Rio Grande Valley, CFI,CFII
Are you referring to changing a 'traction motor' or the Prime Mover of the locomotive?
Traction motors in many cases get changed out in the field with the use of off track contractors to do the lifting and company mechanical forces to do the mechanical work necessary.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
BaltACD Are you referring to changing a 'traction motor' or the Prime Mover of the locomotive?
It is the traction motor.
PJS1 The other day I watched them changing the motor on an ES44AC. The work was performed by a contract crew of five. They had some seemingly pricey equipment to do the job. Changing a motor appears to be expensive. How does an engineer know when one of the motors on his/her locomotive is bad or is going bad?
PJS1 Yesterday I heard as much as watched an employee running up the diesel engine on a locomotive. He seemed to be running it at high rpms, as judged by the sounds and exhaust. What was he likely testing?
That sounds like a load test. Rev the engine up with the generator's output routed to a resistor ('load box') instead of the traction motors. Most units built since the 1970s can use their own dynamic brake grid as the resistor. There are any number of engine or electrical problems that load testing can help diagnose, or he may have simply been testing it after a repair was completed to ensure that the shop did everything right.
Greetings from Alberta
-an Articulate Malcontent
SD70 Dude,
Thanks for your thoughful answer. I appreciate it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_gqoZFZmvs&t=215s
One cold winter day I had a traction motor lock up on an eastbound trip. After much delay due to a frozen switch we got the unit set off in a siding.
A couple days later on a westbound trip the unit had been moved about five miles east to a location where it could be worked on and was leaning over on top of one of those dozers. Something had failed while it was being lifted.
BaltACD https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_gqoZFZmvs&t=215s
Great video! This is the company that I have seen perform the job in Temple. Even the pick-ups have the same color scheme.
Any idea how much it cost to change out a traction motor?
PJS1 BaltACD https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_gqoZFZmvs&t=215s Great video! This is the company that I have seen perform the job in Temple. Even the pick-ups have the same color scheme. Any idea how much it cost to change out a traction motor?
As someone pointed out in the comments section, they swapped it out for a dummy axle rather than changing the traction motor. I'm guessing that's what they usually do in the field.
I'm guessing someone has to crawl under there to unbolt things and disconnect the cables, which has to be fun...
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