@Nick Chillianis posted:I knew Willy Nilly. He never swapped tenders. He worked in the freight car shops. 😎
Actually, tenders were separated from all locomotives for class repairs.
Even more often than that. Remember that per ICC/FRA regulations, the engine to tender draw-bars had to be hammer tested (looking for cracks) every 90 days. That regulation still applies to this day.
If a tender was serviced and ready to go and another locomotive of the same class was road-ready but its tender was still under repair, the tenders would be swapped. Many Union Pacific locomotives trailed different tenders for that reason. Roadworthy locomotives would not be held out of service just to get their original tender.
Absolutely correct. In fact, a number of railroads even had entirely separate "tender/tank shops", where the tenders were overhauled. Thus, when a particular engine was almost finished with a major overhaul and ready for a tender, the appropriate class of tender that was finished, was transferred from the "Tank Shop" to the Back Shop, and thus connected to the engine.
