Chaihe

NG station area and depot is now a gated bus park. The famous bridge is now a road bridge and a new road bridge cross the river from the sg underpass to begin the log road covering the old formation on the other side. A second ng bridge used to cross from north of depot to join the line but only piers remain of this. On the other bank is the Chaihe Forestry Machinery factory which still repairs 10-13 ng C2s each year (no C4s, no diesels) from April - November. Repair of C2s is not limited to local forestry lines-see below. It has no ng (or sg connection) these days and locos are shipped to the sg line by road.

At its peak in the 50s and 60s it repaired 40-60 locos a year and built around 10 locos a year. This sugests 100 to 200+ locos were built here. They carried a simple rectangular plate (with Chinese characters only, no motif) saying it was made at Chaihe. The works has no samples of these plates. Has anyone seen or photographed one?

Information provided by the manager Mr. Huang is:

'Steam ng logging railways operating at

Huanan near Jiamusi

Alihe and Ganhe off the line from Jagdaqi to Yitulihe and Genhe from latter to Mangui.' (Quail routes 14H and 14G)

'The factory also repairs locos for Dahuichan (Beijing) and a salt (mine and factory?) near Tianjing.'

'Dunhua in Jilin prov., Shijiazhuang Hebei prov. and Harbin factories no longer build nor repair C2s. '

We forgot to ask if Chaihe or anywhere else is producing new boilers for C2s. An object in the yard looking like an internal boiler tube structure painted pink suggests they may be.

The following lines are said to be closed; Changting, Tieli and all other lines between Suihua and Nancha, Tongbei (confirmed by visit Evans and Gillard).

He did not know about Arxan (Quail 7B), lines north of Nancha or Wanxintian at the end of Quail 13B.

The manager and friend also suggested that:

prefix SZ = Shen Zhanhe (Forest Zhanhe)

prefix SW=Shen Weihe

prefix 31 is a region including Zhanhe and Suiling

SZ-31010 Zhanhe, 020 Suilin = Polish built 31020, it was said

prefix 21 is a region including Weihe and Huanan. SW-21055 Weihe, 21026 Huanan Pritchard

prefix B* is for Polish built loco. The star being the communist star linking Poland and China. B*309 Yabuli

Other systems/information

Lengshan/Qingyun

System reported closed with Qingyun now a ski resort. But this needs more research. Lengshan is not off the expressway from Yabuli to Mudangiang and is probably accessed by road via Qingyun or by train.

Hengdaohezi (Yabuli to Mudangjiang)

mainline through gorge, view from freeway down on old roundhouse with +/- 10 QJs dumped outside. Must have been great in steam days.

Logyard here supplied by road (and rail?) and overhead wire electrics work a 762mm line in the yard to transfer logs from the factory to standard gauge. 3 locos seen 1, 3 and 2 (or 5?) These locos are disimilar to Japanese o/h ng electrics Nichiyu as seen elsewhere in China and Taiwan and are probably more recently Chinese built. Pick up is by bow collector and poles for catenary are all wood.

Hailin

This was a wild goose chase. No local information on ng forestry line here. It appears not to exist so ng loco seen at Mudangjiang locomotive works was not from here (nor likely from Hailun nor Hualin).

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