Does anyone know what happened in that incident? I read somewhere that a train wreck in Georgia in 1967 apparently destroyed 5 new 67 427 Fairlanes. There were ten 10 on the train at the time.
There was a thread on another forum recently indicating that it actually happened in 1966, and there were 10 of 20, 66 427 Fairlanes destroyed.

Hate to tell you, but they were probably buried beside the tracks. Most of the class 1 railroads are self insured and they would have paid the owners of any property that was on the train and dug a hole and buried it beside the tracks where the derailment occurred. Same thing happened to a John Deer train about 10 years ago just before I got my signalman age started in Indiana. They took several million dollars worth of farming equipment, all of which could have been repaired and used, and buried beside the tracks after a derailment. You could find out where the derailment occurred and go out there with a metal detector and a backhoe.

But hey , anything would be possible . It would certainly help to account for the '66 VINs being all over the place with a bunch of missing numbers in between . Maybe Dennis K has heard of this ???

I've never heard of either wreck. If ten 1966 427 Fairlanes were never delivered, that would of been 17% of the build of 57 units. NHRA might of squawked that the 50 min were not "delivered". What ten dealers did not receive their cars?

I would imagine the VIN's are not in consecutive order due to when the orders were placed by customers. Although typically, 427 and 428 lightweight drag vehicles were VIN'd in batches. Maybe the 1966 427 Fairlanes were VIN'd in small batches, I don't know of anyone that has really researched this subject that deeply. Half the puzzle is solved. PMW???

Regards,
Dennis

I always understood that the original build of 70 units was dropped to 57 due to parts / engine shortage . Only 56 or 57 units had been built by the '66 model year deadline . I was just throwing that in there regarding the train wreck taking out ten '66 427's, if there was a bunch of 427 Fairlanes damaged in a train wreck near Atlanta , they probably were not '67s , as it would have to be an inbound shipment as the '67s were all made in Lorain . what would be the chances that there were 10 427 Fairlanes going to that area all on the same train . Its probably an old wives tale .

I agree.

If this really happened, Ford probably would want all of the cast iron exhaust manifolds returned as that was supposedly the bottleneck in the delivery of the 1966 427 Fairlanes. LOL

Regards,
Dennis

Same thing happened in Hondo Tx in the late '80s,except they were imports.

The guys I worked with watch about 30 cars get buried not more than 25feet from the tracks.

Suppositly a load of motors went down on a transport boat sumtime in the 60s. I keep hearing of this rumor but can`t find any info. I know they say there a lot of Allisons and Rolls Merlins on the bottom of that river from all the boat racing that went on there too.

Why would they use a boat they have a bridge a tunnel and trains that run between windsor and Detroit.I doubt that one.

69 R code Mustang coupe 68 1/2 R code Mustang coupe 70 ram air Drag Pack Cougar 67 505 F.A.S.T legal Fairlane

Rail cars between Detroit MI and Windsor ONT used to also go on rail car ferries across the Detroit River. The only memorable sinking in the Detroit River that I recall was the Montrose, and that I think was in 1962 or 63. I don't think there were any 427's aboard her.



Regards,

Dennis

when the Ford company truck carrying 6 427 TP engines to H&M was hi-jacked in KY????? Truck came out of EEE.
Rick

Yes, but I don't recall this specific incident.

Parts dissapearing wasn't all that uncommon. I recall where a boxcar full of engines or transmissions, and not necessarily High Performance, would occasionally dissapear. Sometimes it was just a routing error, or sometimes the boxcar would be found on a siding, empty.

Stuff would get hidden or fall into the coolant trenches, misplaced in cribs, etc ... . Test vehicles occasionally going bye bye.

My dad was at Ford too in Production Control. Tubs or baskets full of components thought lost or stolen were simply misplaced, then found later on. If not usable, either scrapped or sold to Parts and Service.

Regards,
Dennis

...I used to drive to Detroit twice a week for dealer will-call, circa 1970-1972. One day was to DPD (Detroit Parts Depot), and another day was to NPD (National Parts Depot). I used to just drive right past the guard gate, and drive around back to the docks. They decided to start checking everyone that entered, because a semi-trailer load of carburetors disappeared, but they never told me I had to stop before entering. Security called the loading dock, and told them to have me check-in next time, account the theft.

I knew the part number system, and used to take the long way around back. At NPD, They had stacks of frames (basic #5005), left over from the assembly line run, and I was always tempted to slide one off the top of the pile for my '66 Galaxie 500 XL. I probably could have gotten away with it, especially before the tightened security.

.......did receive truckloads of them at A-FPRC (Autolite-Ford Parts Redistribution Center, later called BPRC, Brownstown Parts Redistribution Center). We supplied the Regional Parts Depots across the country. NPD was a Class C Depot which handled slow moving stock and housed a majority of the 'Special' race parts until ordered by a dealer. I recall shipping a pallet of Cross-Boss intakes to NPD and I loaded a truck of 20 C5AZ blocks. Any carton labeled with an 'XE' got my personal attention, LOL, Rod. BTW, I started at A-FPRC when it wasn't even completed in 69 and left in 73. We had 96 truckwells, inside, along with 8 train tracks with places for 6 Hi-Cubes each.

Mickey Thompson's 63 1/2 #997 S/S Hi-Rise 427 Lgt/Wgt Galaxie,
1957 C-600 Cab-over carhauler w/390-4V, 2-speed rear-end
FGCofA member #4908
MCGC member #75

"There will ALWAYS be an FE in my LiFE"

...I never got beyond the dock area, but they had rear axle assemblies stacked to the roof, behind chain link fence near the dock. Looked like they were left-overs, right off the assembly line. Had the drums, everything attached to them. I knew what they had there because I used to study the books, noting the class "C" parts. NPD was the only source for class C parts in the whole USA. Which one was on Middlebelt in Livonia?

.

Mickey Thompson's 63 1/2 #997 S/S Hi-Rise 427 Lgt/Wgt Galaxie,
1957 C-600 Cab-over carhauler w/390-4V, 2-speed rear-end
FGCofA member #4908
MCGC member #75

"There will ALWAYS be an FE in my LiFE"

n/m

that is one factual incident, I know, I was one of the guys riding in the truck down to Charlotte. 4 guys from the Detroit area followed us (1 was a Ford employee) until we stopped at a bo-dunk restaurant in KY to eat. When we came out, the truck was gone and we ended up staying at a local dump motel for 2 days. Truck was found near Chicago, burned. Guys were arrested about 4 months later. Found 2 engines.

In some ways railroads are really strange.....

Funniest story I ever heard was a few months back while meeting with a railroad supplier in Atlanta. As you can imagine, most of the suppliers have a pretty substantial RR back ground. One of the co-founders of the company was an ex-CSXT manager with 30+ years RR experience. We were sitting during a break making small talk and he was telling us about some of his adventures as a young man on the RR. This guy was a 3rd generation railroader so he was tapped early to become a manager. One of the trains on his territory carried, as part of it's consist, a boxcar of old coins that were being returned to the treasury for recycling. Somehow the train ended up derailing and the box car carrying the coins spit open and spilled coins all over the right of way. After any derailment it is standard practice to conduct an investigation to establish the cause of the derailment. This guy and an older manager were just starting to interview the engineer of the train and ask him what was the first thing he did after the derailment. The engineer responded "I took every coin I had in my pocket out and threw em on the ground and told my conductor to do the same. Knowing you SOBs you'll accuse me of stealing em."

...I've been with CSX since it was C&O in 1977...*some* of the SOB's are out to hang anyone they can...BNSF Railway is supposed to be the worst.

Yea not only are the rail roads like that but a company i worked for did stuff like that too but it was semi trailers floor loaded with coins , with armed gaurds in front of the semi and behind it .
i think alot of people would be surprised on what trucks and rail haul nearthem . but anyways they said the floor loaded truck weighed like damn near 80,000 lbs . rough estimate . but man thats kinda wild to hear .
but i also heard of a semi truck full of nickles got high jacked like 7 years ago in FL
not to mention the UpS strike in MN i heard some of the old timers talking about hi jacking the trucks and some of the trucks did get high jacked , dont know if it was them but it was picket line talk so who knows

.......channel is dredged and would be the deepest part of the river, JMO, Rod.

Mickey Thompson's 63 1/2 #997 S/S Hi-Rise 427 Lgt/Wgt Galaxie,
1957 C-600 Cab-over carhauler w/390-4V, 2-speed rear-end
FGCofA member #4908
MCGC member #75

"There will ALWAYS be an FE in my LiFE"

This was the proverbial Shit Hit the Fan!

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&rls=com.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox&rlz=1I7GGLD&sa=X&oi=spell&resnum=0&ct=result&cd=1&q=Kissimmee+train+wreck+turbine&spell=1

hate to tell you.....


Hate to tell you, but they were probably buried beside the tracks. Most of the class 1 railroads are self insured and they would have paid the owners of any property that was on the train and dug a hole and buried it beside the tracks where the derailment occurred.


THis would be correct.

railroads are strange....... December 5 2008, 5:18 PM


In some ways railroads are really strange.....
The engineer responded "I took every coin I had in my pocket out and threw em on the ground and told my conductor to do the same. Knowing you SOBs you'll accuse me of stealing em."


Typical RR officer behavior.If there is a derailment caused by a broken rail,they will wait untill the drug test on the crew comes back to see if they can blame the crew for it.

My Grandfather worked most of his life on the New York Central...among his great stories was one from the prohibition era, how the railroad guys would hear about a box car carrying barrels of illegal whiskey and how they'd crawl under the car when it was in the yard, with a manual wood drill and keep boring holes in the floor until the whiskey started flowing...

I know this happened a lot in Montana back in the 60's and 70's on the Milwaukee Railroad. They were notorious for derailments due to bad rails and ties. I remember seeing pictures that my neighbor took of some of these incidents, as he worked on the recovery side. Lots of car carriers on their sides, and it was the same thing...dig a trench and push them in. From my understanding, the car companies didn't want the liability if something happened with these cars if they were recovered and sold. All the tracks were pulled up back in the 80's for scrap and the right of ways reverted back to the counties they passed thru. Not sure a metal detector would do much good, as there are also 100 years worth of spikes and plates laying out there too. lol