(The following article by Steve McEnroe was posted on the Rapid City Journal website on December 13.)
RAPID CITY, S.D. — They simply refer to it as the “power.” They are a group of highly trained mechanics. The power is the diesel-electric locomotives they work on daily.
Tim Sheets, 32, is one of the locomotive mechanics working out of the Dakota, Minnesota & Eastern Rapid City Roundhouse. The Sturgis native served four years as a light-wheel mechanic in the U.S. Army, working on trucks and Humvees in Desert Storm and in Somalia before returning to civilian life and joining DM&E in 1996.
The huge locomotives were a big change. In fact, DM&E puts its new hires through a two-year apprenticeship on the massive engines.
The local DM&E mechanic crew includes six men in Rapid
City and another in Belle Fourche. Some are locomotive mechanics, such as Sheets, who maintain the nine to 15 locomotives that may be working in the region at any one time. Others are composite mechanics who work primarily on the hundreds of rail cars that run the local lines to Crawford, Neb., Colony, Wyo., Midland, Pierre and Belle Fourche.
Sheets works out of the Rapid City Roundhouse in the rail yard just north of South Dakota School of Mines & Technology. Roundhouse is a bit of a misnomer for the pie-shaped facility. The old building isn’t round and doesn’t have a turntable for switching engines like the traditional roundhouses did.
Instead, it has four bays. One is used now by the ConAgra flour mill for cleaning grain cars, and another has been paved for a truck bay. But two still sport rails and a mechanic’s trench allowing workers access to the undersides of the locomotives.
Today, the two engine bays are used for repair work on locomotives and as garage space for the railroad’s maintenance-o-way vehicles, the large trucks you see capable of running on normal roads or on the rails, which tend to rail maintenance and company bridges and buildings.
But Sheets spends much of his time outside the roundhouse, rain or shine, hot or cold. Even so, the composite mechanics laugh and say his is a cushy job. They are outside virtually all the time, inspecting and working on railcars.
The mechanics inspect every locomotive every calendar day under federal law. They start with the horns, bells and lights and work their way around the enormous vehicles, checking the wheels and brake systems and the huge diesel engine that is the heart of the mechanical beast.
The engine drives an air compressor that powers the brakes on the entire train, as well as the main generator, which transfers power via traction motors to the wheels of the locomotive. The generator also powers the other electrical systems in the locomotive.
Today, many of the systems on newer and retrofitted locomotives have been computerized, and a mechanic can run a point-by-point check at a touch-control panel in the locomotive’s cab in addition to conducting a visual and hands-on inspection.
The local mechanics handle “running repairs” in Rapid City, as well as scheduled lube jobs and filter changes. Major locomotive repairs are handled at DM&E’s heavy-repair facility in Huron.
DM&E operates two types of locomotives: a general purpose, four-axle yard unit that is used for most switching and other tasks in town, and a six-axle special-duty locomotive. The four-axle locomotives run about 2,000 horsepower and can turn tighter corners such as those in the area of the Hubbard feed mill; the larger locomotives, sporting 3,500 horsepower or more, run the routes.
Although rail beds generally appear flat to the casual observer, there are long, gradual grades they must handle in the Black Hills region. Notable hills in the local area are the “Wall hill,” the climb into the tourist town famous for its drug store, and the area southeast of Sturgis in the foothills of the Black Hills.
According to Sheets, depending on the route, it takes an estimated 1.7 hp per ton of train towed, which determines how many locomotives are linked together at the head of a train.
Here’s a final fact for the train-curious. Besides carrying hundreds of gallons of water and as much as 3,500 gallons of diesel fuel, a locomotive will also carry 1,000 pounds of sand on board. When a locomotive needs additional traction, because of grade or weather conditions, the sand can be blown onto the rails through two hoses placed just in front of the lead wheels, giving the locomotive the edge it needs to haul tons of grain, bentonite, cement and everything else that is needed to keep a nation on track.