E1192 and E1147

[allanroy]

Went to stay in a small town called Hermon on the main line between Tulbach and Wellington. Took my sons to watch a train and spotted this freight train. Drove to a farm railway crossing and watched it pass. boys very happy that the driver hooted when they waved. We then chased the train to watch it pass again and got it at the start to the Nuwekloof pass. My sons now want to chase the train all the way to Jhb.

Not sure what class this are, and with the number it had CW written - whats that mean?

[Stefan Andrzejewski]

Great photos Roy especially photo no4. Those Loco's are 6E's. Drivers are generally friendly and sometimes hoot. CW stands for Cape Western

[allanroy]

Thanks Stefan

lookin at all the photos on this forum I noticed that the wheels of these logo's differ. All the others have tow diagonal bars into the centre of the axle. Why would these be different?

[Stefan Andrzejewski]

From the 6E1 onwards they had traction links fitted. These help with the weight distribution over the whole bogey. Someone with more technical knowledge can help. I enclose two photos. You can see the 6E1 with the Traction links and the 6E without

[Steve Appleton]

The other obvious difference when the bogie detail cannot be discerned is the location of the sand boxes. The 6E1s have four sandboxes mounted higher than the 6Es, cutting into the bodywork.

[allanroy]

Thanks for all the info -learning alot. This train was doing around 90 km/h is that the normal speed on the mainline?

[Steve Appleton]

Most likely. However some curves may have a lower speed limit set. Such permanent lower speed limits are indicated by a hexagonal yellow "diamond"-shaped board containing the speed limit (in km/h) in black numerals.

[Ashley Peter]

Vacuum-braked goods trains (as this one appears to be) and most air-braked goods trains are limited to a maximum speed of 60 km/h. Failure to adhere to these limits can be career-limiting for footplate crews as loco inspectors (now called section managers) do regular speed checks with radar speed traps, just like the road traffic "speed-cops" and there is very little leeway given in terms of exceeding the speed limit. There is also no option of simply paying a fine - alleged offenders face an official disciplinary enquiry and should they be found guilty more than two or three times, would quite possibly face dismissal.

[Stefan Andrzejewski]

From Wellington to Gouda , it can be like a race track. I have clocked both passenger and freight doing over 100km/h. The speed along there is 90, but its mostly straight , no stations to stop at. After Gouda it goes into Nuwekloof where the speed drops to 70 and then 40 on the sharp curves allthe way to Wolsely then 90 to Worcster. With our recent Shos trip we left Wellington 15 minutes late and got into Worcster 2 minutes early. Passing cars with ease where the road speed limit is 100.

[John Ashworth]

The extremely interesting discussion on braking systems which sprung up in this thread has now been moved to a thread of it's own here

[allanroy]

We took the Shosholoza Meyl to Johannesburg in the 23rd Dec and I deceided to get a photo of the spot I took the first 4 photos above. My son is looking out the window to see the spot next to the trees where we had parked.