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Jay asked in Cars & TransportationRail · 9 years ago

How and where do Amtrak trains refuel?

Well, where (specifically what stations or locations) and how (what systems or methods) do Amtrak diesels refuel, because i have heard of fuel stops, but never enough to seem realistic.

7 Answers

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  • DON W
    Lv 7
    9 years ago
    Favourite answer

    You've received some good answers. To summarize (and add a bit of my own knowledge)...

    --Trains start out with a full tank of fuel. For many of the routes, that's enough fuel to keep them going until they get to their destination, or in some cases, to do a round-trip to their starting place.

    --When feasible, Amtrak fuels up their engines at maintenance yards, rather than at a passenger station. It's safer that way.

    --Where the refueling is done at a passenger station, it will likely be way down at the end of the platform where the engine(s) stop, well past where passengers are allowed to walk. The refueling is as simple as a heavy-duty hose, coming up from an underground fuel storage tank, that's put into the engine's fuel tank.

    --In some circumstances, Amtrak will arrange for a refueling truck to be on hand to pump directly from the truck into the engine, when more permanent arrangements aren't feasible.

  • ?
    Lv 4
    4 years ago

    Their engines generally carry sufficient gasoline to make it from commencing place to holiday spot. on longer routes, which incorporate Chicago to California, for the period of specific station stops engines are uncoupled and are replaced with the help of an engine that has been inspected and serviced. making a stop in undemanding terms for gasoline is a waste of time, for the period of your 17 hr holiday, there'll be station stops. The Cardinal,which runs bvetweenm Washington and Chicago, makes approximately sixteen stops at stations alongside the way.

  • ?
    Lv 5
    9 years ago

    They share railroad tracks with CSX a lot so any railroad yard along their lines. We have a csx yard in Euclid, Ohio near the willoby boarder and you could see them refueling there.

  • 9 years ago

    Locomotives are serviced at various larger rail yard out of the sight of passengers. The person who does this is called a "hostler", and their job is to fill the fuel tanks, add water for the steam generator (the heat for passenger trains) , and for the engineer's toilet and drinking water, and add sand for the wheel sanders used to gain traction during wheel slip, etc. Sorta "full service" but for a locomotive. Most Amtrak locomotives are designed to travel roughly 800 - 1000 miles between services.

    Not bad for a Blond, right? (My Grandma's first husband was a fireman on the B & O RR)

    Source(s): So Cal gal
  • 9 years ago

    i know for the southwest chief i know one place is

    Albuquerque

    on others it can be service yard

    like los angeles for the surfliner for example

  • 9 years ago

    You just pump the fuel in with a hose. Just a little bigger and faster of a flow rate. It can be done out of a tank or a tanker truck. I used to drive a fuel truck and we occasionally had to fill rail Equipment

  • Ray
    Lv 7
    9 years ago
    Source(s): Google/Answers
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