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From: dmc@videovax.Tek.COM (Donald M. Craig)
Newsgroups: comp.society.futures,rec.railroad
Subject: Re: Warm superconductors
Message-ID: <4676@videovax.Tek.COM>
Date: Tue, 10-Nov-87 13:25:20 EST
Article-I.D.: videovax.4676
Posted: Tue Nov 10 13:25:20 1987
Date-Received: Fri, 13-Nov-87 06:59:51 EST
References: <2824@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu> <1407@houdi.UUCP>
Reply-To: dmc@videovax.Tek.COM (Donald M. Craig)
Organization: Tektronix Television Systems, Beaverton, Oregon
Lines: 20
Summary: It ain't always hot and dry
Xref: mnetor comp.society.futures:191 rec.railroad:885

Once upon a time the Ontario government had (maybe they still do)
a `Transportation Research Centre' in Kingston, Ontario.
They had a maglev track and a train that ran around on it,
using technology licensed from a German company (Krauss-Maffei ?).

It seemed to work fine, in the summer.  But when the winter blizzards
howled off the Saint Lawrence River the track was buried under ice
and snow, and all the lovely hovering clearances disappeared.
They might still have the train, but they never bought another.

There's a lot of sophistication in old train technology.  When the
Canadian National Railways introduced a United Technologies turbine
powered (jet fuel yet) `Turbo' train on the Toronto - Montreal run
in the early seventies, it took ten years of re-engineering before
the things would run reliably during the winter.  I remember on
several occasions having to transfer to the diesel `Rapido' when
the `Turbo' failed in the thick of a blizzard.

Don Craig
Tektronix Television Systems