CHRIS D’AMATO: MONTREAL, QUE., CANADA; SEPT. 9, 1995
Self-propelled cranes like CP Rail crane No. 414222 (above) can move short work trains without the need of a locomotive. This crane (above right), operated by Mid East Railroad Service, can run on either roads or rails. For years, the Sperry Rail Service re-
NICHOLAS D’AMATO: MEBANE, NC; MAY 13, 2010
lied on self-propelled railcars (below left). Now they are using hi- rail trucks (below right). Tamping machines (bottom) are used for track surfacing. Lasers are used between the trailing buggy and the tamper to measure needed track alignments.
BEN SWOPE: APR. 1993
propelled machines were usually light enough to set off the track at any road crossing or motor car set-off point. Modeling the operations of these mo- tor cars in HO scale can be easy with the offering of Bachmann’s “speeder with work crane and cart” set. The speeder unit comes powered and is not too far out of scale, as some Fairmont “A” series motorcars were quite large. Hi-rail pickup trucks are quite simi- lar to the function and operation of mo- tor cars; usually, they are set on the railroad’s track at road crossings. To- day, nearly every railroad employs hi- rail vehicles of some sort, so there are plenty of reasons to model them on any model railroad. Most heavy-haul mainline railroads require daily track inspections, so oper- ating a hi-rail pickup over your layout to simulate these inspections is quite ap- propriate. Even if you model a small seg- ment of a shortline, you could still have a hi-rail truck breeze over your line every so often, doing its weekly inspection. Modeling a modern hi-rail pickup truck in HO scale is as easy as acquir-
RAILROAD MODEL CRAFTSMAN
NICHOLAS D’AMATO: APEX, NC; AUG. 5, 2008
ing one from a hobby shop. These ready-to-run trucks come pre-painted in several railroad names and are even available with DCC. Another, larger hi-rail vehicle in use on several modern railroads is a truck manufactured by Brandt Road Rail Corporation. These trucks can be used by track maintenance crews much like
CHRIS D’AMATO: ROANOKE, VA; APR. 8, 2005
a locomotive, being equipped with cou- plers and train air brakes, by moving several railcars for crosstie or track materials distribution.
No models of these interesting vehi-
cles are available, so you would have to scratchbuild one using a scale heavy truck as a starting point. To maintain a uniform railhead pro-
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