I can argue that one. I have done repairs on locomotives that should have been reported through the daily inspection reports. I've had to replace a brake head and hangar arm because they didn't do the morning walk around. Wore the hanger into the wheel. I've had a unit run out of oil due to a leaking governor line that was never reported. When I found it I asked how long that was leaking and was told 3 weeks. Never reported. The list goes on and on. So to say it is never the engineers fault is totally wrong. I have fired engineers for these problems, but it keeps happening. I know if a few class 1 railroads with the same problems. As a consultant, I have seen more stupidity and neglect by engineers than should exist.

Never operator error? Bwahahaha!! Lmfao!! Come work for UP with me and you'll see.

Probably not, too far from here to there.

No, I maintain and troubleshoot a small fleet of locomotives.

Lol. Wish it was that simple. I have heard of doing something like that if you have dynamic brakes, but not something I know enough about.

@@TopperMachineLLC Dynamic brakes won't work without a runner engine, so that's not possible to do anything with.

@@pootispiker2866 there is a way to do it. It was explained to me once. Couple jumper wires in the right places and blocked relays. All you need to do is create some excitation with a little voltage and it will build. A motor and generator are the same thing in opposite operations.

@@TopperMachineLLC oh definitely some hacky ways to go about it for sure. On the road with an engineer's knowledge it wouldn't be done. If i had to guess I'd say put some battery voltage across a motor field and shove it down a hill with the right things jumpered across the output. It's probably something to that degree. If you're at that stage though you probably have a locomotive to run a proper charge cable to.

@@pootispiker2866 it was done all the time back in the day. Electricians would go out to get units running with nothing more than their tool kit. Now days, they just drag them back to the shop. It was a Great Northern electrician who taught me most of this. He retired in the early 90s, when railroading was good. Unfortunately it is not fun or good anymore. You can't do anything without the threat of an FRA fine. It's the reason why I only go out in special circumstances.