Indeed it is, a hight tech tamper. We have a few of these running around where I work and they are raising the track a total of nine inches.

--
Typical Railroader-Tired, Broke, Hungry, Sick, and Mad

that explains a lot... there's another picture I'm going to post of a new sign I found under a bridge.

--
I dunno... whada you think?

These machines are often referred to as production jacker/tampers. A conventional tamping machine has enough equipment to tamp one tie at a time. Tie gangs will often run with two or three in a line, and each tamper will tamp every other or every third tie based on the number of tampers available. Production jacker/tampers do far more, as you have indicated. They lift the track (jacking) to a consistent height, correct any yaw discrepencies (alignment), and tamp under three or four ties at the same time. They're especially helpful in jointed rail territory, as this machine can smooth out a low joint in about 15 seconds; whereas a section gang could jack and pound at a low joint for an hour to achieve the same result. I only wish I had my camera with me more frequently when I ran Heavener yard, since the tie gangs and steel gangs stored their machines overnight in the yard when they worked the southern end of the Heavener sub and the northern end of the Shreveport sub.

Thanks for this bit of info. Next time I'm out in KC for an extended session, I'll make sure to hit up the KCS territory and see what I can produce. Not just the yard, but mainline stuff as well. BNSF and UP get real old, real fast.

--
"Diplomacy is the ability to tell a person to go to hell in such a way that he looks forward to the trip."

"God is playing a comic to an audience that's afraid to laugh."—Voltaire

Interesting stuff. Wonder if I'll be seeing that anytime soon. Some of the stick rail out here needs to be tamped something bad...

--
"Diplomacy is the ability to tell a person to go to hell in such a way that he looks forward to the trip."

"God is playing a comic to an audience that's afraid to laugh."—Voltaire

From an operational standpoint, it's a good thing that BNSF and UP get old. Their trains are consistent and reliable, so they don't change much from day to day. KCS is definitely less consistent, and they have a greater variety of power, since they're still using SD40's on their H (all-stop mainline freight) trains.

From a railfan standpoint, I'll go take what KCS has to offer over the other two.

--
"Diplomacy is the ability to tell a person to go to hell in such a way that he looks forward to the trip."

"God is playing a comic to an audience that's afraid to laugh."—Voltaire

I like your style.

Thanks for the details Hoyt! (My apologies for taking so long to get back to you. I had a literal computer crash.

--
I dunno... whada you think?