# You think YOU have weed problems???



## Al McEvoy (Jan 3, 2008)

If you're tired of weeding your garden railroad then check out this 1:1 scale train ride video….
http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/1mUfz...EPR8X1rcho


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## 6323 (Jan 17, 2008)

Not bad, until you hit the unseen object laying across the rails! 
Heard of a trip like this, from a friends neighbor, years ago. 
Slammed into a fallen tree, at a good clip. Serious injuries, and major 
speeder damage. 

At least I can still see my track! The one turnout I do have, but don't use, was 
situated right over a decent sized weed patch. When weeds came up, turnout was buried. 
Hope expansion project in progress isn't too bad, once done!


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## Dave F (Jan 2, 2008)

Good Lord.. I wonder where that is?


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## Semper Vaporo (Jan 2, 2008)

What about the missing trestle?


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## ThinkerT (Jan 2, 2008)

Quite the drop off to the one side as well. 

Reminds me of the time when I was a kid out at the homestead years ago and had to use the riding lawnmower to 'reclaim' a patch of lawn that had 'gone wild' so to speak. Cutting down ferns and grass and brush and stuff taller than I was...off the tractor!...and just praying I didn't hit a log or rock or big tree branch or run past the edge of the old lawn and into the swamp I knew was there somewhere...


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## jbwilcox (Jan 2, 2008)

Interesting, but it was mostly out of focus on my screen.

John


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## Semper Vaporo (Jan 2, 2008)

Posted By jbwilcox on 02 May 2010 10:52 AM 
Interesting, but it was mostly out of focus on my screen.

John


Not really "out of focus"... just very low resolution and way to much digital compression so the playback does not recreate the detail well... net result, it looks "out of focus" to everybody, anyway.

Anecdote: There was a club/RR sanctioned run of many of these "track gang-cars" on well maintained (class 1 freight line) roadbed near here a few years ago. One one of the drivers apparently fell asleep and missed a "slow order" at a grade crossing that had a bit of a hump. His car derailed and he died of the injuries he sustained when he was thrown from the car.


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## Al McEvoy (Jan 3, 2008)

Yeah the video quality was very poor but enough to see that they should never have driven that fast into the unknown….


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## Scottychaos (Jan 2, 2008)

You can click on one of the links and get the video actually on youtube, rather than the page the video is embedded into.. 
caption on youtube says: 

The South Carolina Railroad Museum has 11.5 miles of track that was once the Rockton & Rion Railway. The western 6.5 miles of track is known as the Museum's "West End" and is more than 40 years old and badly overgrown with weeds and small trees. A small crew is clearing and reopening this track. The video is taken through the windshield of a small self-propelled railroad motor car known as a speeder. The speeder was moving at idle speed and had already made three trips through the weeds that morning before the video was shot. 

Scot


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## ohioriverrailway (Jan 2, 2008)

In the final days of the Washington & Waynesburg the franchise was held down by a weekly motor car trip. In the spring they added large pieces of flag stone to increase weight and tractive effort to get thru the weeds. They went through several sets of canvas curtains each year from the brush beating on the car sides.


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## Pete Chimney (Jan 12, 2008)

Years ago when i worked in Indonesia on the island of Sumatra we took a short trip from Rumbai over to Bukitinnghi. Along the way we stumbled on an old Dutch-built railroad, 42" inch gauge. The rails were very rusty, not having seen a turning metal wheel in many years. The ties were made of pressed steel not wood. 

Along the right-of-way the jungle had reclaimed much of the track, there were portions where trees had grown between the ties and some were now up to 24" in diameter. Imagine hitting a tree of this size with a speeder while cruising through the jungle.


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