1st Gen/567 Hypotheticals Re: Customization and Repowering

[Allen Hazen]

EMD would do... what they thought would make a profit. Selling ENGINES to be used in locomotive re-powering competes with their (more profitable) business of selling whole LOCOMOTIVES to replace the off-brand units that would be candidates for repowering. My impression is that-- at least in the 645 era (1966 and later)-- EMD charged prices for new engines that didn't encourage repowering. (Of course, a significant portion of EMD's engine production went for non-rail -- stationary and marine -- applications. Leaving management in a delicate situation: too low a price tag on the engine and rail customers are going to re-engine old Alcos and Baldwins instead of buying new GP38, but too high and you won't sell any engines for tugboats!)
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As for ... weird ... locomotive configurations... Again, they'd do anything if it looked profitable. U.P.'s management was certainly eccentric in wanting 5000(+) horsepower freight diesels in the 1960s, but was a big enough customer (and promised to buy enough copies) that EMD was willing to do significant development work (notably, design a 4-axle truck) to give them DD-35 and DD-40X units. So, if you wanted 12-cylinder engines in F-unit carbodies(*) and A1A trucked geeps badly enough to ask for several dozen of each (and looked like a railroad customer worth cultivating for the future), you could probably have gotten them. I suspect EMD would have been more openminded about such things in the 1940s than later: they actually DID build some E-units with only one engine installed (and a baggage compartment in the rest of the engine room) before WW II, but apparently resisted Amtrak in the 1970s when Amtrak wanted an "E-10."

(*) Export locomotives... demand special engineering, since railways in different countries have different requirements. Locomotives with more or less F-like carbodies but 12-cylinder engines were built for some customers. ... Very few export-model EMD locomotives have been built for North American service, but a few have! So your imagined eccentric and nonconformist railroad president should certainly start by asking to see the export catalogue. ... I'm a GE fan myself, with Vermont ancestors: one of the counterfactual scenarios I sometimes enjoy imagining is one in which the Rutland's light-duty line over a delicate trestle to the islands in the north end of Lake Champlain survives and gets re-equipped with U12B units.

[JayBee]

For light axle loading situations look at the SDL39s built for the Milwaukee Road, with the second batch built after Dash 2 production had started. Also the GMD-1 production in Canada for CN, the majority of which were A1A trucked for light axle loading on prairie branchlines.

[Allen Hazen]

The SDL-39 is an interesting "hybrid" of domestic and export design features. Above the deck, it is a US-style unit: cab, etc, like those on standard units. But the trucks are similar to those used on export models.

[mtuandrew]

Mr. Hazen: could you expound on the proposed E10? I have a mental image of what it may have looked like, but would like some clarity.

[Allen Hazen]

MTU Andrew--
Alas, no: You now know as much as I do! ... As I recall, my information was from a "Trains" article when Amtrak was about to receive its first new power, so probably 1973 or 1972. (For the GE fans among us... if it's the article I think I remember, one of the pictures was a sketch of GE's offering -- very much like the ATSF U30CG -- that Amtrak passed up on in favor of the SDP40F.) The article said that Amtrak liked E-units: they particularly liked the twin-engine feature, since they thought many of their lighter trains would have a single unit, and with two engines the train might not be totally stranded when one engine failed. Supposedly they approached EMD about the possibility of an "E-10," but EMD refused to build one, saying (according to the article: someone posting to, I think, this forum a few years back said it wasn't true) that the template for building E-unit underframes had been scrapped. (If using the same underframe was even an issue, I suppose the idea was to have something very similar to older E-units in carbody construction. But I don't know how far the idea was pursued, or whether anything like drawings were ever prepared.)

Amtrak DID like E-units, and invested in refurbishing and modernizing some of their E-8 and E-9 units. At least some were rebuild as "E-9.5": 12-645 engines, but rated at only 1300 hp each.

(For clarity: I think the article may have used the term "E-10," but I am not sure. "E-9.5" is my made-upterm for the uprated E-units: I don't think it was ever used officially.)

[v8interceptor]

MTU Andrew--
(For the GE fans among us... if it's the article I think I remember, one of the pictures was a sketch of GE's offering -- very much like the ATSF U30CG -- that Amtrak passed up on in favor of the SDP40F.)

I know that this is the wrong forum for GE discusssions but I must offer a correction:
Amtrak did not Pass on the GE design. They purchased 25 of the design you are thinking of; the P30CH
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GE_P30CH
Granted they bought many more EMD's but the GE units were bought and operated for a number of years.

[Allen Hazen]

V8Interceptor--
True enough: Amtrak did buy P30CH units from GE in 1975. But this was earlier, when they were making up their minds to buy the SDP40F, the first units of which were acquired in 1973. I ***think*** that what GE offered earlier was close to the U30CG design built for the ATSF in 1967 (though, if I remember correctly, the sketch showed a unit without the front walkway that the Santa Fe had specified for its second generation "streamliners"): the P30CH was a modified design, with a longer frame to accommodate rear-mounted HEP auxiliaries.
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I looked for the "Trains" article this evening, but didn't find it. (30 years of "Trains" takes up a fair bit of shelf-space, and I got rid of a lot of things before moving a few years ago. Alas.) I ***did*** find the September 1973 issue, which contains the "25th annual motive power survey," written by J. David Ingles.
It mentions a number of locomotive re-building programs that were going on at the time and says

"...there are rebuilt E units running around which may qualify for an E10 designation because of increased horsepower rating. These units are ex-Milwaukee Road E9's completely overhauled and rebuilt from the frame up by the CMStP&P at West Milwaukee shops. The units feature new traction motors and electrical equipment...[and] have two 645 engines rated at 1300 h.p. each..."

From the accompanying photo, the skirting around the underbody tanks has been removed, and there are no portholes in the side walls, but otherwise they look like as-built E-units. The 1970s were a period when cost-cutting was in vogue, so PERHAPS, had EMD agreed to built "real" E-10 units for Amtrak, there would have been further simplifications in the car-body appearance. (In the actual world, the nose of the SDP40F was redesigned between the first and second orders to simplify -- cheapen -- the sheet-metal work.

(And my personal preference would be to call theMilwaukee re-builds "E-9u," reserving the "E-10" designation for the hypothetical new-builds from EMD. ... What EMD would have called the new units had they buit them is anybody's guess! The SDP40F was so-called (and not, as one would have expected given the similarity to the earlier FP-45, the "FP-40") because of price control regulations: it was easier to pretend they were a modification of an existing model than to give them a new model designation!)

[v8interceptor]

V8Interceptor--
True enough: Amtrak did buy P30CH units from GE in 1975. But this was earlier, when they were making up their minds to buy the SDP40F, the first units of which were acquired in 1973. I ***think*** that what GE offered earlier was close to the U30CG design built for the ATSF in 1967 (though, if I remember correctly, the sketch showed a unit without the front walkway that the Santa Fe had specified for its second generation "streamliners"): the P30CH was a modified design, with a longer frame to accommodate rear-mounted HEP auxiliaries.
---
I looked for the "Trains" article this evening, but didn't find it. (30 years of "Trains" takes up a fair bit of shelf-space, and I got rid of a lot of things before moving a few years ago. Alas.) I ***did*** find the September 1973 issue, which contains the "25th annual motive power survey," written by J. David Ingles.
It mentions a number of locomotive re-building programs that were going on at the time and says

"...there are rebuilt E units running around which may qualify for an E10 designation because of increased horsepower rating. These units are ex-Milwaukee Road E9's completely overhauled and rebuilt from the frame up by the CMStP&P at West Milwaukee shops. The units feature new traction motors and electrical equipment...[and] have two 645 engines rated at 1300 h.p. each..."

From the accompanying photo, the skirting around the underbody tanks has been removed, and there are no portholes in the side walls, but otherwise they look like as-built E-units. The 1970s were a period when cost-cutting was in vogue, so PERHAPS, had EMD agreed to built "real" E-10 units for Amtrak, there would have been further simplifications in the car-body appearance. (In the actual world, the nose of the SDP40F was redesigned between the first and second orders to simplify -- cheapen -- the sheet-metal work.

(And my personal preference would be to call theMilwaukee re-builds "E-9u," reserving the "E-10" designation for the hypothetical new-builds from EMD. ... What EMD would have called the new units had they buit them is anybody's guess! The SDP40F was so-called (and not, as one would have expected given the similarity to the earlier FP-45, the "FP-40") because of price control regulations: it was easier to pretend they were a modification of an existing model than to give them a new model designation!)

I would imagine that a new build E type unit designed in the early Amtrak era would have been much like the Commonwealth Railways (Australia) CL class:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonweal ... s_CL_class
These locomotives, built by EMD's Australian licensee Clyde Engineering, were mechanically very similiar to the SDP40F with 16-645 prime movers and C-C trucks.
They look like a cowl type unit with an E/F style Bulldog nose although an Australian poster on another forum said that they were true cab units with the carbody being a structural member.
Of course they probably would have had a higher unit purchase price than the SD40Fs and they wouldn't have made as good freight locomotives as the cowl units that Amtrak traded (for rebuilt switchers and CF7s to be used for switching and MOW service) to ATSF did....

[MEC407]

I would imagine that a new build E type unit designed in the early Amtrak era would have been much like the Commonwealth Railways (Australia) CL class:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonweal ... s_CL_class

DING DING DING DING DING! We have a winner!

[mtuandrew]

Too bad Amtrak didn't just send away to Clyde Engineering for their new locomotives A six-motor Amtrak E10 with dual 12-645s (whether with a traditional bulldog nose or with an FP45-style cab) would be a really nice kitbash for any model railroaders out there!

If Amtrak had insisted that EMD build a new E-unit, and accepted a conventional frame like on the DD40AX, do you suppose that EMD could have built a unit that fit through the North River tunnels? I still don't understand why Amtrak didn't insist that the F40PH be sized for the tunnels, even though it was primarily meant for off-Corridor use.

[Nasadowsk]

I still don't understand why Amtrak didn't insist that the F40PH be sized for the tunnels, even though it was primarily meant for off-Corridor use.

What would the point be? There's no way they'd go through the tunnels and Penn under their own power. Maybe to tow them through?

And, they *did* have some Corridor use - New Haven to Boston. And New Haven to Springfield. I don't think any sane person cried when those things were replaced by AEM-7s to Boston...

IIRC, the ever-popular P-32/40/42 were specifically sized to fit into Grand Central, which supposedly has the tightest clearances in the US.

(Maybe that's why they're so slow - GE had to take out the power to make everything else fit!)

[Engineer Spike]

(Maybe that's why they're so slow - GE had to take out the power to make everything else fit!)

No they're just slow loaders like every other -8 or -9.