BandA wrote:So, for front line engines it makes sense to scrap & go new due to fuel efficiency and maintenance costs paying for themselves compared to old engines?
CR also needs a fleet of reserve, peak time engines (making a couple of trips per day max), and "winter beaters" that they can sacrifice in future storms or plow service.
I hate to see old stuff scrapped as it seems wasteful, but I can't get too misty about diesel engines, especially ones that have high emissions. I find it hard to understand why coaches aren't indefinitely rebuildable unless the T's maintenance costs aren't competitive.
Despite the T's crushing debt burden, they have access to low interest loans through MassDOT and/or the feds, so cash flow shouldn't stop engine retirement.
Rebuilds are still economical on certain makes. As noted, the later-gen F40's are still the #1 passenger locomotive in North America, and are likely to remain so for a long time. Metra's actively rebuilding their massive fleet to the latest "3C" designation, which is the spec for the last all-new units that were produced on the mid-2000's. The T's 2C's and PHM's will almost certainly be snapped up and rebuilt for another generation continued service when they're scheduled for retirement in 2020-22. The only reason the T won't be rebuilding them for itself is because it's outgrown lower-end 3000 HP engines and needs much brawnier power to feed the system at peak load. It's not even consist length or bi-level vs. single-level that's forcing it...it's the rush hour butts-in-seats that have gotten too heavy for 3000 horses to pull without undue strain. But they will be excellent engines for somebody else in their next rebuilt.
But those are second-gen units with factory-delivered HEP. A rote-standard rebuild of a 2C to 3C spec doesn't take any unorthodox modifications to upgrade, so they remain pretty economical to rebuild and maintain at that spec (which still has a new-parts supply chain). Any original Screamers that were modified for HEP were done so nearly 20 years ago from the Amtrak dispersals with more invasive mods. Back when you simply couldn't get used passenger diesels that weren't museum pieces from the Truman Administration, so the higher cost of a rebuild was justifiable. Same era in which all the ex-freight Geep conversions flooded commuter rail rosters. In some cases those ex-AMTK F40's have been re-re-built once more from unorthodox or ugly-hack HEP conversions into rote-standard 3C's (like Metro North's Amtrak-convert F40PH-2CAT's, which are now vanilla 3C's)...but only because the toughest mods were done 20 years ago. There are no extant original Screamers still being picked up for rebuild because it takes a lot more work at a lot higher cost to redo one of those into a 3C than it does taking a 2C or PHM and churning out a 3C. The carbody can be solid as hell, but the economics don't wash when there are so many other options out there...
including aftermarket 2C's. Just Google "F40PH used locomotive" or "F40PH lease locomotive". Lots of them out there, and they're all 2's with HEP...no Screamers.
Maybe those carbodies can be totally cut up and refashioned into a totally different make of loco, sort of like the
MP32PH-Q, in which MPI took some of those dead MARC Geeps and repowered them as no-foolin' MP36's complete with an MP36's nose and cab grafted on. Sort of like a hermit crab inhabiting an old dead shell. But the market is not going to offer very much for them other than the parts cannibalization value. The cost-benefit isn't good enough, and with plenty of ex-Amtrak hulks still scattered around out-of-service amongst various owners the fact that no one in close to a decade has chosen to reanimate any more of those things speaks volumes. MassDOT is going to spend itself stupid trying to buck that trend, and expose itself to the risk of making a bad component selection like the terrible GP40MC HEP conversions because they won't be dealing with any of the outfits adhering to the more sustainable 3C-spec conversions. It doesn't matter if it's only a couple of units...giving them another crack at overcustomization is like letting a compulsive binge drinker have another go at the punchbowl. It's the exact opposite of what behavior they should be encouraging. And there are so freaking many better options on the lease/resale market--like those refurbished 2C's every major locomotive lessor is peddling--that they couldn't give a rational justification if asked.
Food for more thought: if you want rebuilds with a future...GE Genesis all the way. GE collaborated with MPI on the HSP-46 in part because it's got primo money to make repowering its own P40DC/P42DC locos (the #2 most widely-used passenger make on the continent) with the same GEVO prime movers and AC traction motors as our new ones. Buy 'em now from NJT and run 'em, then rebuild in a few years as "P46AC's" that are little other than HSP's in a Gennie's clothing. It may be our best bet for fleet standardization if MPI is too burned out from this experience to want to make any more HSP's after these 40 are done. All 200 of Amtrak's P40/P42's go on the aftermarket if their Siemens Charger option orders get drained...the P40's soonest.
As for coaches...you have to consider the upcoming retirements picture across ALL of the railroads still running single-levels. All single-level commuter rail coaches in active use in the U.S. and Canada are--with exception of 34 remaining MARC single-levels and 32 Shore Line East coastes--"Comet"-class of identical design. The Pullman, Bombardier, and MBB BTC's/CTC's are the same cars--with agency-specific door configuration and interior livery--as NJT's Comet II's, Metro North's Shoreliner I's and II's, the SEPTA I's, AMT's Comet singles.
-- AMT has slashed its fleet down to 24 and is gearing up for another purge by decade's end to go all MultiLevel. Gone by 2020.
-- SEPTA is actively studying replacing its small single-level fleet with MLV's by decade's end. Gone by 2020.
-- Metro North has released its new fleet plan calling for aggressive phase-out of all single-levels by 2025, starting with the Shoreliner I's and II's in 2020.
-- NJT's fleet plan calls for the same...total purge by 2025 starting with the Comet II's at decade's end.
There goes all your exact replicas--and their parts--in commuter service.
Next most-alike Comet generation:
-- NJT Comet IV's, the SEPTA II's, and the Shoreliner III's and IV's are later-gen...*almost* like ours, with slight evolutionary differences. Those will last until the middle/late- NJT and MNRR purges...maybe lingering to 2023-25, but definitely not being taken care of like they have any future after that.
-- Amtrak's Horizons are based on the Comet III"s, but have very different trucks with Amtrak fabricating its own parts in-house. Not really comparable.
-- NJT Comet V's--the last all-new order of single-level commuter coaches on the continent--are more divergent from the earlier gens, with Bombardier going fresh on the design. These will last till the tail end of the 2025 purges and could get scooped up by someone for light duty since they'll only have about 19 or 20 years on the odometer. But they will not have a rebuild afterlife because they've been problematic cars generally seen as a big disappointment. And the parts supply will be really really gone by then.
See where this is going? A decision in 2015 to send some of our dispersal coaches out for rebuild will--for units as worn out as the MBB's--take a couple years to complete. Say, 2017. At which point all 4 commuter agencies that use lookalike cars will have bid out and selected their next-gen bi-level orders. Meaning, by the time these coaches see renewed revenue service as rebuilds the countdown will be starting on retirements of the continent's entire supply of identical makes. Meaning fresh parts matches will only be in-stock for the slightly divergent later makes. By 2025-27 there may be no Comet-class coaches still in-service on any other (non-museum) railroad...including Amtrak, which can't wait to get rid of its black-sheep Horizons. So you end up rebuilding the cars for 10 years of renewed service...and the maintenance cost starts increasing steadily after Year 5 when the first waves of mass-scrappings make hunting for parts a lot more difficult. Nobody is buying them...not even upstart commuter rail loperators because aftermarket bi-levels are now readily available for rebuild. Nobody is fabricating new parts for them. And the parts supply at the end of these scrapping will be worn parts-replacing-worn parts, since NJT and Metro North pretty much run theirs into the ground.
So...you pay for a 10-year rebuild, they come out of the factory shiny and new, and then they're retired in less than 7 years because they're too costly per unit to maintain. And it escalates to too-expensive-to-maintain almost overnight. It's the same reason GP40 passenger locomotives are becoming increasingly endangered. 5 years ago there were close to 10 passenger outfits using them and easily 125+ active units. Now it's down to NJT which has slashed its fleet in half, the T which is in process of slashing its fleet in half, Shore Line East's half-dozen units (which are being rebuilt...but which also see far and away the lightest duty of any active roster of passenger Geeps), and MARC's six de-rated GP39's. That's it. Most of the retirements happened in the last TWO years. This is how suddenly the bottom is going to fall out of the Comet-class coach rosters once the mass retirements start coming in waves, and how quickly it's going to become unsustainable to maintain them. The end is coming sooner than the service life of a 10-year rebuild.
If you're going to rebuild
any singles to actually live out the full extent of their rebuild lifespan, it's probably got to be a selection of the best-condition Bombardiers. Or the Pullmans which were the most recent rebuilds with the freshest parts and best overall condition of the singles fleet. Not the rotted-floor MBB's.
