It was a great insulator hunt...

[Brains]

..In the ghetto of all places.
Todays hunt got off to a rough start, at first we didn't even plan on doing anything even remotely related to insulators but when our plans got canceled we found the time to go and hunt on a line where we knew we could find some Lynchburg 44's and olive green hemingray 40's. It took us two tries to find the spot, at first we got on the wrong highway and drove around in circles for about an hour, so we decided to go home in order to find a better map. I thought the map we had with us was fine and that my dad was crazy, he insisted the railroad was near 70 but i told him it was near 670 because on the map there was a familiar formation of railroads near 670. He said we could find out when we got home and you know who was right all along, me
So after lunch we went to the right spot on the line. Most of the leaves on the vines that were growing on the poles were gone, but the vines themselves were still there making it hard to get down out first target, and olive green 40. When we got the insulator we were pleased with the color however the condition was quite poor. Still, it was a nice insulator for a display or something so we kept it.
Next we made our way towards a shorter pole that we thought might have had a Lynchburg-44 on it but before we got to the pole we noticed something that seemed very out of place. Looking at the pole through the binoculars i could see some whitall tatums, some clear 155's of some sort, olive hemingray 40's and then there was some crazy looking insulator mixed in with them. Now we had been to this line before and we did see this insulator, but due to all the leaves we assumed it was just a busted hemingray 42. We got half the equation right, but this was no 42. Maybe a Locke 16? No, it couldn't be, unless... it was a cd-306.
Further investigation confirmed, that wile only a specimen, it was a Lynchburg cd-306!
We made out way through the weeds and cleared a spot so we could retrieve the insulator. It put up quite a fight and with the wind and all but we finally wrestled it down off the pole.
Wile only a specimen, this is the best thing we have ever found! You might say that it's the worlds biggest heart breaker, but i am very happy that we found something that is rare enough to have a 600-700 book value just sitting on a pole on some plain old railroad in the city. It is a bit unfortunate that the factory workers busted this one up, I'll bet they wouldn't have if they learned it was worth about 60 times what they make in an hour at the brick factory.
Moving on, we placed the insulator along with the 40 we had gotten down somewhere where we could find them again on the way back.
Yadda yadda yadda, we found some more Lynchburg cd-154's, tried climbing a hilariously tall pole, and saw some amber cd-216's, then we took off. Finally, one of our hunts worked out for us!
Given the magnitude of the Lynchburg-181, we will now continue to hunt this line more often, plan trips, maybe even camp out along it in different cities, or in different states if we have to until we can find one of these beauties in one piece.
Enjoy the pictures, it's too bad i didn't have my camera with me on the hunt though

[Buster]

Nice hunting. Even with wrong roads you all did good. Congrats....Buster....

[JCWhite]

Those are 4 nice insulators.... Remind me of Darth Vader.

[MinelabMan]

Pretty cool, but how do you find them or how do you know where to look?

[Brains]

a wile ago we drove past the line and thats how we found it, normally we look up the lines using our map program, google earth, and our map of us railroads we have. Normally works out, but sometimes we cant find the abandoned railroads that well.

[grasshopper]

sounds like a great time-congrats!

[gordiesgirl]

I for one hate getting lost, Glad thing worked out for you. Nice Insulators.

[Steve in PR]

That was an excellent find, Brains! What is the "Holy Grail" of indulators? The Lynchburg has to be pretty close with that kind of value!

[julieburger]

very cool.

[Brains]

i herd from some guy who herd it from some guy who read it in some article that the line is filled with them, gota do some serious hunting on this here line! IT might be the holy grail of insulators, it's one of those ones where you hear about them allot but never really see one, one that you know you will never find in the wild or own and then bam, ya got one!