I like MP36.

There, I said it. It was a realization I came to today as I was cruising around CUS at rush hour, and a hogger revved the daylight out of a MP accelerating out of the station, much in the way a teen would rev dad's hi-po car. With the constant-rpm F40's, there's no sound show. Although I still think F40 is tops for looks, the MP provides a better show some days.

The MP36es are okay, but I like the F40PH-2Ms the best. (Ignore that sound, it's just a pig hitting the window) Although I won't argue with an engineer who probably prefers the regular/-2 F40PHs, I like the looks of the Winnebagos. It's the only engine Metra runs where, even without paint, you can see it and think "That's a Metra engine!" They're unique to the system (like the F40Cs were) and also have historical significance, as they were the last F40s built, and were the final locomotives ever built at EMDs LaGrange plant.

Tadman wrote:There, I said it. It was a realization I came to today as I was cruising around CUS at rush hour, and a hogger revved the daylight out of a MP accelerating out of the station, much in the way a teen would rev dad's hi-po car. With the constant-rpm F40's, there's no sound show. Although I still think F40 is tops for looks, the MP provides a better show some days.

I can dig the historical significance about the F40PH-2M's, they are indeed unique, but that weird angular slant on the nose just doesn't do it for me. But I've got to say, if brute force could actually have a sound, an engineer revving up an MP36 upon receiving a highball would come very close. There's no other sound like it...

Hey Tadman
Do your self a favor and go out To IRM if you live in the Chicago area, I rode in BN3(9919) those two 567s are music makers. now that is a sweet sound. Any 567 is a music maker, rent or buy Silver Streak 1976 if you have a goo sound system on your TV you can hear the F7 Engines.
Also a Corsair reving up to taxi to a runway sounds just as good.

CNW5022-A519 wrote:Hey Tadman
Do your self a favor and go out To IRM if you live in the Chicago area, I rode in BN3(9919) those two 567s are music makers. now that is a sweet sound. Any 567 is a music maker, rent or buy Silver Streak 1976 if you have a goo sound system on your TV you can hear the F7 Engines.
Also a Corsair reving up to taxi to a runway sounds just as good.

Yes!!! The Es and Fs w/567s SOUND like locomotives. The MPs sound like lumbering B17s.

Guys, chill out. So he likes em, big deal? I think they sound neat, too, so chill. Ya, the dual 567s sound awesome. Not much beats that, but the rebuilt 645s in the MP36s sound pretty damn cool.

MetraF40C607 wrote:Guys, chill out. So he likes em, big deal? I think they sound neat, too, so chill. Ya, the dual 567s sound awesome. Not much beats that, but the rebuilt 645s in the MP36s sound pretty damn cool.

Actually ... the 645s weren't rebuilt! They were built new, however the design is different than the rest of the 645s Metra runs, so that would account for the difference in sound. That and they were built by GE, not EMD.

This is correct. The MP36s 16-645 F3B engine were brand new, and slightly different from F40s engine. Since the MP36 rated power is 3600 Hp vs 3200 Hp for F40PH-2M, it is probably one of the main reasons to explain such sound.

Other features such as electronic engine monitoring and control system, higher compression ratio (16:1 vs 14.5:1), Tier-1 HO fuel injectors, 4 pass intercoolers, Diamond-5 engine heads, split cooling system and the carbody harmonics are probably part of the explanation too.

Claude

I've never actually heard an E with twin 567's still in operation, but I do listen to UP GP15-1's and MP15's in Chicago Heights on CHTT, and they always put on a good show, as do the CSS GP38-2's pulling a long drag uphill at Hegewisch. But as the non-turbo units are getting rarer, the MP's are still in the upper echelon with regard to sound - at least they rev up and down, as compared to the constant whine of a F40.


Disclaimer - I still like the F40, this is not intended as a "bash" of any forty-series EMD.

Tadman wrote:I've never actually heard an E with twin 567's still in operation, but I do listen to UP GP15-1's and MP15's in Chicago Heights on CHTT, and they always put on a good show, as do the CSS GP38-2's pulling a long drag uphill at Hegewisch. But as the non-turbo units are getting rarer, the MP's are still in the upper echelon with regard to sound - at least they rev up and down, as compared to the constant whine of a F40.

Non-turbo 645s are getting a little rarer, but non-turbo'd 567s actually proved to be more reliable than their turbo'd counterparts, so more of those are still running (think about all the GP7s and 9s left on the class 1s, vs the number of GP20s and 35s). Of course, finding an operating 2 x 12-567 E-unit is a bit harder than finding a run-of-the mill 16-567 GP7/9..

byte wrote:They were built new, however the design is different than the rest of the 645s Metra runs, so that would account for the difference in sound. That and they were built by GE, not EMD.

I read somewhere, that they were built in Poland. If that is correct, you have a EMD-designed engine, built by a foreign contractor for GE. On top of that, I think they were modified to get the extra horse-power.

They are called a 645FZ crankcase, it is correct that they were built in Poland, the "Z" is the first initial of the company that builds them. They were not designed by EMD, they were designed in direct competition with EMD to accept standard EMD parts. The design history of the crankcase was covered previously in very considerable detail on the EMD discussion forum.

mxdata wrote:They are called a 645FZ crankcase, it is correct that they were built in Poland, the "Z" is the first initial of the company that builds them. They were not designed by EMD, they were designed in direct competition with EMD to accept standard EMD parts. The design history of the crankcase was covered previously in very considerable detail on the EMD discussion forum.

Yeah, long story short it was Morrison Knudsen who developed it, to have an aftermarket equivalent to drop into their rebuilds (primarily SD45-to-40 conversions) without needing to pay EMD anything. GE bought the assets from them when they went bankrupt.