Diesels Catalogued, but not Built

[Overmod]

NorthWest

I just came across a drawing of the GE proposal for the LD P42DC replacements: the P47AC.

http://vergarastudio.com/index.php/projects/ge-p47ac-passenger-locomotive.html

Tom Selleck in Ray-Bans.

[BEAUSABRE]

cefinkjr

Somebody please confirm that an SD-30 was never cataloged, much less built!

Yes, that is correct. As for the answer as to why that is easy - would you buy a 2250 hp "SD30" when for a small amount more or the same price, you could buy the 2400 hp SD24? Me either. The GP20 did have the advantage of a sealed carbody - to compete with GE's U25B - but the U25C didn't ship until November 1963, only about half a year before the sealed SD35 (June 1964), which matched its horsepower.

[Tom John]

Caldreamer,  

  If you are still here, I had a copy of The Technical (Operators) Manual on ALCO'S C650-H also known as the DH-650. I Have seen a copy of the C650 Manual back in the mid 1980'S to Late 1990's I Iost my scanned copy of this ALCO C650-DH Operators Manual, by any chance is there way where I could obtain a copy? 

Tom  

[NorthWest]

I just came across a drawing of the GE proposal for the LD P42DC replacements: the P47AC.

http://vergarastudio.com/index.php/projects/ge-p47ac-passenger-locomotive.html

Clearly reflects the merging of GE and Wabtec, and perpetuates the slightly strange headlight-sooting HSP46 design.

[alfadawg01]

The M640 actually had an 18 cylinder engine.

[NorthWest]

A32D (for Australia):

https://www.railpage.com.au/f-p2137630.htm

[NorthWest]

Thanks for the revival, Leo. I promise you I will get around to the unbuilt Limas eventually.

While digging around GE export Universal Series locomotives, I've found a few more.

U17B

U15B

Phases:

Late low hood carbody U13B

[Leo_Ames]

The January 1978 issue of Trains mentions how Bombardier/MLW had won the contract with their LRC design for Via Rail over that of a competing proposal from GM, Vickers, and Budd.

I assume that GM would've provided the propulsion, Budd would've contributed to the carbody design and perhaps built the car shell out of stainless steel in Red Lion, and Vickers would've been the Canadian company handling the assembly so that they could be labeled as Canadian-built. 

Anyone know anything about GM's part of the proposal, which seems safe to say would've been for the train's motive power? I assume that it would've been based on their earlier AMT-125 proposal for Amtrak, which seems like it would've been a good match for what they were looking for?

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

CSX did a good job with the GP30's that were converted to road slugs.  The interior may have been gutted but the shell still looked good.

[NorthWest]

Interesting. The L&N unit is a more elegant solution than was used when BN picked up Southern GP30s that had new cabs put on them when converted to GP39(something)s.

http://rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=3332110

[16-567D3A]

.

[NorthWest]

Very interesting! Looks like they also left the bulge behind the cab unmodified. It would be interesting to see how that cab treatment would have looked on a high hood.

[Leo_Ames]

Yeah, that's indeed prototype #5629, both as a demo and in its final Union Pacific form as their #875.

Not only did it start out unique, it visibly retained some of its demonstrator heritage above the skin with the classification lights perhaps being the most obvious hint.

They're the earlier style seen on GP20's and don't match the more flush examples on her 111 younger sisters on the Union Pacific. You can see how they match the Union Pacific GP20 behind the #875 in your picture.

Here's some pictures that show how the classification lights match this earlier Burlington Northern GP20 rather than the #844, a production GP30 of some fame. Can also see several other differences if you compare your picture with that below of the #844. 

Another quirk with the GP30 is that most of them were built as F unit trade-ins and for tax purposes were considered rebuilt rather than new.

Yet most railfans wouldn't ever think about considering one of these as being a rebuilt FT these days, but don't bat an eye at stating that EMD hasn't built a Geep since Southern Pacific's GP60 #9794 was outshopped by London in February 1994. 

Yet Canadian Pacific's fleet of GP20C-ECO's, constructed on new frames and just reusing Blomberg truck frames from traded in Geeps [Edit: And air compressor], are widely viewed as being rebuilds. But they actually reused significantly less components than EMD's popular unit replacement program over half a century ago did from older EMD's.

A GP20 built for a railroad trading in an F3 for instance recycled a total of 41 components, including many major components outside of the truck frames like the 567's crankshaft.

[SD70M-2Dude]

Leo, is this one of them (post-reconditioning of course)?

EDIT:  would this be pre-reconditioning?

[Leo_Ames]

If it's of interest to others (M636C is no doubt aware of this), the GP22 prototype didn't start out looking like the GP30. It had a very different looking roof line.

There's a good picture of it in the February 1962 issue of Trains that was taken before it was reconditioned for sale to Union Pacific (A regular customer for used demonstrators), with the roof flared over to give it an appearance closer to production GP30's.

[M636C]

carnej1

 

 The 6 axle 2.400 HP SD24 was seen as a special purpose niche market locomotive. The 4 axle road locomotive market was a brisk one and EMD was competing against both Alco and GE with the new U25B locomotive. So they turned to corporate parent GM's design staff to come up with a unique looking unit and the GP30 was born.

 EMD did not see potential customers for a unit rated at less HP (2,250 HP) then it's then current 6 axle high horsepower offering just based on styling so the 30 series remained a single model.

 

The "styling" of the GP30 was due to the electrical cabinet being too tall to fit inside the hood and the "styling" was GM styling's means of hiding the hump.

 

The locomotive was originally known as the GP22 since at this time the model number matched the horsepower (eg GP18, GP20, SD24). But EMD marketing wanted a bigger number to make the GP22 sound better than the U25, hence GP30...

 

Confirmation of the electrical cabinet size appeared in the brochures for the GP35 where the lower height of the electrical cabinet compared to the GP30 was one of the claimed improvements. It didn't take much to think "that's what it was all about".

 

M636C

[NorthWest]

However, a railroad could combine two wrecked units into an SD30 if a GP30 suffered a bent frame in an accident while an SD24 suffered a damaged cab, prime mover and long hood...

[16-567D3A]

              .     

[carnej1]

cefinkjr

Somebody please confirm that an SD-30 was never cataloged, much less built!

I've always wanted to model an SD-30 (maybe the cab part of a GP-30 wedded to the long hood and frame of an SD-45) and listen to the nit-pickers tell me it has too many or not enough hinges on the access doors.

If EMD had actually offered an SD-30, it would take away some of the fun. 

 

 From what I've read the answer is no and the likely explanation I've read involves EMD's then standard traction motors.

 The D67B traction motor had power limits that would not allow a 2,400 HP 4 axle locomotive (i.e a GP24). the upper limit on a BB unit using that motor model was 2,250 HP so a different model number was assigned.

 The 6 axle 2.400 HP SD24 was seen as a special purpose niche market locomotive. The 4 axle road locomotive market was a brisk one and EMD was competing against both Alco and GE with the new U25B locomotive. So they turned to corporate parent GM's design staff to come up with a unique looking unit and the GP30 was born.

 EMD did not see potential customers for a unit rated at less HP (2,250 HP) then it's then current 6 axle high horsepower offering just based on styling so the 30 series remained a single model.

[Wizlish]

cefinkjr

Somebody please confirm that an SD-30 was never cataloged, much less built!

Probably wasn't enough of a perceived market for a six-motor unit of that horsepower if a four-motor (cheaper) unit could do the business ... the SD9 was optimized around a limited-horsepower engine at the time, and the evolving competition for six-motor locomotives was 2400 hp and up... also, I'd suspect that the market for special low-axle-weight locomotives (like the Milwaukee locomotives) did not produce orders during the comparatively brief time the 30 and not the 35/40 family was in production.

I do agree it would be interesting to see what the long hood of a 'styled' six-motor 30-series would have been.  I'd be at least thinking about a nose like a GMD1... but with that level of horsepower, flared radiators would be an unnecessary expense.  Now an "SD30-T" ... that might be interesting... 

[cefinkjr]

Somebody please confirm that an SD-30 was never cataloged, much less built!

I've always wanted to model an SD-30 (maybe the cab part of a GP-30 wedded to the long hood and frame of an SD-45) and listen to the nit-pickers tell me it has too many or not enough hinges on the access doors.

If EMD had actually offered an SD-30, it would take away some of the fun. 

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

NorthWest

From the 'Locomotive' section of the March 2016 Trains Magazine comes the proposed Rio Grande GP50T, killed by the SP merger.

(Seems to me that it would require a longer frame than a GP50s...)

That would be most likely.  The tunnel motors were longer than conventional SD40-2's and SD45-2's and the GP40TC's and GP40P's were also longer than conventional GP40's.

[NorthWest]

From the 'Locomotive' section of the March 2016 Trains Magazine comes the proposed Rio Grande GP50T, killed by the SP merger.

(Seems to me that it would require a longer frame than a GP50s...)

[NorthWest]

I thought that someone was going to bring this up.

I'm going to disregard the Super 7N-C30s and CMP30-S7Ns because they were built new and are outside the scope of the rebuild/repower category of locomotives being discussed.

And yes, the Super-7 line did find a market-for NdeM who couldn't afford anything else at the time. The original target market, rebuilds, only accounted for 27 units: 16 Super 7-B23s and 11 Super 7-C30s.

[carnej1]

NorthWest

I'm not so sure that it is primarily that-witness dozens of UP gensets running around on FB-2 trucks-but rather the large amount of second-generation and newer EMD power still around.

GEs have never been candidates for the kind of EMD capital rebuilding for a variety of reasons, including parts supply, quality issues (whether actual or percieved), etc. There have just always been enough EMDs without those issues to fill the limited amount of secondary roles. NS for example is about to scrap their B32-8s while older EMDs are in rebuilding programs.

I think it is important to note that EMD hasn't really done that many ECO repowers either when the fleet of second-generation diesels is considered. Also, the similar EMD BL20-2 and GE Super-7 programs of the '90s also failed to find markets.

 

 I would imagine that General Electric probably did find the Super 7 line to be a success due to the large number (including kits and built as new units) sold in Mexico, many of which utilized "core units" retired by US operators.

 Of course the most successful Super 7's were 3,000 HP six motor road units and not the 4 axle 2,300 HP(some rebuilt to 3,000 HP) locomotives that were sold in much smaller numbers to U.S and Canadian operators.

 

[Leo_Ames]

NorthWest

I'm not so sure that it is primarily that-witness dozens of UP gensets running around on FB-2 trucks-but rather the large amount of second-generation and newer EMD power still around.

And while I'm not sure of their current status since I know that there have been retirements as their need has decreased, they also converted 70 B23-7's and B30-7's into CCRCL platforms back in the early to middle part of the last decade. They of course retained their GE trucks. 

For those that don't know what that means, it stands for Control Car Remote Control Locomotive. Basically, it allows any locomotive to be MU'ed to one of these former locomotives and be controlled remotely by a man on the ground, with the CCRCL containing all the remote control equipment. 

[NorthWest]

I'm not so sure that it is primarily that-witness dozens of UP gensets running around on FB-2 trucks-but rather the large amount of second-generation and newer EMD power still around.

GEs have never been candidates for the kind of EMD capital rebuilding for a variety of reasons, including parts supply, quality issues (whether actual or percieved), etc. There have just always been enough EMDs without those issues to fill the limited amount of secondary roles. NS for example is about to scrap their B32-8s while older EMDs are in rebuilding programs.

I think it is important to note that EMD hasn't really done that many ECO repowers either when the fleet of second-generation diesels is considered. Also, the similar EMD BL20-2 and GE Super-7 programs of the '90s also failed to find markets.

[Wizlish]

NorthWest

That said, I doubt we will ever see any constructed because of the lack of a market. As you said on that other forum, there isn't any demand for GEs in secondary service.

But isn't this so, in large part, because by the time you fix the other stuff that goes wrong on older GE cores, notably all the wretched rubber pieces in the B trucks, you're too far over budget (compared to, say, the usual form of 'Blomberg' EMD truck) to justify the project for "typical" use of an engine of this power?

[NorthWest]

The shovel-nose E5? Unfortunately no, all we have is that one (incomplete) drawing.