Ari- The power of a locomotive can be converted but, there are
certain problems, like going downhill, not only are brakes applied
to the cars, but the diesels go into "Dynamic Breaking", a complicated
way to say "Let the driver wheels run the motor (as a generator), and
them dump their output to banks of RESISTORS!! Provides great breaking,
but lousey voltage regulation! The radios on these units are powered
by (as stated,) 72 Volts, tho the radios also work on 12 volts (which
was the standard in Cabooses). The main point tho, remains that there
are considerable electronics (the new G.E. A.C.engines , from what
I have been told, are computer operated)! and that anything that
interfers with other items causes considerable greif to the operation
of a railroad- even turning a relay upside down can cause a derailment!



They are STILL looking for such a foolproof device!


What's the issue, this appears not to be a huge deal?


Well, Ari-- the big deal is (Primarily in mountainous country- even
a grade of .5 degree, is considered quite steep). Now, suppose a
Maintainence of Way employees (push car, Motor Car, Hi-Railer (a
pickup equipped for rail travel) accidentally get loose- these can
be doing considerable speed- several MILES later-- worse, these
dont trip the signals, and further, the work crews have the track
from the dispatcher, so these can sneak up on workers with fatal
consequences. A similar thing happened on the old Siskiyou line,
when the powers that be were testing one of the old style of
remote controlled helpers-, going down-hill, on 5 Mile /Hour track
they called the remote to go to dynamic brakeing- but it went to
8-throttle instead (full throttle)! When they got it to control,
that train was doing 20 MPH! Had a bunch of scared people on it!
as you can see, it is not for the faint of heart! I sure wouldn't have
wanted to be anywhere near that track-- would you ??
I know it looks simple, and most times it is, but it doesn't take
much for things to get out of control! Have fun -- Jim