I made a post earlier about trains and how they can’t stop, so I thought I’d follow up with some videos that show how heavy they are and just what it takes to get that TV, Car or Bottle of Orange juice to your house.

This video is from Horseshoe Curve in Pennsylvania in the United States. Note he isn’t going that fast because he’s climbing a hill. The engines operating on the rear are called ‘helpers’ or ‘pushers.’ The either push a heavy train up a grade or provide extra breaking for a heavy train to make it down the hill safely and not run away.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p03E9_RxZew

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lHLkqyxGso0

This website has a generator you can play with. Throw in the amount of tons you have, and a grade you want to create (bear in mind 1.25 is a good grade for a train. Anything over 2% is almost too much.) and it’ll tell you horsepower necessary.

http://www.alkrug.vcn.com/rrfacts/RRForcesCalc.html