Locomotive cabs

[WSH]

To the engineers out there; what that heck are you guys doing in these cabs? I've worked in 20+yr old construction equipment that has better condition operating cabs. Most of these cabs in the photos are very beat up. What's the main factor that contributes most to these cabs looking like they do?

[MEC407]

Good question. And while we're at it, why do some people insist on taking a Sharpie and writing the unit's number on every square inch of the cab? I can understand wanting to have the number somewhere within your field of vision... but unless you have tunnel vision, I just can't understand the need to have the number in 50 different places throughout the cab. There is a thing called peripheral vision that is very useful, and most of us come with it preinstalled from the factory.

[GOLDEN-ARM]

It might sound bizarre, but Amtrak puts the unit number every foot or so, across a loco. Everywhere you look, there's a decal with the unit's number. No joke, I counted 16 different railroad applied numbers in the cab of a P-42. (AMTK 13) They are also in the hall behind the cab, on the steps, bathroom door, just about everywhere. When you have to answer the radio, in just a glance, in ANY direction, you know what loco you are on......

[10more years]

Well, there's a couple of reasons why the equipment looks so bad. None of them very good. There's conductors riding in those cabs also, so it's not just engineers. CSX is notorious for not maintaining anything. They just run things to death (I had an engine go bad on me last week. They sent me out another on as a lead unit. It went bad down the road a ways. I called the mechanical desk and they said that that engine had been "out of service " for two weeks.) Some of that equipment is getting really old. We used to have people who actually cleaned locomotive cabs. Not anymore, although some of the service centers still do. Believe it or not, a lot of us are first cousins to pigs (evidently). We don't keep the same power so some of us don't think that we are responsible for keeping it clean for our co-workers. A lot of the writing is done by bored, disgruntled employees sitting on trains for hours at a time. Some of us take pride in our work, our work environment. Some of us don't!

Noe of that explains why folks who smoke think it's all right to put their cigarette butts out on the floor of a cab, or in the widow sill, or leave ashes all over the control stand and floor.

[Engineer Spike]

As long a I have been an engineer, I have never seen a dual control engine, with the single control stand. I am talking about the ones where the controls on both sides are interconnected, like the ex Pennsylvania Reading Seashore GP 38s. I have been on many units with 2 regular control stands.

[NV290]

To the engineers out there; what that heck are you guys doing in these cabs? I've worked in 20+yr old construction equipment that has better condition operating cabs. Most of these cabs in the photos are very beat up. What's the main factor that contributes most to these cabs looking like they do?

The "Abused" looking cabs i have found comes down to two problems, either alone or in tandem.

1. The peeling paint and overall grimy look is the RR simply not taking the time to keep the cabs clean and painted. Most loco's will not see a shop for anything more then typical fuel/sand/fluid check. It's only at 92 day test cycles that they will ever be pulled off the road and actually get "shopped". But a loco not pulling a train is simply not earing money for the company so visits to the shops are kept at the bare minimum. To properly clean a cab, including wiping down the walls and ceilings, scrubbing the floor, disenfecting the toilet compartment, etc, etc and THEN, having to prep (sand, mask, remove certain items, prime) and then paint a cab is NOT something you can do in a few hours. That is easily a days work without anyone interfering in the cab. So needless to say, it rarely will be done. That is why if you notice on virtually all new locomotives, there are very little painted surfaces. Go inside any modern GE or EMD and you will find Vinyl covered ceilings and plastic covered walls. Rubber floor matting with vinyl trim. The only painted surfaces are generally the control stand and the back cab wall. This is all done to simplIfy upkeep and keep the locomotive looking like new. All the plastic wall coverings are dyed in the cab interior color. So there is no need to ever paint them. And it's much more durable. I even see stainless steel panels in many units in locations where people put there feet up on walls. All these surfaces are easily wiped down and stay looking like new alot longer. The back walls have little if anything to mask when it does come time to touch up paint.

2. The other big issue is the people IN the cabs. The crews. And quite frankly, they are without question, the biggest offenders.

Where do i begin?. The "road grime", the grey/black dirt that covers walls, ceilings and everything else is caused primarily by crews leaving windows and doors open on trailing units. Sand, diesel exhaust and dirt expelled from other engines in the consist end up leaving this mess everywhere. How lazy do you have to be to not close windows and doors when leaving a loco? Drives me nuts. Next is the people putting there feet on the walls, seats, control stand/desks and window. NASTY. Once again, a bunch of animals who have the mentality that because it is not there own, it's perfectly ok to abuse it. It's not just the dirt that hurts the cab appearence but also the abrasiveness of sand and other coarse grains that scratch up the surfaces. I see windows all the time on older style cabs with deep gouges from sand trapped in boot soles and worse yet, steel ice creeper spikes. Then you have dirty jackets hung on hooks that add grime to the walls as well as gloves left on surfaces. And then you have the trash. Once again, a bunch of lazy animals who cannot be bothered to use a trash bag. Nothing worse then getting on power and having to spend 10 minutes cleaning up some lazy SOB's trash. The worst is the idiots who eat sunflower seeds and pistachios and spit the shells on the floor. People have no respect for anything. We have ben getting brand spankin new GE's over the past months and already they have signs of crews simply not caring about anything. Writing on walls, and in almost every instance it's just stupid nonsense. It's sad that people cannot show respect not just for the equipment that is our livelihood, but respect for other crews who have to spend 12 hours on those loco's as well.

So there you have it, why are so many cabs NASTY? See above....

[Jtgshu]

To the engineers out there; what that heck are you guys doing in these cabs? I've worked in 20+yr old construction equipment that has better condition operating cabs. Most of these cabs in the photos are very beat up. What's the main factor that contributes most to these cabs looking like they do?

The "Abused" looking cabs i have found comes down to two problems, either alone or in tandem.

1. The peeling paint and overall grimy look is the RR simply not taking the time to keep the cabs clean and painted. Most loco's will not see a shop for anything more then typical fuel/sand/fluid check. It's only at 92 day test cycles that they will ever be pulled off the road and actually get "shopped". But a loco not pulling a train is simply not earing money for the company so visits to the shops are kept at the bare minimum. To properly clean a cab, including wiping down the walls and ceilings, scrubbing the floor, disenfecting the toilet compartment, etc, etc and THEN, having to prep (sand, mask, remove certain items, prime) and then paint a cab is NOT something you can do in a few hours. That is easily a days work without anyone interfering in the cab. So needless to say, it rarely will be done. That is why if you notice on virtually all new locomotives, there are very little painted surfaces. Go inside any modern GE or EMD and you will find Vinyl covered ceilings and plastic covered walls. Rubber floor matting with vinyl trim. The only painted surfaces are generally the control stand and the back cab wall. This is all done to simplIfy upkeep and keep the locomotive looking like new. All the plastic wall coverings are dyed in the cab interior color. So there is no need to ever paint them. And it's much more durable. I even see stainless steel panels in many units in locations where people put there feet up on walls. All these surfaces are easily wiped down and stay looking like new alot longer. The back walls have little if anything to mask when it does come time to touch up paint.

2. The other big issue is the people IN the cabs. The crews. And quite frankly, they are without question, the biggest offenders.

Where do i begin?. The "road grime", the grey/black dirt that covers walls, ceilings and everything else is caused primarily by crews leaving windows and doors open on trailing units. Sand, diesel exhaust and dirt expelled from other engines in the consist end up leaving this mess everywhere. How lazy do you have to be to not close windows and doors when leaving a loco? Drives me nuts. Next is the people putting there feet on the walls, seats, control stand/desks and window. NASTY. Once again, a bunch of animals who have the mentality that because it is not there own, it's perfectly ok to abuse it. It's not just the dirt that hurts the cab appearence but also the abrasiveness of sand and other coarse grains that scratch up the surfaces. I see windows all the time on older style cabs with deep gouges from sand trapped in boot soles and worse yet, steel ice creeper spikes. Then you have dirty jackets hung on hooks that add grime to the walls as well as gloves left on surfaces. And then you have the trash. Once again, a bunch of lazy animals who cannot be bothered to use a trash bag. Nothing worse then getting on power and having to spend 10 minutes cleaning up some lazy SOB's trash. The worst is the idiots who eat sunflower seeds and pistachios and spit the shells on the floor. People have no respect for anything. We have ben getting brand spankin new GE's over the past months and already they have signs of crews simply not caring about anything. Writing on walls, and in almost every instance it's just stupid nonsense. It's sad that people cannot show respect not just for the equipment that is our livelihood, but respect for other crews who have to spend 12 hours on those loco's as well.

So there you have it, why are so many cabs NASTY? See above....

Amen NV, Amen!!!

[slchub]

I'm known as "Mr. Clean" in the crew base. Once in the cab, I bring out the paint brush to dust off the control console. Next comes the anti-bacterial wipes to all of the control surfaces and the doorway leading to the restroom in the back of the cab (P42) and the toilet itself. (BTW, Who is ELMO?)

While the Amtrak cabs are not as bad as the freights, they are just as dirty and need to be tidied up a bit.

[Plate F]

I know of at least one guy on our RR that comes in early just to clean the locomotive and make sure there is water and an empty trash bag. Too bad more guys don't do that. Its nice riding with him cuz I can actually see the floor! :D

[Engineer Spike]

When I first started working out of CP's St. Luc yard, I could not even set my bags down right away. They had just mopped the floors. On the other hand, units off of Guilford usually have several bags of garbage in them. I usually try to find a dumpster, or if the isn't one, air mail it into a gon.
Even on new units, I try to wipe down the control stand. Somehow, no matter what, my hands are completely grimy at the end of the trip.
I used to work with an engineer who is a real neat freak. He used to wash the windows. He also had some solvent to remove the graffiti. He had a kit of spare light bulbs. He took the back panel off of the control stand, and replaced all of the burnt out gauge lights. He would even replace the bulb inside the alerter button. I have gotten on units and had to replace the gauge lights too, just so I could see the gauges. Luckily the mechanical dept. usually puts spare number, platform bulbs, as well as the reading light, and gauge light bulbs, in the circuit breaker cabinet.

[Montrealrail]

Here's some shot of the CP AC4400
let's come inside the CP 8858 AC4400dc


the virtual monitor


the trottles,we can see there are no reverser in


and the brake system

[ex Budd man]

People do things on the job they would never do at home. "It ain't mine", "can't see it from my house", "I'm no janitor", I hear this all the time. If their spouse caught them doing anythig like this they would get an earfull. I guess its a macho thing, cleaning is girley stuff. Grow up guys, you aren't twelve any more. Have some self respect and respect your fellow workers...........do unto others...........

[Vmac]

Does anyone have any pics of the rear of the locomotive interior(s).

[Engineer Spike]

The toilet is where you find out who is queer, a scab, latest separatist bickering between the French and English, or the true opinion on management. These are really useful bits of information! (just kidding)
Anyone from BNSF remember Margaret Morgan?

[GOLDEN-ARM]

I dunno Spike, did she have a deep @$$ ?