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  • EMD Tier 4 locomotives delayed until 2017

  • Discussion of Electro-Motive locomotive products and technology, past and present. Official web site can be found here: http://www.emdiesels.com/.
Discussion of Electro-Motive locomotive products and technology, past and present. Official web site can be found here: http://www.emdiesels.com/.

Moderator: GOLDEN-ARM

 #1288353  by MEC407
 
EGR is a nightmare. That's why the engine manufacturers for trucks and buses are all using SCR instead.
 #1288387  by Sir Ray
 
At least one website I found indicates that urea (sorry, Diesel Emissions Fluid - DEF) is required in a 1:20 ratio to diesel fuel, which I take to mean 5% or so (wiki states "typically 2-6% of diesel consumption volume"). Given a 5000gal fuel tank, we get 200gal urea capacity - where would this tank(s) likely be mounted if EMD/Cat throws up their hands at EGR and take the more proven tech route?
 #1288419  by MEC407
 
One approach would be to reduce fuel capacity to 4800 gallons and use the rest of the fuel tank space for DEF. I can't think of any EMD-friendly railroads that would choose not to buy an EMD based only on 4800 gallons vs 5000 gallons fuel capacity.
 #1289751  by v8interceptor
 
Sir Ray wrote:At least one website I found indicates that urea (sorry, Diesel Emissions Fluid - DEF) is required in a 1:20 ratio to diesel fuel, which I take to mean 5% or so (wiki states "typically 2-6% of diesel consumption volume"). Given a 5000gal fuel tank, we get 200gal urea capacity - where would this tank(s) likely be mounted if EMD/Cat throws up their hands at EGR and take the more proven tech route?
Caterpillar has urea based systems available for it's line of engines and the new passenger units that EMD is building will have it.
They certainly could offer it as an option on freight units and, if what I am reading in industry news sources such as Railway Age is correct, not a single Class 1 railroad in North America will order them. GE is right now in position to completely blow EMD out of the water in the new build line haul freight locomotive market, possibly even permanently.
Their only hope would be that one or more railroads orders EMD power only to keep GE from having a monopoly and I haven't read any industry source that says there is any likelihood of that happening...
They can take the "more proven tech route" and still get no orders...I'm sure there are folks at Cat/Progress/EMD that are hoping against hope that some major technical issue appears with General Electric's EGR system...
 #1290669  by mikado-2-8-2
 
So, we are going to strangle railroads in favor of more trucks that would drastically increase total emissions from the whole transportation industry although individually each unit would look good on paper. The thing that clean air bureaucracy lacks is looking at the total picture as opposed to one piece of it. Micromanage and loosing the total perspective is a very real problem today no matter what we are led to believe. Figures and statistics can be manipulated any number of ways to come up with the desired outcome. I am just glad I don't have too many more years left to put up with the nonsense nowadays.
 #1291998  by v8interceptor
 
mikado-2-8-2 wrote:So, we are going to strangle railroads in favor of more trucks that would drastically increase total emissions from the whole transportation industry although individually each unit would look good on paper. The thing that clean air bureaucracy lacks is looking at the total picture as opposed to one piece of it. Micromanage and loosing the total perspective is a very real problem today no matter what we are led to believe. Figures and statistics can be manipulated any number of ways to come up with the desired outcome. I am just glad I don't have too many more years left to put up with the nonsense nowadays.
Unless General Electric is lying about their Tier IV locomotives being ready for market the railroad industry will be able to comply with the new regs. Note also the large scale rebuilding of older road locomotives (which are grandfathered under the new rules) being undertaken by some of the Class 1s right now..
 #1300129  by renrut44
 
These pages are interesting

http://www.dloco.com/LISTS/product/_MAI ... px?id=1070" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
http://en.chinacnr.com/394-977-10783.aspx" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

From this do we assume that the 16-265H is now built in China?

The 12-265H that EMD is experimenting with for Tier 4, is the block to be cast in the USA or China?

Will Caterpillar build the 12-645 Tier 4 in China? Should make the resulting loco price competitive, assembled in Mexico with a Chinese engine
 #1301832  by v8interceptor
 
renrut44 wrote:These pages are interesting

http://www.dloco.com/LISTS/product/_MAI ... px?id=1070" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
http://en.chinacnr.com/394-977-10783.aspx" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

From this do we assume that the 16-265H is now built in China?

The 12-265H that EMD is experimenting with for Tier 4, is the block to be cast in the USA or China?

Will Caterpillar build the 12-645 Tier 4 in China? Should make the resulting loco price competitive, assembled in Mexico with a Chinese engine
It's true that the 16-265H engines used in the EMD designed locomotives in China are built under license in China.
I do not read this to mean that the new Tier IV engine (which from what I am seeing is going to be an evolution of the 265 but with differences from that engine series,it probably won't even be called a 265, think GE HDL re-engineered to GEVO) will be built over there. I am fairly sure the prototype engine was built at EMD McCook (LaGrange). I imagine it might reuse components (crankcase (i.e block),ect.) from the 12-265H engine originally installed in the prototype SD89MAC.
Note that GE has licensed production of the GEVO engine(the 12 cylinder version I believe but not Tier IV compliant) to a Chinese firm as well but only for the Chinese market.

I guess if Caterpillar really wants their trade secrets stolen and engineering copied they could go outsource the new Tier IV engine line to a Chinese firm...
 #1301955  by BobLI
 
I'm wondering if the tier 4 EPA date will be pushed back by the new House and Senate. The republicans want to lessen the power of the EPA and the anti-coal campaign. Coal traffic makes up a nice chunk of RR revenue.
 #1303247  by renrut44
 
v8interceptor wrote:
I guess if Caterpillar really wants their trade secrets stolen and engineering copied they could go outsource the new Tier IV engine line to a Chinese firm...
CNR have fully built at least 210 16-265H in China, including casting and machining the block

CSR are building the 16 cylinder GEVO (the HXN5 is 6250HP), and exporting GEVO components back to the USA

Building diesel engines is not rocket science, why would you not license to a low wage source, then ship components back to drop your own cost of production?

I believe that the Cat 3500 family is now built in China

The Cummins QSK60 and 78 have a German cast and machined block, with the engines assembled in the UK

MTU (a Rolls Royce/Daimler Benz JV) use the Detroit Diesel trade name in the US, how much of a Detroit Diesel is now US sourced? Or are the engines bolted together in the US from foreign manufactured components?

Modern diesel engines are international

How many bogies under US domestic locomotives are now cast/machined in the USA? I recollect seeing GE's with SCAW bogies. Americast and Atchison are now owned by Australian listed Bradken, with Bradken's foundries now located in China
 #1303774  by v8interceptor
 
BobLI wrote:I'm wondering if the tier 4 EPA date will be pushed back by the new House and Senate. The republicans want to lessen the power of the EPA and the anti-coal campaign. Coal traffic makes up a nice chunk of RR revenue.
The new Congress will not be seated until January, a few days after Tier IV takes effect.
I doubt it will be repealed but there may be an effort...
 #1308730  by Allen Hazen
 
In its locomotive new section (p. 16), the December 2014 issue of "Trains" has a one-page story about Tier 4 developments (by Chris Guss).
A Progress Rail person is quoted as saying that "EMD and Caterpillar Large Power Systems engineering teams are working jointly on the development of a new 12-cylinder engine" and "plan to have Tier 4 freight locomotives field-testing as early as next year." The engine, so far, being "un-named."

The 12-cylinder bit is the most informative part of this: the EMD 710 engine needs 16 cylinders to power a 4,000(+) horsepower locomotive, so this must be some new design, not a modified 710.

The article has a photo of one of the new engines: possibly a photo of the engine compartment of the test locomotive (91) in the photo NorthWest linked to in the previous post, with the primer-painted portion of the hood removed. The photo is a bit of a teaser: there is so much external piping and ducting that the engine block is completely concealed from view! (Perhaps somebody who knows more about diesel engine engineering than I do could deduce something from the arrangement of ducts.
… It looks as if the turbocharger might be located at the end of the engine AWAY from the generator, as on GE diesels, rather than over the main generator as on previous EMD products (but the image is small and cluttered enough that I'm not 100% sure).

(The article also mentions the urea-using F125 locomotive on order for LA Metrolink, and explains the "Tier 4 Credit" scheme under which GE will produce "old fashioned" locomotives in the early months of 2015. A larger photo shows GE's test units 2023 and 2024 on a test train in California, back in June.)
 #1308960  by NorthWest
 
The understanding is that EMD is going a similar route that GE did, and this appears to be a substantial revision of the 265H. The turbochargers do seem to have moved from the alternator end. This may be due to the need to find space for DPF. Some of the new ducts are part of an EGR system.
Not an expert, but this is what I have observed.