Nelson Cabrera

Eric Girouard  0:00  

This is bucket talk, a weekly podcast for people who work in the trades and construction that aren't just trying to survive, but have the ambition and desire to thrive. The opportunity in the trades and construction is absolutely ridiculous right now. So if you're hungry, it's time to eat. We discuss what it takes to rise from the bottom to the top with people who are well on their way and roll up their sleeves every single day.

Jeremy Perkins  0:28  

This episode of bucket talk, we got Nelson Cabrera. He goes by the Instagram and Tiktok handle the crazy Salvadorian. This is a new trade for me on the podcast. We have not dove into the railroad. Nelson comes from the rail yards and the railroad, and I don't know much about it myself, so I'm really excited to get the background on what he does on a daily basis, how he got into it. Nelson, welcome

Nelson Cabrera  0:53  

well. Thank you very much. It's a pleasure to do this. This the first time doing a podcast, and I'll be on some just a bit nervous, but I'll be okay after, after a minute or two, nah, nah,

Jeremy Perkins  1:05  

nah. This will be, this will be good. Glad it's your first podcast, because it's, you know, your story raw, right from the railyard. So I'm excited about this. But take us as far back as, you know, high school, or even prior to that, like, Where'd you come from? How'd you get to where you are? And, you know, why? Why the railroad industry? Like, really, how'd you get into it?

Nelson Cabrera  1:31  

Well, back when I was living in my country, my dad put me in a mechanic shop when I was 13 years old, and then I didn't want to do that because I just want to be a regular kid. But he always told me, this stuff is going to help you in the future. I didn't want to see it like that once again, because I was a little kid. They just want to be playing. Anyways, we we moved to United States in 98 started working in construction. I worked with construction for 12 years. I be honest to you, I did not like that at all because my hands always been greasy. Doing construction is not it's not like that. So, yeah, I always thought that working for the railroad, you were gonna, they were gonna require a degree in anything like that. And I was kind of hesitating to get into the railroad because, like I said, I was, I thought that you were going to have to be some sort of big guy to do that. My best friend told me one day, just go apply for that railroad and see what they say? They might say, No. They might say, Yeah, apply for him. Luckily, I was able to talk to the vice president of the company in East Texas. He saw that I did, I done construction this whole time, and he saw that I know how to run forklift and such. He just didn't hesitate. And he said, Just go see sherry. She will get you that paperwork so you can go do your physical, your drug test tomorrow, and come see me like just like that. But here comes the book, a sweep floor for three months. I didn't, I didn't complain about it because I already was there, yep. So my point was to get far, not to stay in the same, same place. Anyways, they, they offer me to start working on trash more. Which trash more? They are the one that moves the train, or the locomotive, which they're electrical. Tore down, rebuild them. Then from there, they swapped me to do painting on locomotive. I did that for about a year. Then from there, one of my buddies asked me if I wanted to, if I want, if I want, to start working for him, but that wasn't a diesel side. And I'm like, sure he asked me if I know how to work on vehicles. That's all that I did, that I know how to work on vehicles. And that was on a Friday, Saturday morning, I show up to his house around nine, ish. The first thing he did, he pop a beard. He handed out to me. Long story short, we pulled one in United at Toyota Tacoma, about noonish, about four o'clock. We have the other one already in running, and he told me that I was gonna start working for him full time on that diesel side, and that's how to start working like that. That was in East Texas, and I moved to Fort Worth, and it's a different beast though here, because I'm on their 10 locomotive here in Fort Worth that I maintain, and I may do electrical air mechanic. All welding. So you name it all that kind of good stuff on on my engines, that's

Jeremy Perkins  5:06  

wild. So you started at a very young age in El Salvador, and then you got then you moved out here. Your dad was he a just like an automotive mechanic by trade, or he fixed everything.

Nelson Cabrera  5:23  

My dad was a carpenter. Oh, okay, but he always told me the mechanic was going to be the biggest step deal in the future. And like I said, I didn't want to believe that then, matter of fact, I just got done working on my wife vehicle, because I did the oil chain, I replaced some bushings and some other good stuff. And she's like, how do you know all this stuff just, I guess, just comes natural.

Jeremy Perkins  5:53  

Yeah, it's a it's a great foundation. I mean, you know, once you once you have a basic understanding of tools and how things work and how to take things apart. To this day, I don't necessarily know everything about my trade, but I'm willing to roll up my sleeves and and take it apart, see how it works. 90% of the time it works out for me 10% of the time. I'm like, oh, like, you know, you pull something apart all the bulb ball bearings fall out, and you're like, well, now I have no idea where all these springs and your bearings go. Long story short, it's good. It's a, it's a, it's a good trade to get into. It sounds like you were interested in trains at an early age, and that's kind of the way you want it to go.

Is that true? Yes, oh, yes. Why

the interest in trains?

Nelson Cabrera  6:48  

Well, because I always thought that working on trains or locomotive, it was gonna be like a regular vehicle, engine, transmission and a long ass shaft, a dry shaft. I was wrong. Not okay, so, no, so I was, I just want to learn how to, how to everything works, yeah, from the engine to the transmission, which it doesn't have a transmission, yeah, so, and this is how the whole thing works. You have the engine, which is the ones I have here. There are 16 cylinder engine, and they have a big main generator from the me. From the main generator, they shoot electricity to all my six stretch motors. And that's how you start building amperage. And that's I start moving. So it that's, that was one of my things, that I'm like, I really need to know how those things works. And I've been doing it for about 16 years, and I'm still, it still shocked me to see how much weight that those beasts moves around. Yeah,

Jeremy Perkins  8:00  

yeah, no, it's actually pretty cool. And you drummed up a memory for me, because little young Jeremy, my first, my first real job, or entry level job, was actually in the military. And nice. I was in the engine room, and I totally forgot that both main diesel engines were Alco engines. So they're American locomotive company engines, and that's what powered our boat went to, you know, reduction gears, and then to the prop shafts. But I remember, you know, at first I didn't know what Alco stood for. And then come to find out, they're the same engines used in diesel electric trains. And it they're, they're huge. I mean, two, I think ours were, they could have been 16 cylinder, but my memory is correct. It's like 218 cylinder Alco engines with with these massive turbochargers on it. Like, massive, the size. Oh, yeah, Volkswagen and each individual cylinder head, it's not set up it. It's not set up like a car where you have a cylinder head for three cylinders or four cylinders, you have one cylinder head. That is, I don't know, size of, like, two cinder blocks, two guys screw poles and do it, pick it off, and then you decode a lot of the the piston. Sorry, DECO, the carbon off the piston. You the pistons are massive. I mean, it's wild. It's a it's a big operation to to change anything on that. But, yeah, it was funny. I got my cut my teeth there on on some Alco So, yeah, bringing back some good memories.

Nelson Cabrera  9:46  

Yeah, those alcohols right there, versus my EMD unit, they have a different sounds, but they're on idle now Ges, they have a different sounds as well. Versus alcohols and EMD. Is EMD. They're more mellow down when they're in idle. The alcohol sounds like they're so mad at the world now, now the GE sounds like they have a big cam chef in Yeah. I don't know if you ever hear them when they they're on idle, but they sound just like there's a massive Camp Chef in it.

Jeremy Perkins  10:22  

So schooling wise, and everything like that. Everything was done on the job. You know, obviously started off pushing brooms, then, you know, got into, you know, taking stuff apart and learning on the job. But at either of the companies that you're at. Do they take, do they send you to factory schooling, or any schooling like that, to kind of up your knowledge on the platform you're working on?

Nelson Cabrera  10:48  

They did send me to to really noise, to get my to become, to be a certified mechanic, which all the stuff that they show me, there it was, I already know. Yeah, there was a few things that I like. I don't know that. I don't know that I need to keep it. I need to keep it with me, because that's, that's the kind of things that I'm messing up when I'm doing something on my engines. Yeah, but I'll stay there for about a week. And I got my certification, I got a lot of books and a lot of heart books that I still have at home, which they help me out sometimes to do some troubleshoot with my agents. Because I'll be honest, that's the you and I know that we're never gonna end up learning about mechanical there's always, always going to be more and more and more to it. So I was in Vegas last week. I was doing an air conditioning in one of my small engines, the ones I have here there, SD 40, dash two, which they're big agents that once I have in Vegas is a small switcher. It's W 1500 so from working on my massive engines over here, the smoking is to end, excuse me, to work on the small locomotor. Is a big change, yeah, because I'm so used to about seeing all this big stuff over here, and then I'll go over there. I'm like, Yeah, this is going to this. This going to be different.

Jeremy Perkins  12:26  

What, what? What is a switcher? So you obviously have your, I guess, walk me through, like, a basic understanding of the types of locomotives you have out there and, and, you know, what their job is, you know, Are they pulling, you know, 100 rail cars on, you know, an X platform and another ones just for moving equipment around the yard. Like, walk me through a little bit of that, because I know nothing about the railroad industry. Alright,

Nelson Cabrera  12:53  

so nest before the dash two is a 16 cylinder engine with this one don't have main generator. This This one has a alternator. That's what it's called, yeah. So we do business for BNSF. When a train from BNSF gets to our rail yard, they get there, they might look more goes there. They start breaking all the trainer part. Start moving the different containers to a different track. So I have three units on one end and another three units on the other end. So they both start moving stuff around, and we build trains for them, which an SD 40 dash to as a big, big engine, not like the one that BNSF has. BNSF has some, some SD 80s, which, that's the massive, massive engines, but that's some road powers. The ones that we have here, they're just nothing but a switchers. That little switcher, I'm telling you, is just a small engine with the AC on their diesel engine. Yeah. That one has just four wheels. The one I have here, they have six wheels with six stretch motor. The ones I the ones I have here, they're about 3000 horsepower each. And the one I have over there, I think it's 1100 horsepower in Vegas. I'm sorry,

Jeremy Perkins  14:39  

that's cool. I'm

looking them up right now. I actually didn't know that. I mean, it makes sense, like, obviously you gotta move containers and stuff around trail, rail yards and those the SD 80s are, are huge.

Nelson Cabrera  14:58  

Yeah. They

Jeremy Perkins  15:00  

are massive. So that's General Motors makes these. Yes, that's crazy.

Nelson Cabrera  15:07  

100 No, yeah, no.

Jeremy Perkins  15:10  

35 ton,

Nelson Cabrera  15:12  

wow, yeah, mine. Did I think about 368,000 pounds each,

Jeremy Perkins  15:18  

yeah? And then the little switchers just move stuff around, move cars, move equipment. So,

Nelson Cabrera  15:27  

so since I have three engines over here, I can pull about 100 cars, maybe less, yeah, and when we're talking about double stack containers full. So and the little switches that I have in Vegas down that one, they can only pull about seven cars because that the grade that they have over there is the wheels just leap too much on the on the rail, so they can pull more than seven cars.

Jeremy Perkins  15:56  

That's what that's, you know, I, I still am in a I still am in awe about the, you know, obviously, with with gearing, or, you know, tires and traction, or, you know, even even snowmobiles and and, you know, the tread they got. But like trains, it's amazing that that they can gain as much traction as they have there, that they can move on two smooth metal surfaces. It's wild that it even goes anywhere. You know, I always thought that was kind of funny,

Nelson Cabrera  16:35  

yeah, so some of my Indians used to have senders, which, that's the one that should send to the wheels. So when the wheel starts sleeping, it should sense constantly, or just poof, poof, poof, the way it can get some traction. No way. Oh, yeah,

Jeremy Perkins  16:53  

that's that's crazy. So, like, we had those, we had a different setup. I forget what it's called, but on like, if you ever been behind a fire truck, yes, up north, I don't know if you've ever been, but they have these, these units that come down when they need additional traction, and they spent, they spin chains, and they come down to the tire, and then the tire can roll over the chains. Um, that's wild, that that you have that same sort of setup. I never knew that.

Nelson Cabrera  17:21  

So a good friend of mine that he was one of my first followers on Tiktok. He posted video. He worked on fire engines West Virginia police, yeah, and he posted video about that, so I know exactly what you're talking about. Yeah, that chain just start rotating like that, and the wheel just, it's, that's wild. Yeah, no, that's crazy. Now, if you think about it, when we talk about sin, you know, we're thinking about regular sin, that sin that that would we used to put in our engines. It's, it's like a black, kind of like piece of glass. It's still part of sin, but it gives more, a better tracking to my engines.

Jeremy Perkins  18:06  

Yeah. So we, I would assume it's the same as, like in the automotive industry. It's called Black Beauty. We used it for, like, sandblasting parts.

Nelson Cabrera  18:16  

That's, that's the same stuff, Yep, yeah. So it's, it's

Jeremy Perkins  18:20  

a silica compound, black sand. So, yeah, I'm looking at it right now. Rail, railway traction sand. Wow, that's cool. I I knew nothing about it, and it, it's got a little hose with a little nozzle that shoots right down to the track. And I would assume you have, like, a hopper that you store the sand in. Like, how big is that you carry? Like, you know? So

Nelson Cabrera  18:47  

about, yeah, but 75 to 200 so in each end of that the locomotive, there's a sand tank. That's what we used to fill up those scents with same things with it. So it now, so it gives extra weight to the unit. Because if you think about it, if the unit weights more, they give less will sleep to it, yeah. So it was helped. Help out whenever you have more sand on the units, in anything that's

Jeremy Perkins  19:21  

cool, that's cool. All right, so now that's getting a train going. How does the train stop? You? Like? Breaks that up on that?

Nelson Cabrera  19:30  

Well, there's two type of brakes on my units or in every single locomotive. So you have the independent which the independence that want to stop the look more itself when you don't have any cars in the back. So let's say you have three units, and you use the lower handle, which has due independent that will stop the whole consist of three units or four units. Now when you're pulling the train, you have another one that is. Called automatic brake, yep. So that's the one that we use our work the most, and you have a dynamic brake. So the dynamic brake, and it's going to be kind of interesting, because it's based with electricity. So I don't know if you ever take one of those RC cars or and take the little motor apart, and you'll see the little motor, okay? So when you put electricity to that motor, it just spins one way, right? So in our situation with a dynamic Bray, we put electricity to it, very kind of invert the polarity, so instead of being yep, yep. So that's how you stop the train when, when they're going to, well, not when they're going super fast. But instead of using air brakes, they use automatic dynamic brake. Oh, cool. So that kind of slow the engine a little. It's kind of like an engine break, like a J brake, so, so, like I said, Yep. But those two, diatomatic and dynamic, I'm sorry, diatomatic and independent break, they're based with air. So all my system, inside my unit, they're nothing but air,

Jeremy Perkins  21:20  

yeah. So it's a, essentially, you got a reservoir that that holds the air, and then piping, and what have you, to a brake cylinder, and then it pushes on the shoe, which then pushes on the the wheel,

Nelson Cabrera  21:35  

the wheel, yeah, yeah. Cool. So you have, you have about 100

Jeremy Perkins  21:41  

100 pounds, no,

Nelson Cabrera  21:42  

40 pounds, okay,

Jeremy Perkins  21:46  

and that, how long would it take to stop 100 car train, say,

Speaker 1  21:52  

going 40 miles an hour? About three miles, three miles. Wow,

Jeremy Perkins  22:00  

that's intense.

Nelson Cabrera  22:01  

That's just because all the weight in the back. I mean, even if you throw it in emergency, the wheel just gonna lock, but they're just gonna slide into a rail.

Jeremy Perkins  22:11  

Alright, hey, alright,

Nelson Cabrera  22:13  

before I start working on the rail, yeah, I used, I used to have a 998, must, and I always said that I was gonna beat the train. Now that I work on this, I said, Yeah, my kids, they better not be doing that stuff, because I'm going to now that I know how that thing works. Yes, yeah, no, thank you.

Jeremy Perkins  22:32  

Alright, tell me. So we got a little bit of background on trains. It's, it's pretty cool, you know, a little bit different than automotive, some, some similar principles, crossover stuff like that. Um, education sounds, sounds pretty cool. They got a little bit of continuing education. So, you know, in your case, you didn't know a ton, but you were driven and and always hands on. So, you know, you got a job and then and learn from there. But tell me, tell me an oh shit moment, a moment that, like, you had something apart or didn't know how to fix it. How'd you overcome all that? There's gotta be one good story that you always tell at the barbecue. Okay,

Nelson Cabrera  23:23  

so here's a good one. Yeah, enough. An fra inspector is a federal inspector that goes to inspect any local models in the whole United States. Yeah. So this, this guy has, it's like the big boss of any bosses in the whole railroad. He can come and say, Well, I don't like how the unit's running because it has too many oil leaks, blah, blah, I'm taking night of service until you fix it. He came one time and he said, Hey, this handbrake I have. So the handbrakes on the unit, I have two that they have wheels and the element they have handled, just ratchet up like that, and it ties. But this one, this, this handbrake has a wheel, and it was flapping up and down, up and down the whole time. So he said, You're gonna have to fix this. He said, until you fix it, you're not gonna be able to use it. I said, shit. I went inside my car next I went to look for it's just a little bush in the ghost that holds the pin. And I already have one. I do have one, but it was bigger. I called my boss, and I said, Hey, dude, Fra came and put this unit that a service that matter. But how many those bushings? He's like shit. Well, now what we gonna do? I said, I don't know, but I'm thinking about something. So my friend called me the Mexican MacGyver. I. Yeah, so one thing, grab another bushing. I cut two of them at the at the same time. Yeah, I left one a little bigger and the other one smaller. That way I can fit it in. And when I got it all fit up, I welded all the way around, yeah, believe it or not, stay pretty sturdy right there. Wow. And then I took a video to it, and I sent it to my fra inspector. I sent it to my boss, and said, Let's fix he's like, how the hell do you fix that? I said, I don't know. It just came to my head, like, I will never would have thought that my pro way for for the right bushing to get there. But if you fix it, you fix it, yeah, therefore I reply, it's like, I'm good with that. If it is all fixed, it's all fixed. I don't have to show up there to get it done.

Jeremy Perkins  25:48  

Sweet, sweet. And then obviously, you know, you you probably find the right the right bushing at some point in time and replaced it. But like thinking on your toes and getting the job done and and fixing it in a pinch. I love it. I love, I love stories like that. That's awesome. Yeah.

Nelson Cabrera  26:06  

I mean, this is, it's like a it's, you know, it's like I was telling my boss the one time I tell you that I don't know how to fix something or I don't have a solution for it, just fire me. Just find me. Because, I mean, you know, there's always, there's always a solution for everything. Yeah, yeah, it's just a little common sense you have to use. And if you have it, you can do whatever you want. But yeah, there's, there's been some hiccups too, yeah, this is a good one, too. Nothing to repair about anything trying to start this, this locomore, one of one side of the batteries. Well, it takes two batteries to start locomotor, and there are 32 bolts. They're about 4000 bucks each one. So I couldn't start this locomore. And I just went and grabbed a brand new battery that it just came in. And I guess I was trying to cut some brakes right there, bridges and stuff. I used this logo mode to start the engine. I got it all all up and running. When I lower down my forklift and I back up the body went like that. I just went sideways. I flip it. Yeah. That was the Holy so, since it's a brand new Barry, have the brand new acid and all the stuff you should have See, all the bubble just coming out in the ground. No, exactly. That's what I said. I called my boss and I said, I'm going home. He was like, what happened? I said, I just dropped this battery. It's a brand new bar. He's like, holy shit. Now what are we gonna do? I'm like, I'll figure out. I'll figure something out, see if I can get it up or fix it my myself. Well, I did. I went to, I went to autoso, and I just got me, like, like, bridges of, not metal, copper, yeah. So I just drilled drill holes on top of it, on top of the cells, about this little maybe about one by one. Now I just put the bridges in between. That works crazy. I just, I say, I say, $4,000

Jeremy Perkins  28:31  

now it sounds like it's a huge battery to get these things started.

Nelson Cabrera  28:34  

Yes, they are, and they are massive,

Jeremy Perkins  28:37  

and it doesn't travel with the locomotive. Once you get the locomotive started?

Nelson Cabrera  28:42  

No, I have to Leo man, okay, so because, it's only because there's two, so on the on the front of the locomotive, on the side, I don't know if you ever seen the little step in before you get into the cab, yep. So there's, there's two cabinets were used when I slide my batteries in, yeah, the only way, 1800 pounds,

Jeremy Perkins  29:06  

okay, only 18.

He almost got me that. I was like, yeah, no,

Nelson Cabrera  29:18  

oh, yeah, yeah, there's

Jeremy Perkins  29:22  

how long do they last? I mean, a normal automotive battery. I mean, obviously they can go under the right conditions for a decent amount of time, but it's usually like three years or 30 or it's three years or 36 months that that a battery is good for. I've seen them go 567, years. But is it the same with yours that they're about three years or they're less? No,

Nelson Cabrera  29:44  

they're last long. They're about the last one I replaced, I think last by 11 years. Wow. I mean, they're expensive, but they're they're good, and it's all depends how, how. Good about treatment you give them, because you can just add regular water to it, and that'll be fine, yeah. But if you add acid made once in a while, it will last long.

Jeremy Perkins  30:12  

Oh, so, yeah, I'm looking at it now. They're serviceable batteries. They're like, they're like, the old car batteries. You add distilled water and and, yeah, put some acid in it, and that's interesting. And once they get low, they each individual cell has a cap. And

Nelson Cabrera  30:30  

that's, yeah,

Jeremy Perkins  30:33  

old school, old school. I love it. Um, technology wise have, I mean, obviously there's more electronics on them and stuff like that. But like, are they still pretty old school compared to, like, today's standards when it comes to trucks and, you know, excavation equipment and stuff like that, where they got joysticks, more computers, more electronics. Um, are trains still pretty dinosaurish?

Nelson Cabrera  31:02  

Well, mine, they were built. They were built in 1970s and to be honest, for 1970s technology, it's pretty amazed me. Amazed me because inside that cab, there's a long cabinet where there's some electronic cars. So some of them are for my voltage regulator, some are for my governor, some are for my wheel sleep, some are for my throttle. And they're pricey. They're about $3,000 per per car. Electronic I have, I used to have some couple of units that they were that they have electronic horn and electrical bail for that age. I mean, I'm sure that somebody put it along the way. But to have those little improvements, it's just, crazy. Yeah, they are. I think that old was that guy? No,

Jeremy Perkins  32:10  

no, I was gonna say it was the boat I worked on, I think was built in the 80s. And, I mean, I remember the technology in the engine room. It's like, big cabinets. Everything was big and there just wasn't, there wasn't a ton of technology. It was, you know, a lot of a lot of, actually, no LED lights. Everything was bulbs, um, you know, the switches, the gages, everything was just very simple, very easy to work on. There was no, you know, beautiful, you know, LED displays, or stuff like that. This was, yeah, I guess it's simple.

Nelson Cabrera  33:00  

I've been slowly replacing some of my lights on my units for for LED, yeah, because back in the days, I mean, when you when you're sitting down in the cab looking at the casting, and you have just the regular light bulbs you can barely see on needles on night time. So, and that's what I told my boss. I said, we need to just upgrade it so we can see better. And that's where, that's what we've been doing, and it takes so each light bulb that I have right there, they're 74 bolts. So my headlights, the one that goes on the nose, they're 32 bolts. And they slide the one goes in the bottom. There's 74 bolts,

okay. But other than I want to get a little,

Jeremy Perkins  33:54  

I wanted to get a little into current events, because, you know, as you've seen and and it's probably ripped through your industry a little bit with safety standards and whatnot. I guess it comes to the news that, you know, especially, I think it was in Pennsylvania, there was derailment, and then there's been a couple of derailments that hit the news. But one thing that was pretty interesting that I didn't know was, you know, there's what people there's what the media tells you and and, and what you see on Instagram, Tiktok, whatever, that this is happening more frequently. And though, what I found out, doing a little bit more digging, is that derailments happen pretty regularly. It's just whether or not they're, you know, put out in the news or whatnot, and that just happened to hit a news cycle. But is that true? You guys see a lot of derailments, or at least at a frequent pace.

Nelson Cabrera  34:50  

It's very rare to see a derailment. Okay? I had, in this whole time there working with this company, I had maybe two of them. Nothing really bad. I mean, it's just they derail, because sometimes when it's cold, the rail just shrink, and when it's hot, I mean, the rail just expands, and it's just part of the nature. I have one before that the rail just started stretch a lot, and the engine they were running just fine. Notice on you see the engine just rocking back and forth. Does coming out and it was in the ground, jump the train. I mean, one, one engine state like this,

Jeremy Perkins  35:37  

yeah. How do you? How do you, how do you fix that? Like tons of equipment. Do you guys do it yourself? Do you guys have a crane company come out and and pick them back up? Or how does a whole derailment scenario work? It?

Nelson Cabrera  35:54  

There's a big crane that that is. It's not on standby, but we usually use them. It's massive, to be honest, that crane itself comes in one truck. That trucks come in different trucks, so and when they bring it over, they just put everything, they attach everything together, and then it takes more time for them to put the crane together then pick up whatever they need to pick up.

Jeremy Perkins  36:24  

Wow. And your company owns one No, no, no,

Nelson Cabrera  36:29  

that's that's a different company that we use, cool, cool.

Jeremy Perkins  36:35  

Well, shit. I mean, I think that we've got a basic introduction to the train and locomotive industry, it sounds like, from the research that I've done, Texas seems to be one of the main areas for for cargo shipments and train yards and rail yards and and if you're looking for a job in the railroad industry, you might want to look in Texas. There are other hubs around the United States, but that seems to be, I think the last time I did a little bit of research on it, there was, I think that's the most employment of railroad mechanics, operators, stuff like that. Was, was in was in Texas. So I'm in Texas, yeah. But outside of that, what do you do for fun?

Nelson Cabrera  37:27  

Well, since I have like, 71,000 kids and I'm just playing, we've been stuck on baseball here lately, I have three kids that they love to play at baseball, and that's, that's, that's what we've been doing, nice, weekends, weeks, days, that practices and like, maybe here in the next couple hours, one of my kids going to go to practice, because he goes, he went to elite. So, but other than that. I mean, the family is this the last thing, not the last thing, but that's the thing we that I do more, more than anything nowadays. And, yeah, I will go to the game and, you know, here and there. And better than that, this just what the kid does want.

Jeremy Perkins  38:19  

Simple Life, simple life, yes, yes, easy, but fulfilling. I love it. Yeah, my daughter and son. My daughter plays softball, my son plays baseball, and she just made the all star team. So, like, there's going to be travel through the summer and and, and a lot more games. So yeah, you're right. It does. It consumes your time and it makes you feel sometimes like you have 7100 kids.

Nelson Cabrera  38:47  

Yeah, when this season was over, my oldest son was having practice on Monday, yeah, my second one was having practice on No, I take that back. On Tuesday, they were they were going to church on Wednesday, my son has a practice. On Thursday, my daughter have had a practice. And Friday, it was like this, on and off, and then Saturday morning, three games, four games and a day. So can't complain. I mean,

Jeremy Perkins  39:23  

it's, it's nuts, it's getting, it's a lot more than when I was growing up. They're, they're playing more games and traveling more and having more practices, and it's wild. But yeah, Nelson, I want to thank you for being on this podcast. This has been eye opening for me. I hope, I hope the gear heads out there, that that that hear this, are a little bit more knowledgeable on the railroad industry. I absolutely enjoyed this, because I learned more about the trade than than I knew going into this podcast. So that was wonderful. But if anybody wants to learn more, where can they find you? What you know, what's a good resource to point them to leave the phone.

Nelson Cabrera  40:09  

It can be either Instagram or Tiktok, which you know, goes as a the crazy Salvadorian on on either Instagram or Tiktok and like, it's like, I always say they if, if somebody's looking for a job and to start the railroad, if I don't have the option to say, hey, you can work for me, I have some other followers that they have. They work as a contractor, and if they looking for somebody to hire. I just got in that direction. It's only because when you get into a railroad, it's kind of like a drug, yeah, it gets into your veins. And I get up from there, I went to to the oil field, and I'm like, I have to go back. I have to go back, and I have to go back in here. I am Hell yeah,

Jeremy Perkins  41:04  

so it's an addiction. I love it. Awesome. Well, thank you for being on the podcast. This is a blessing. I appreciate learning more about what you do.

Nelson Cabrera  41:11  

I appreciate it. Thank you very much for having me and thank you for everything you guys has done for me.