After the very successful Budd RDC car came the SPV 2000. What were the actual mechanical problems with the SPV 2000 that resulted in its ultimate failure?
LC
From what I can remember, the SPVs had all 4 axles powered and had an automatic transmission to supply torque consumate with the improved wt on drivers, but that required matching axle diameters with in each truck. That - or maybe it was a wt on drivers clause in the crew agreement requiring an extra crewman - apparently was such a headache that the RRs dropped the drive shaft between the axles. This made the SPV slippery.
I also knew a guy who was quite familiar with the design - he was at MN when they took delivery. He said that Budd "apparently forget everything they knew about designing an RDC for maintainability". Everything from routine maintenance to changing out major components was anything but simple. It wasn't so much that the components were unreliable - well, anymore than an RDCs were, it was just that you couldn't get at them very easily.
-Don (Random stuff, mostly about trains - what else? http://blerfblog.blogspot.com/)
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