Probably a heck of a lot smoother ride than even the Northeast Corridor, too!
For those who don’t know what the Northeast Corridor is
[spoiler]The Northeast Corridor is the stretch of Amtrak-owned track that stretches from Union Station in Washington to South Station in Boston. (South Station is a pretty awesome station at that.) You can feel the difference when you cross from the freight tracks that make up most of Amtrak’s system to the NEC, which connects with the Silver Star route (the only train that serves Columbia) in Washington. It’s a great improvement in ride smoothness, but light sleepers still need not apply.[/spoiler]
That’s wicked awesome, especially since it never derails. (Darn N-scale trains in the middle of a tunnel…)
Also impressive is that the trains can “remember” exactly how far from the track they started out as, without any kind of sensor feedback or active controls, as well as being able to “hover” sideways from the sides of buildings. I wonder if this technology could feasibly be put to other uses, like taking the linear track and turning it into frictionless bearings?
Thanks Dave, now I have to rip up my track and start over again!
That’s neat and makes a good trade show exibit. I just don’t see it making mainstream model railroading with the need for liquid nitrogen. Maybe the enginners (pun intended! ) can design it to work with something more readily available, and safer for younger children.
Here’s a pic I took just this morning after seeing this thread. The second engine is a model of the one in my current WAI pic. It’s an HO scale Atlas RS-3 New Haven (as is the one in the foreground) except it has road number 529. A model of the same exact real engine I’m standing in front of!
Atlas wound up doing a special run with #529 as they had already released #551 (the one in the foreground) and #559 (I have but not pictured). They normally release two with each road name but since #529 has been fully restored and is functional on the Railroad Museum of New Englandthey were presurred by hobbiests to release a third number for the New Haven road name. I just couldn’t pass it up when I saw it on ebay.