That is a track inspection mobile or better known as a track geometry car which checks the tracks for defects so the MOW can fix the hiccups in the rail before a train gets them and ends up on the ground.

Not bad for a sleepy lion who knows his trains

Twenty points goes to you!

Geometry Car my guess

Sorry, you are just a little too late. It is in fact a Plasser American Gauge Restraint Measuring System. It has the ability to measure:
* Alignment of both rails (31 foot mid chord offset)
* Longitudinal profile of both rails (31 foot mid chord offset)
* Superelevation
* Gauge (loaded)
* Gauge (unloaded)
* Vertical and lateral forces

I have a few more pics coming up soon.

damnit i had to do something called sleep lol and i just got up. Anyways its 1 of 2 Geometry Cars, the other is in a train of 2 cars while this is the self propelled one.

Personally, I prefer CN's iteration...a former RDC-1 converted into a self-propelled track geometry car. It's got everything a crew would need inside (including a full kitchen, bedrooms, and, of course, bathrooms) and a complete suite of detectors underneath.

(And at the risk of sounding like a foamer, it has a sick horn...a P5, if I recall correctly)

P5 is a sick horn indeed, up ther with the RS3l and RS5T...

Very interesting. To say the least I was surprised to see that roll out of the CSX yard in Fostoria. I didn't know what it was until I was able to get home and look up the company.

rail feasure detector. rail detector car for short. finds place the rail is ready to fail, rails that have hidden voids by a combination of strobes and ultrasound. crawls along at a fraction of an mph when working. self propelled of course.

ranthor beat me to it. i didn't see that.

but the ones we had, one actually, (no two, there was one that looked like that a little and one that looked like two of those little german railbusses)) and it belonged to some outfit that subcontracted, (speno maybe?) didn't normally do all of that, but that was back in the days of strip chart recorders and before computers that i remember them. back in the 60s.

ooooo nice inspection car catch love it.