Do they know what is causing the crcking?
The latest word is that with UP needing a lot of power and having found no buyers for them they'll be going back into service. The ones without cracked frames first and the ones with cracked frames will be overhauled and returned to service. No one wants them so UP is either stuck with them or would have to sell them for scrap prices. I recently started work at the NP diesel shop and I've been told some of them have been sitting "in storage" for several years already.
Bruce Kelly We caught UP 8259 coming south through Bonners Ferry, Idaho, this past weekend. That's the only SD9043MAC I've seen on this route in over a month. Weird, considering how they were the most common power here for several years. UP's Can Am Corridor, Hinkle, OR, to Eastport, ID, is now mostly UP and CP AC4400CWs , with the occasional CP ES44.
We caught UP 8259 coming south through Bonners Ferry, Idaho, this past weekend. That's the only SD9043MAC I've seen on this route in over a month. Weird, considering how they were the most common power here for several years. UP's Can Am Corridor, Hinkle, OR, to Eastport, ID, is now mostly UP and CP AC4400CWs , with the occasional CP ES44.
According to a fellow clubmember that works in the Roseville Loco shops, Roseville and Hinkle basically do there best to get the 9043's on the other's section of railroad. Nobody wants to deal with the oddballs.
So you'll often see them in bulk on either division.
i've seen at 2 different times an indianna rr sd9043 on cp's paynsville sub west of mpls mn. i know they have a few. I saw them because i heard a different souding loco coming other than the GEVO's that we usually see and hear.
The MK 20 to 16 Cyl. conversion involves removing one pair of cylinders from EACH end of the crankcase.
For those who missed it, Kalmbach's "Locomotive 2012" annual contained my story on the CEFX and UP SD9043MACs which once roamed the Can Am. Editor Greg McDonnell, who is one of the most knowledgeable people out there when it comes to diesel locomotives, changed my references in the story about SD9043MACs to read SD90MACs because that's actually how they were listed in the GM/EMD documentation, even for the 4300hp versions. It was the buyers (UP, CP, CIT/CEFX) who applied the SD9043MAC name, according to McDonnell.
narig01Did any other railroads get these frames with 16-710 engines?Thx IGN
Canadian Pacific bought 60 SD9043MACs (and 3 H engined 6,000 HP SD90s whcich were quickly retired), some may be in service but all are currently for sale.
CEFX leasing has a fleet of 40 (built new for them, not bought second hand)
"I Often Dream of Trains"-From the Album of the Same Name by Robyn Hitchcock
narig01Question. What was the effect of putting a lighter prime mover in these units? One of the design issues I remember reading about when SP reengined SD 45's with 16-645's was concerns about balancing weight. Thx IGN
There were 16 cylinder -40 series EMDs built on -45 series frames (IC's SD40A's come to mind) so there certainly was some engineering precedents known to ESPEE, I would imagine the real challenge was when they started using "cut down" crankcases (i.e the original 20 cylinder crankcase with the last four cylinders "sawn off") in the SD45 to SD40-2 conversion program, though IIRC MK Rail held a patent for that process..
At the time the "convertible" SD9043MACs were built EMD had designed a common platform locomotive frame which would accept the 16-710, 20-710(i.e SD80MAC) and 16-265H engines so the convertibles were not a case of "kitbashing" but were engineered to take any of the prime movers..
There are among us "rivet counters," able discern there merest meager variations among locomotives and other stuff of railroading.......
This weld's/frame cracking involves, believe it or don't, shock-absorber counters. Response to track-to-truck-to-carbody inputs of force resulting in carbody-motion, make running any locomotive a unique thrill ride, well at least a curiously surprising micro adventure.
The video in this stream shows shocks on every journal. We normally saw few of the 9043's in the Bay Area before I retired...so I fall back to the recollections about shock absosorbers: the HTC on dash 2's had one on each side of the each trucks center axle and if leakage was seen speed was resricted to 50 mph (from 70).....no mention was made of any restrictions
for any other engs with leaking shocks---like the GE and Alco FBs, floating bolsters, Blomberg Bs with only vertical or vertical and horizontal shocks.
The GE C truck has shocks on the outer axles; the steerable EMD truck that I picture in mind had, initially, one shock mounted on the forward axles of each truck on one side and the trailing axle on the other side. Again no restrictions if leakage was observred.
Back to the 9043's; observe that all axles on both sides have shocks in the clip. When walking around the SD90's, about a dozen of them, I ran I remember the same configuration....until the last one.
Inspected, walked around with mini-Maglite at 0500, no exceptions.
At noon delayed 70 miles away, I walked around
again, and saw each journal had been freshly applied shocks on every journal and.....please believe this....each had unfastened from the truck frame and were hanging down.
Freshly applied I use to say that dust and rust were not next to the drill,bolt and nut holes.
I wouldn't move the engines further toward Roseville without some safety judgement from Omaha. They said go.
Can we guess that, for entertainment purposes, that these shock absorber amplifications had something to do with suspected or actual failures of the eng's frames?
UP are renumbering them to 35xx to free up the 8xxx numbers for ES44s
M636C
Catch 'em while you can! I found this pair working the grade up from the western banks of the Missouri River,
west of Atchison, Kansas, earlier this year.
watch?v=95I0PguFrk8
Just putting this out their when i went for a FAN TRIP to Spokane Wa, i saw TONS of SD9043 MACs it was nuts.
During inspections the UP discovered cracking of the locomotive frames at the location where the fuel tank attaches to the locomotive frame. Those locomotives with cracks are being stored at major UP terminals like North Platte. Those locomotives without cracks are still in service, At this point the UP plans to repair the locomotives, but the repairs are awaiting UP and EMD mechanical people engineering a permanent fix and not just a temporary Bandaid repair.
I hear UP is putting most or all of their SD9043MAC's in storage or something like that. I read 3 different things about them. Does anybody really know what the scoop is. Here is what I read:
1. UP is putting their SD9043MAC's in EMD shops for frame repair
2. UP is retiring them and replacing them with GEVO's
3. UP is storing most or all of them at major points such as Proviso, San Antonio, North Platte and many more
I want to know what the real scoop is here.
Nate
UP Altoona Sub
MP 94.1
Fall Creek, WI
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