Wasa skirun Specials during 2005.
SJ Rc6 1386
SJ Rc6 1415
SJ WL 4
SJ BC 3
SJ BC 3
The special in Mora 25/2 2005
How to cramp a yard in one day
The last weekend of February every year is the time when the quiet town of Mora with a population of 20 000 souls gets a very busy spot. TV channels send their crew, roads are blocked by thousends of private cars and buses with people with luggage and the most important thing, skis. The ten day bonanza will include various variation of cross ski competions. The only thing they have common is they are rather lengthy and become hugely popular with more than 10 000 people each day. This has become a pride of the town and a huge number of its citizens are invloved as volunteers to this event. The highlight is the final day, the first Sunday in March, when 12 000 people take on the task of going 90 kilometers from a small village of Berga to the town of Mora. The legend is from the 16th century when the king Gustav Wasa escaped from a hostile persuit going by ski to the safety, a basement in a farm.This years there was a plenty of action, on the first friday of Vasa Ski Run week, ICA a daily grocery food chain has leased a train from SJ. Seeing this car is a indeed impressive sight, drawn by two passanger Rc6.s 1386 and 1415 and 18 passanger cars and it really fills the yard. Though Mora sees freight service the trains are not as this long as the special train. For Mora line the train is only appearance of sleeping cars and couchettes which dominates the trainset. The other two cars is an ex. B5 class lounge car and and B7 generation conference car tucked in the middle of the train.
These trains are used for Tjejvasan, a female only race on the first Saturday to Oxberg. As the Mora i end of the line for the electrics, the last 30 kilometers will be handeled by a pair of diesels. Earlier SJ used a pair or even a trio of T44.s on this service. But as the freight section was devided in to Green Gargo, this year this service was given to a pair of TMX covered wagons, Ibabs TMX 1016 and Bantågs, ex IBAB TMX 1015. To heat the train a four wheeled container car was loaded with a special container with generator.
The train will also display few of the SJ.s sleeping cars, here we find examples of WL4 and WL6 sleepers. They are both built in B7 generation bodies and are easily identified. The earlier WL 4.s have rather small windows, even in the corridors, while the last class of B7-generation cars WL6 were developed with the long night trains to Northern parts of the country in mind. As these runs have a plenty of daytime travel the passangers were given larger windows. This arrangement does the trick of visually slimming down the cars. Both classes have shower and bathrooms in each of the compartments. If you want to go more on budget, clouchettes are way to go, the most common cars are BC2 and BC5 claases. BC2.s are originated from various passanger cars from the 1940.s generation which were rebuilt twice. First they were rebuilt to couchettes, with new car sides and raised roofs. During the late nineties they were rebuilt internally to meet the current demands of comfort. These cars are the last of this generation which is earning revenue, though heaviky rebuilt. The second is BC4.s which are part of 1980.s generation, or as I call them B7-generation. Like the sleepers they have only one vestibule and the space for the missing vestibule houses bathrooms.