There’s a Facebook group called Abandoned Rails which I flip through as occasionally something interesting pops up. This contraption appeared recently.
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Gunnison Alpine Contractors
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Necessity is the mother of invention, a half truck/half train. In the early 80s GAC had contracts to tear up old rail lines all over the Midwest and Deep South. This often meant moving a lot, weather it meant down the rails or down the road. Originally bought for parts to help fix the rear suspension of another Kenworth, it quickly became apparent we needed a vehicle to shuttle rails down the tracks to to the transfer spots to be loaded onto other highway trucks and hauled off. So the old cab over was put back together and pressed into service as a cheap but highly effective hi-rail truck. The front axel could be swapped with the rail wheel trucks and the rear was simply chained to the rail car behind it. This truck wasn’t the first to have this radical modification, she replaced an equally unique 66 stub nose Autocar that was similarly hi railed. Her rail running days were short though, she was replaced by a true hirail FWD (former Rock Island) that sported a dump bed and grapple that worked much better in this role. Now being surplus, she was sadly traded off to a fate unknown. It’s amazing the ingenuity and imagination of Grandpa (Jim Coleman), Dad (Tom Coleman), Uncles (Dave and Rob), and the rest of the GAC crew for creating such a unusual Franken-Truck!
And the same guy posted a pic of the model.
