Beech Grove drive-by

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creddick

creddick

Service Attendant
Joined
May 17, 2006
Messages
239
Location
Northeastern Michigan
I'll be going through Indy in a couple of weeks. If I drive by the Beech Grove facility, how much will I be able to see from the street?
 
The main road from I-465 on the south east side of town up into Beech Grove is Emerson Ave. If you take that north you will go right next to the repair facility on your right. It used to be you could park on Emerson and walk up and down the street looking easily into the fenced area. They have now made it no-parking and reconstructed the fence to make it more difficult. I have sometimes parked on a side street on the west side of Emerson and walked back over to the fence line.

Also, going north on Emerson you can turn right on Bellfontaine and it T's into the street the main entrance is on. If you drive east on that street, Garstang (it becomes Cincinnati Rd) you can see a lot of equipment in the back area. But, most of that stuff has been sitting there for years.

At the main entrance you can drive in and park and walk to the Amtrak Police guard shack, explain you just want to look, take pictures, etc. Sometimes they will say OK and you can drive around in the employee parking lot and get some good views. The last few times I have tried that they told me no. Depends on the mood of the officer on the particular day.

Here are links to pictures I have taken there over the years:

10-22-2009

7-11-2007

 

5-26-2007

4-13-2007

Facility Tour (They let the public in for a tour)
 
Great pictures, thanks for sharing.

BTW, does anyone know when / if Amtrak offers tours of the BG shops? I took one tour many years ago as part of a NMRA regional convention, not sure if any other groups are planing tours in the coming year or so? It'd be interesting to see what they're doing, especially with all the rebuild activities. I know the tour I took, the shop managers were all very open to all questions and really presented the operation well.
 
MrFSS said:
The main road from I-465 on the south east side of town up into Beech Grove is Emerson Ave. If you take that north you will go right next to the repair facility on your right. It used to be you could park on Emerson and walk up and down the street looking easily into the fenced area. They have now made it no-parking and reconstructed the fence to make it more difficult. I have sometimes parked on a side street on the west side of Emerson and walked back over to the fence line.
Also, going north on Emerson you can turn right on Bellfontaine and it T's into the street the main entrance is on. If you drive east on that street, Garstang (it becomes Cincinnati Rd) you can see a lot of equipment in the back area. But, most of that stuff has been sitting there for years.

At the main entrance you can drive in and park and walk to the Amtrak Police guard shack, explain you just want to look, take pictures, etc. Sometimes they will say OK and you can drive around in the employee parking lot and get some good views. The last few times I have tried that they told me no. Depends on the mood of the officer on the particular day.

Here are links to pictures I have taken there over the years:

10-22-2009

7-11-2007

 

5-26-2007

4-13-2007

Facility Tour (They let the public in for a tour)
Click to expand...
Great pix Tom. Too bad the guards are not reliable. My grand father used to tell me "NO" was only half of a four letter word.
 
MikeM said:
Great pictures, thanks for sharing.
BTW, does anyone know when / if Amtrak offers tours of the BG shops? I took one tour many years ago as part of a NMRA regional convention, not sure if any other groups are planing tours in the coming year or so? It'd be interesting to see what they're doing, especially with all the rebuild activities. I know the tour I took, the shop managers were all very open to all questions and really presented the operation well.
Click to expand...
I have heard they have tours now and then in conjunction with a rail group (how about a Gathering in Indy??)

The one I was on with fellow AU member RTabern (its where we first met) was in conjunction with the 100th anniversary of the town of Beech Grove, I'm sure they will have a 200th anniversary and you could probably get a tour, then. :p :p
 
beech23.JPG

The tower in the Maintenance Building was used to turn steam locomotives upright in order to clean out their boilers.
Click to expand...
Amtrak used to run steam engines? :D
 
I remember an editorial cartoon from years ago when Amtrak was having trouble getting enough money from Congress or something. The train, stopped at a station, was behind a steam engine. The station was being torn down to provide fuel for the train. I believe also that announcements were being made over the station's P.A. system explaining why the train was being delayed.
 
Neither one of those. In the cartoon I saw, the station was being torn down to provide firewood for the engine. Apparently it was a wood-burner (there really were some wood-burning steam engines, presumably in areas where coal was scarce).
 
And the first new Amtrak locomotives, the EMD SDP40F's had a pair of steam generators aboard. ;)
 
amtrakwolverine said:
i've seen some of there GE violating that policy. they were smoking so bad. what causes a loco to bellow black smoke from the exhaust a faulty turbocharger.
Click to expand...
No, black smoke from a diesel engine is generally the result of incomplete combustion. The combustion being incomplete in diesel fuel results in carbon particulates to leave through the exhaust without combining with oxygen to form carbon oxides (monoxide or dioxide) which leaves as, essentially, small bits of ash. All the ash coming through creates the black smoke.

Its an engine in need of either fuel-flow adjustment (decrease fuel, decrease richness, more complete combustion), increase air flow (which could, I guess, be the turbocharger), a combination thereof, or a cleaning of its injectors to better atomize the fuel, increasing the completeness of the burn.
 
Green Maned Lion said:
amtrakwolverine said:
i've seen some of there GE violating that policy. they were smoking so bad. what causes a loco to bellow black smoke from the exhaust a faulty turbocharger.
Click to expand...
No, black smoke from a diesel engine is generally the result of incomplete combustion. The combustion being incomplete in diesel fuel results in carbon particulates to leave through the exhaust without combining with oxygen to form carbon oxides (monoxide or dioxide) which leaves as, essentially, small bits of ash. All the ash coming through creates the black smoke.

Its an engine in need of either fuel-flow adjustment (decrease fuel, decrease richness, more complete combustion), increase air flow (which could, I guess, be the turbocharger), a combination thereof, or a cleaning of its injectors to better atomize the fuel, increasing the completeness of the burn.
Click to expand...
So you tell him no, it cannot be the turbocharger, then you admit it could be the turbocharger.

Confused.....
 
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It could potentially be the turbocharger, but I am pretty confident it isn't. If its running to rich, due to bad atomization or too high a fuel flow, the engine is still producing enough power to comfortably move it for Wolverine purposes. Kill the turbo, though, and the engine would be so way down on power such an engine would be in the shops as soon as it pulls back in to Chicago.
 
It looks like, and sorta sounds like, a combination of excessive fuel flow and bad atomization, both of which are probably caused by dirty fuel.
 
if its anything like a carburetor dirty fuel can cause the needle to not seat right allowing the carb to flood with gas.
 
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