• MEC GP38's, A second Order?

  • Discussion relating to the pre-1983 B&M and MEC railroads. For current operations, please see the Pan Am Railways Forum.
Discussion relating to the pre-1983 B&M and MEC railroads. For current operations, please see the Pan Am Railways Forum.

Moderator: MEC407

  by KSmitty
 
I was looking through the Summer 2010 Classic Trains Mag, and on page 20 in the "Fallen Flags Remembered" section was mention of DTI's only dynamic brake equipped locomotives-7 GP38's built to MEC specs. Apparently the order was canceled and DTIpicked up 7. According to this picture DT&I #200 would have been the first GP38 built and would have been an MEC engine.

Does anyone know;
-was the canceled MEC order really the first GP38 order?
-why was the order canceled?
-the fate of these units?
  by jwhite07
 
I think there may be an error in the article. The first GP38s built did indeed go to DT&I, but the order was for only five units delivered in January and February of 1966 (they did pick up two more in 1969 for a total of seven). Also, the photo you linked shows a locomotive with a nose headlight - MEC's GP38s were spec'd with high-mount headlights, and theirs were delivered in November 1966. Seems illogical to cancel a order and then turn around and place another order just a couple months later.

I can't put my hands on the cite so don't take this as gospel, but I seem to recall reading somewhere that MEC's GP38 order was a result of them borrowing one of Bangor and Aroostook's units for evaluation and liking what they found. BAR had the second order of GP38s, right behind DT&I's.

As far as what happened to the DT&I units, they went to GTW/CN, where they had dynamic brakes removed during rebuilding, and then to leasing companies LLPX and RTEX. Funny enough, the ones that went to LLPX were rebuilt again and had dynamics reinstalled! I don't know if they're all still running. All of the above info is per the photos of each unit in various stages of their operating lifetime as posted to rrpicturearchives.net, the same site your photo links to.

EDIT: A little more info, and to answer your questions more fully...