Sunday, May 1, 2016

Switzerland 1988: From Disentis to the Matterhorn

Deutsche Version dieses Postings

On the day after our Bernina tour, I could take this picture of the Disentis-Muster station:

Disentis-Muster station, 15.8.1988

A short time later, an older Furka rack locomotive emerged from a shed and rumbled on the turntable:

FO 33, Disentis-Muster, 15.8.1988

We took a short breakfast and went to the tracks—but the FO locomotive had not moved:

FO 33, Disentis-Muster, 15.8.1988

Our train, however, was pushed over the Oberalp pass by a newer Deh 4/4 II.

Distant signal D* of ?, 15.8.1988

Descent to Andermatt, 15.8.1988

11% (110‰) downhill:

Descent to Andermatt, 15.8.1988

Descent to Andermatt, 15.8.1988

Deh 4/4 II 92 "Realp", descent to Andermatt, 15.8.1988

Andermatt, 15.8.1988

Home signal, Andermatt, 15.8.1988

We took the next train down through the Schöllenen Gorge to Göschenen:

Schöllenen Gorge, 15.8.1988

FO's home signal A, Göschenen, 15.8.1988

FO 53, Göschenen, 15.8.1988

I only took two signal box photos this day, of the Integra signalling panel at Göschenen. It is of type 'Domino 55 mit Zwergsignalen', i.e. "with dwarf signals" for shunting routes, as I have learned from Hanspeter Thöni. The upper part of the panel, which connects to an Integra Domino 67 interlocking, has the diagram and buttons for the northern part of the line through the Gotthard tunnel, with the two-way connection of the two tracks at "Gotthard Nord":

Integra interlocking panel, traffic bureau, Göschenen, 15.8.1988

Integra interlocking panel, traffic bureau, Göschenen, 15.8.1988

Somewhere near Brig I took this picture of a village consisting solely of log houses:

Somewhere near Brig, 15.8.1988

The following picture is probably from the gorge between Visp and Zermatt on the BVZ:

Somewhere between Visp and Zermatt, 15.8.1988

Here is a sequence of pictures from the Gornergrat railway, which uses three-phase current and hence has somewhat complicated overhead lines, not to speak of the complications of the cograil:

Gornergrat railway, Zermatt, 15.8.1988

Gornergrat railway, 15.8.1988

Matterhorn, Gornergrat railway, 15.8.1988

Riffelalp, Gornergrat railway, 15.8.1988

Points, Gornergrat railway, 15.8.1988

Matterhorn, Gornergrat railway, 15.8.1988

The Seilbahn Gornergrat-Hohtälli, built by Von Roll, had a pylon immediately below the top station of the Gornergrat railway. I was fascinated by the double track cables, which allowed the mounting of "flying" suspension rollers to keep the haulage rope up. This allows extremely long distances between the support pylons. Unfortunately, this seilbahn has been dismantled in 2007:

Seilbahn Gornergrat-Hohtälli , 15.8.1988

The two cabins are almost invisible before the boulders of the Hohtälli:

Seilbahn Gornergrat-Hohtälli, 15.8.1988

A small cable railway lead upwards from the top station of the Gornergrat railway. The most important goods to be hauled were clearly stencilled on the car:

Cable railway, Gornergrat, 15.8.1988

Back down in Zermatt, I took the following picture of the old HGe 4/4 15 of the Brig-Visp-Zermatt railway. On its side, it had the old letters VZ ("Visp-Zermatt")—it seems that it was only used for chartered trains at this time:

BVZ HGe 4/4 15, Zermatt, 15.8.1988

At last, here is the electric FO tractor 4926 in front of the Brig station building:

FO 4926, Brig, 15.8.1988

Update 2.5.2016: Here is Hanspeter Thöni's comment:

The interlocking at Göschenen is of type 'Domino 55 mit' (with dwarf signals, i.e., with routes for shunting movements). This is an entry-exit interlocking, but without geographical locking. The relay racks are still wired directly. Only with the Domino 67 type, geographical interlocking (with wiring by geographically oriented cables) was introduced. A Domino 67 can be identified by the transparent buttons for train routes as well as shunting routes, as the buttons can show a flashing indicator (memory indicator [for a prearranged route]).

An addition to the Gotthard tunnel [segment]: The double connections between the two lines are called "Spurwechsel" [literally, track exchange] in Switzerland. This track arrangement is not in the middle of the tunnel, as there are two double connections, called "Gotthard Nord" and "Gotthard Süd." Gotthard Süd is controlled from Airolo.
This part of the interlocking is Domino 67. Looking closely at the image, one can see that the buttons for the dwarf signals are transparent (see previous paragraph). The reason for this [the Domino 67 interlocking] is the distance of the points from the interlocking. With a Domino 55, it would not be possible to control the points and signals in the tunnel. With a Domino 67, this is possible due to three-phase points machines and selective signalling indicators. Therefore, this installation does no longer require separate relay racks in the tunnel.

[Hanspeter Thöni]

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