Viewliner II Delivery/Production

ngotwalt wrote:Hartford has been released into the wild, Harrisburg is ready to go, but hasn't gone out yet. Likely to depart Hialeah in the next few days.

Nick

With Hartford and Harrisburg release, there should now be enough Viewliner II"s (and even the prototype Viewliner Diner) to outfit the Lake Shore Limited. Plans?

From May 1st 2017:

ApproachMedium wrote:No overhaul is needed to raise the speeds. They have moved the cars at 125 in muliple 125mph certification test trains as well as ride quality test trains over a year ago. It is just a matter of them updating the paperwork which at the moment is not necessary as long as all of the old diners are out there.

When will (or did) all the V-IIs get their paperwork to operate at 125mph and then then when will we see which trains operating at higher speeds?

My feeling is Amtrak won’t return diners to the LSL until at least the spring timetable change. Probably Aprilish, which would give them something like 18-20 diners to play with in service without 8400. I don’t think they’ll add the diner right when they are cutting consists for the winter.
Cheers,
Nick

Arlington wrote:From May 1st 2017:

ApproachMedium wrote:No overhaul is needed to raise the speeds. They have moved the cars at 125 in muliple 125mph certification test trains as well as ride quality test trains over a year ago. It is just a matter of them updating the paperwork which at the moment is not necessary as long as all of the old diners are out there.

When will (or did) all the V-IIs get their paperwork to operate at 125mph and then then when will we see which trains operating at higher speeds?

I would imagine once all of the heritage equipment is retired. The cars have long since completed all of their high speed testing on the corridor. All that is needed is to change the ink in the timetable.

Rumor has it Amtrak is making a pickup at CAF in Elmira Heights today.

Regarding Mr. CP-SD40's immediate report, that will give Amtrak twelve V-II Diners on the property. This should enable 8400 to be reassigned to Executrain service and provide adequate "protect" to support the Meteor and Star.

"On paper", with twelve cars they could restore Dining service to the Lake Shore, but if "anything bad happened", there would be a "rob Peter to pay Paul" situation at SSY. Possibly with fourteen cars, they could "go for it", meaning if "two a month" holds, there would be enough cars by February.

Then time for head scratching; what do we do with the remaining eleven?; Star (4), 3x Cardinal (2), Daily Cardinal (2 more), Unassigned (3).

12 is the number of heritage cars they had in service when i hired on in 2010 , so yea they should be able to put it on but i doubt with that they will retire the 8400. Running with 12 is running at the skin of your teeth as there was many a day where they would wait for 98 to arrive to steal cars from it to send out on 91, 19 etc...

Once the all present V-2s including this delivery are in service; why not keep Heritage diners around for back-up until a few more V-2s are in service ?

Interesting that the additional diners seem to imply that Amtrak might yet again have some surplus food service cars that it could convert to coaches.

They wont be converting any food service amfleet 2s or viewliners into coaches. The 25 diners are to compliment the 25 cafe/lounge food service cars.

east point wrote:Once the all present V-2s including this delivery are in service; why not keep Heritage diners around for back-up until a few more V-2s are in service ?

Because they're in absolutely horrid condition and can't come off the road fast enough. The H-foods are in far more dire shape than the 6 best-of-the-rest H-bags that are being held as active reserves until the bag-dorm portion of the V2 order is delivered. It's been documented at-length on the forums the many structural reasons why the proverbial fork is sticking out of them.

ApproachMedium wrote:They wont be converting any food service amfleet 2s or viewliners into coaches. The 25 diners are to compliment the 25 cafe/lounge food service cars.

I should have been clearer. I was only referring to the Amfleet cars. Fair enough point regarding running alongside the lounge cars.

It appears that Jackson and Lansing are "on the way":

http://www.railpictures.net/photo/640996/#remarks" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

When accepted, there will be twelve of 'em on the property. That means there will be adequate protection for 19-20 and 97-98, and that the "rare sighting" will be an H-D.

Theoretically, along with 8400, Amtrak could restore full service to 48-49 now, but they could easily "come up naked" for protection at the outlying points of CHI and NOL, as well as having to play "Rob Peter to Pay Paul" at SSY. Likely two more need be delivered before 48-49 can be in play. Let us not forget that Diners have a higher E-Cleaning cycle than other cars, and if one of our multipeded friends is caught "deadheading", out comes the car and "under the tent" it goes for a fumigation.

E-cleaning was canceled years ago.

Is it me? Or do those 2 cars not look "straight"?

It almost looks like they have a sag in the rooflines.