They just wanted to stick gas turbine in everything back then. The blind optimism clearly clouded their judgement. They forgot the whole reason rail is competitive: its energy efficiency. Gas turbines aren't exactly fuel sipping.

Gas turbines are usable on trains but probably not cars - the hot exhaust is terrifyingly hotter than bothered. The only way to use a turbine properly is to derive the heat as a useful commodity - turbine trains would be ideal for a mobile factory which can process resources during transport - a bakery and processing/packing line would be perfectly appropriate. So would a hotel or hospital. Stalin had his personal militarised power train. Train cars were the private jets of the 19th century in the USA.

So what was its downfall? I would presume the lack of dedicated high speed track. If you could run a train at 170 on regular track then the UK wouldn't need to build HS1 & 2. Fuel cost must have been eye watering too.

Way back in the day when I was just a young fella I rode the turbo from Montreal to Toronto. I remember boarding the train and heading up to the bar dome car - before the train even left the station. Can't really say that I remember much more of the trip. I do remember being very sombre on the trip home. It was on the old Rapido. It seemed to take forever to get back. 🤣

素晴らしい中国！

I worked onboard these trains from 1978 onward, when I started CN had transitioned to Via Rail, and watching this video I was transported back to that time period. Working the bar dome car at the tailend was fun and exciting, especially challenging when going into banks, because the automatic banking system wasn't always working. Anyway I was young so I found it very exciting to serve Via pasenger drinks in the dome. I was lucky to had the opportunity to work both the dome bar car and snack cars, working from Toronto to Montreal return was a very long day, but very rewarding.

The horn section in this soundtrack gave all my houseplants Autism, even the plastic one.

Too bad it doesn't exist today

A phone call to Japan would have been easier.

It has been shelved.

France has also developed a similar train with two Turboméca helicopter engines. It was a very nice machine, but the oil crisis of the 1970s killed it quickly. These machines consumed more than airplanes!

Greetings from England. The turbo train looks great.

C'est vrai qu'on retrouve la silhouette du H 19 vu le nez de la motrice

And the they're still promising high speed rail. But 'merika don't need no infrastructure.

NH..loved the light weight tilt a train idea..it had some success in Europe but never got off the groud here..service was a sore point on The..PC$$⚠️

Living in Boston then having visited montreal..1972/1973 using via 2 toronto i never saw or rode It or rode Acela later & indy we went in 69!

Using right angle gear boxes, we can add as much engines as we please. We don't worry about fuel economy, noise, we're just zipping from downtown of one city, to another, in comfort!

The soundtrack is hilarious! “The Turbotrain… in color!”

Soviet made garbage

Lol, sounds like a DC-9 flew passed you at head height watching it go by..

Sikorsky's Great Gearbox Horror Show.

Looks like a Florida Brightline train concept

Sadly politicians run against high speed rail

I was completely unaware of these. Gearboxes tend to be relatively high maintenance, so perhaps that was an issue. Diesel-electric and electric trains use of electric motors for power at the wheels would seem simpler and lower maintenance.

Engine and locomotive technology advances rapidly. Every 10 years we have something much better than what came before it. The Turbotrain was great at first, but after only 10 years it was clear that there were conventional diesel-electric locomotives that could do the job of pulling a train at high speed better than the engine in the turbotrain. They should have just hooked up that high-speed diesel to the front of the turbotrain and let it do the job of pulling the entire train around. The turbotrain would have been used in that manner for another 20 years with no problems.

How To Compete With Airlines. 1, add wheels to a fuselage. 2, use turbine power but not with direct thrust utilisation nor driving efficient multi-bladed variable-pitch propellers. 3, use complex and unproven gearboxes to funnel shaft-drive directly to some of the wheels, completely ignoring the facts that (a) driving a generator or alternator to provide current to traction motors had already long been proven to be more efficient; (b) that decades of locomotive experience had clearly proven the superior reliability of power-electric drive over power-mechanical (and power-hydraulic) drive; and (c) that UP had unequivocally demonstrated that even turbine-electric propulsion was excessively fuel-hungry compared to diesel-electrics of similar power to the rail and less than optimal in the reliability stakes. 4, run the passenger services at about a third of the speed of a period airliner due to the inconvenient presence of track curvature and altitude variations between and over annoyingly hard and unyielding geographical and man-made features. What could possibly go wrong?

If they can't keep the tracks & roadbeds up to class 1 railroad standards then how can the tracks carry a train capable of 170 MPH when they can't even handle normal freight trains at 60 mph.

A few years ago there was one in Schoharie NY. There were a pile of them in Providence Ri for years. They were POS. Constantly breaking.

If CN had paid as much attention to the design and operation of this train as they did to the hostess's wardrobes then it might have had a chance of success.

I kept expecting Batman and Robin from the 60's to come crashing in everytime hey played those awful horns haha =)

Funny that they blame the TurboTrain for failing and NOT the bad track condition as well as the many railroad crossings.

One issue they had was lack of torque from a start. So why couldn’t the electric motor be used there?

Is it just me or does anyone else think the nose of the turbo train looks like a sore vagina? If I saw this in a Museum, I would point and laugh at it. (Yeah I know I'm sick)

was this filmed on a microwave?

LOVE that the Granatelli Turbine got a shout out in this.

Loved the early morning Turbo from Montreal to Toronto. Faster than the current Via trains these days.

A 800 MPH jet stream circulation hyperl00p between Calgary & Red Deer & Edmonton would work. The terrain & geology is perfect for a Boring Company 800 mph jet stream circulation hyperlOOp. As well as provide shelter from Lot's fire/lightning/EMP's to come due to the Great Year precession of the Sun's shadow millennial alpha Omega equinoxes when earth's orbits pass between the two energies of the Sun's OOrt cloud magnetosphere for the next 1,000 years. These are just the birthing pains of this the millennium of climate change. The first of Noah's SE to NW tidal tsunamis won't be pulled out & around the planet east to west by the new moon until the first major conjunction of mercury & venus in 2033 & every 40 years thereafter. Reject the eastern tribalism racism Antichrist religions in favour Christ's New Covenant New Commandment that united & warned us all.

Shame the video only runs at 5fps.

♫ 'Cause I'm leaving on a jet train ♫ ♩ ♬ Don't know when I'll be back again ♬ ♩

Nothing that obama introduced was successful.... MAGA

Cost is what killed this little experiment. Over $13 million spent on this locomotive alone. Production versions would’ve been less, but still well above the cost of a diesel. Not worth it given that most rail lines aren’t even capable of handling the speeds this could attain.

Canada was great in the 70's

Totally silent.

I am working CW400 450 km CCECC saudia Arabia

Are all ballast less tracks.?

0:29 why was the film spliced here?

Welldon

এই সব পযোকতি মেশিন দিয়ে দুরতো গতিতে বাংলা দেশের রেললাইন তৈরি করা একান্ত দরকার বাংলা দেশের জন্য জরুরি ভিতিতে দরকার

A historical artifact showcasing early high-speed rail exploration in Canada.

Fascinating to see the foresight and ambition of VIA Rail at that time.