :huh:
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Interesting you mention that. I remember reading (I think in Railpace magazine) that crew members are quite enjoying the rebuilt Turboliners despite all the twinks that had to be worked out of it and the high fuel costs.
 
Wow, that was the exact opposite of what my guy said. He said they had a mechanical problem outside of Croton-Harmon today and lights and bells were going off, he's like "What the f*** did I do." The train handles poorly, takes forever and a day to load up (the entire train has four traction motors), and doesn't like it when you ask it to pour on the power, which is why he broke down today. I haven't been on the thing myself, but he knows his equipment so I'm going to trust him.
 
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