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EMD F125 METROLINK to buy 10 Locomotives

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EMD F125 METROLINK to buy 10 Locomotives
Posted by samfp1943 on Wednesday, December 19, 2012 7:10 PM

From TRAINSNEWSWIRE of this date Dec.19,2012:

  The article states at first there is an order for 20 locomotives, The first 10 to be delivered in 2015...The second batch of 10 units are to be delivered when and IF funding is available. Cost is $6.3 million apiece. The first three are to begin testing in the Fall of 2015.

From Newswire story:  "....The new four-axle F125 locomotives will be powered by a Caterpillar C175-20 prime mover, which will be the first EMD passenger locomotive to utilize a Caterpillar engine. The 20-cylinder engine will produce 4,700 hp. Caterpillar first announced the engine in April 2012. It is a larger version of the C175-16 engine currently found in Progress’ PR43C locomotives..."

  There was no representation with the story to show off the new product: which was introduces in 2011.

Further from the Newswire article: "...EMD first announced the new passenger locomotive model in October 2011 at the American Public Transportation Association’s meeting in New Orleans. EMD last built 20-cylinder passenger locomotives in 1967 and 1968 when the FP45 and SDP45 were produced for a handful of railroads..."

Link to the Passenger Diesels in the EMD Catalog :

http://www.emdiesels.com/emdweb/products/passen.jsp

Was curious to see if  EMD had published any pictures of the F125 and apparently they are holding their cards close to their vests  

Railway Gazette of 4 Oct 2011 had the following picture of a new passenger engine, linked here:

http://www.railwaygazette.com/news/single-view/view/emd-to-produce-passenger-demonstrator-loco.html

They say that at the original presentation, an engine had nopt been picked for this proposed 200mph model, which was apparently aimed at a North American market.

 

 


 

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Posted by owlsroost on Thursday, December 20, 2012 6:06 AM

Given that EMD has worked for some years with Vossloh in Spain on passenger and freight locos for the European market (basically EMD power equipment + Vossloh mechanical design/build), I wonder if some of the mechanical design might be derived from the Vossloh Eurolight loco - http://www.vossloh-rail-vehicles.com/media/downloads/pdfs/flyer/Vossloh_EUROLIGHT_us.pdf (this is CAT C175-16 powered, and available with 125 mph/200 kph capability) 

Tony

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Posted by samfp1943 on Thursday, December 20, 2012 10:34 AM

owlsroost

Given that EMD has worked for some years with Vossloh in Spain on passenger and freight locos for the European market (basically EMD power equipment + Vossloh mechanical design/build), I wonder if some of the mechanical design might be derived from the Vossloh Eurolight loco - http://www.vossloh-rail-vehicles.com/media/downloads/pdfs/flyer/Vossloh_EUROLIGHT_us.pdf (this is CAT C175-16 powered, and available with 125 mph/200 kph capability) 

Tony

Link provided by owlsroost (Tony):

 http://www.vossloh-rail-vehicles.com/media/downloads/pdfs/flyer/Vossloh_EUROLIGHT_us.pdf

You may be right Tony. The Vossloh locomotive in the provided link does sort of resemble the EMD shown in the EMD linked PDF (2nd one down on Rt side). (linked here)

 http://www.emdiesels.com/emdweb/products/passen.jsp

   The dynamices of the whole situation are debatable now, with with what Original Equipment manufacturers are in the final mix. Particularly, since EMD, is now part of Progress Rail, and a division of Caterpillar.

  It would seem that EMD is still on their original schedule to provide the locomotives (F125) when it was originally introduced in October 2011 for its roll out in 2015.  With only ten units confirmed and ten more subject to the vagueries of California politics, They are going to have to sell a bunch of units to get to where the E-Units  were in the world of passenger trains.My 2 Cents

 

 


 

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Posted by carnej1 on Thursday, December 20, 2012 4:46 PM

 Interesting..I wonder if the C175-16 is significantly lighter than a 16-710?

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Posted by timz on Thursday, December 20, 2012 6:42 PM

Looks like 175 mm bore, 220 mm stroke-- will it run at 1800 RPM?

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Posted by oltmannd on Thursday, December 20, 2012 10:23 PM

A $6.3M diesel locomotive.  Oh, my!

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Posted by beaulieu on Thursday, December 20, 2012 10:44 PM

oltmannd

A $6.3M diesel locomotive.  Oh, my!

A lot of Engineering cost with only 10 confirmed locomotives.

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Posted by oltmannd on Friday, December 21, 2012 9:32 AM

beaulieu

oltmannd

A $6.3M diesel locomotive.  Oh, my!

A lot of Engineering cost with only 10 confirmed locomotives.

Yeah.  Just wonderful...

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Posted by creepycrank on Friday, December 21, 2012 9:42 AM

Yes, 1800 rpm and 4 sequenced turbo to boot.

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Posted by owlsroost on Friday, December 21, 2012 5:20 PM

carnej1

 Interesting..I wonder if the C175-16 is significantly lighter than a 16-710?

According to the datasheets - yes, it's about 2/3 of the weight of the EMD unit, and probably more compact.

As for running at 1800 rpm - it's one of the prices you pay for having a higher power to weight ratio, which you need for a passenger loco - you can't run 30 ton axle loads at 125 mph.....

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Posted by erikem on Friday, December 28, 2012 11:54 PM

Hmmm, a lighter and smaller prime mover might be just the ticket for an idea that's been bouncing around my head for the last 20 years or so....

Commuter rail and corridor passenger rains do a lot of frequent stops, where the energy to get up to track speed approaches the energy required to overcome rolling resistance for the distance between stops. With some means of storing the braking energy, it would be possible to both reduce fuel consumption and improve acceleration as the stored energy could be used to give a temporary boost in locomotive power. The problem is that batteries don't take kindly to a large number of charge/discharge cycles and ultracaps have a low specific energy density, where a useful storage amount would put the loco over the weight limits for 4 axle power.

If we can load 20 tons of ultracaps by a combination of a lighter prime mover and eliminating the dynamic braking resistors and assuming 2.5 kwhr/ton effective storage capacity (cycling between ~70% and 100% rated voltage), the resulting 50 kwhr capacity should be good for maintaining 1mph/sec acceleration up to 60mph for a typical commuter or short haul train. The faster acceleration should be good for a minute off on travel time between stops. Another advantage is that the prime mover could be shut down on short layovers with the hotel power coming from the capacitor banks.

Thoughts, comments, insults?

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Posted by oltmannd on Saturday, December 29, 2012 7:39 AM

samfp1943
Was curious to see if  EMD had published any pictures of the F125 and apparently they are holding their cards close to their vests  

Likely, it is this:

http://www.progressrail.com/transit-locomotives-passenger.asp

-Don (Random stuff, mostly about trains - what else? http://blerfblog.blogspot.com/

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Posted by VIPER1 on Tuesday, April 20, 2021 10:33 AM

How are they working out for Metrolink?

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Posted by Overmod on Tuesday, April 20, 2021 11:59 PM

Many posts between 2012 and now regarding the Metrolink Spirits.

As far as I know they've worked the bugs out of the SCR/DEF system and have the engines in service.  It has been a long time since I heard about "problems" with them -- which is no guarantee there weren't.

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Posted by YoHo1975 on Friday, April 23, 2021 12:30 PM
Yeah, I've not heard any recent complaints. My gut tells me that Metrolink will likely follow Metra and start looking at Battery Powered next.
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Posted by Overmod on Friday, April 23, 2021 12:39 PM

One approach, right in their back yard:

https://railpropulsion.com/path

RPS is also far along working on a battery 'hybrid add-on' system which couples to an existing locomotive to give it regenerative blended braking, acceleration assist, and the potential for decreased pollution.

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