That would make sense, Ed. The NYC GE 70-ton switcher (Class DES-1) pictured below had dual Cummins 6-cyl diesel engines:
And one of these ex-NYC switchers still lives on at the Youngstown Steel Hertiage Museum as auxillary VDC power for the museum:
Sounds good, too.
Wish one were available in HO in brass. Would snap that up in a heartbeat…
Tom
Your links nail it Ed! [Y]
Mike.
I agree with Douglas. Time for a kitbash!! If you don’t want to work with brass, how about 3D printing?
Dave
This guy did a pretty good job in S scale. Not exactly the same one (radiator for one thing) but a good start.
I’d love to get my paws on one of these big, six-axle Baldwin (or even the Lima) jobs.
Pennsylvania Railroad Baldwin RT-264 8956 by Craig Garver, on Flickr
Regards, Ed
I don’t think it applies here, but there’s something to keep in mind about many of these early diesels. They were works in progress. Many returned to the builder for modifications. In some case, the rebuilding was significant enough that the end product was altered a great deal. So a model of one greatly depends on it being a certain year’s version.
[:$]
I’m still trying to figure out if it is indeed the 90-ton Cummins that he was waiting so long for a model of. I’m also trying to figure out if the 90-ton Cummins was made in brass at some point, and that model is what he’s been specifically waiting for.
Clessie Cummins indicated in his autobiography that he had a longstanding interest in railroad power (cf. his story about a PRR executive highly interested in motor trains who died in 1927 – had that not occurred we might have seen radically accelerated development of internal-combustion power. There is a picture of a Zephyr power room, without technical comment, that led me to believe Cummins had multiple-engine motor-train power along the general modular lines of Baldwin’s Essl locomotive (it turns out they were gensets for the considerable hotel and operating electrical load of the longer trainsets). Two V12s would be big Cummins power for the mid-Thirties, and it might be interesting to see how this unit was reported and perhaps marketed in the trade press.
On the other hand, I suspect that what ‘may have happened’ is that GE, which had much more experience and field support for locomotives, took over providing the “locomotives” with Cummins then being one of the available engine-package suppliers.
Yes, it is the Cummins model I want.
I was told a long time ago the Overland MLW model was correct, but it is not. I had bad information.
The Cummins model has never been made in brass as far as I now know.
1,000 HP in the 30s from a diesel locomotive was very powerful. 500 HP from a 60 liter diesel engine seems insanely low by todays standards. We were getting 500 HP from 11 liter engines in the 2000s. 60 liter engines were exceeding 3,000 HP in stand-by and E.P. applications.
Ah, the old days. NOx and Particulate matter in infinite amounts, but no power, reliabilility, durability, or economy.
I assume you meant The Diesel Oddysey Of Clessie Cummins, which is not an autobiography or a very accurate book. I am not aware of an autobiography by Clessie Cummins. A better book for facts is The Engine That Could published by the Harvard Business School.
-Kevin
Back in the days when turbocharging was rare and insanely expensive, high-cetane fuel and proper lubricosity additives were unknown, and FADEC was science fiction… even the components to be used for it would have been science fiction.
I would like to get my hands on one of those ~1928 marine engines, the kind used in the automobile testing, and see just how that engine behaved. In a proper Packard 745 chassis, of course… [;)]
I’m fond of saying ‘real trucks don’t have spark plugs’. It might also be said ‘real trucks have more than one turbocharger stage’… without boost you might as well be without hope… or without a clue…[:)]
Strange that I remember reading it before 1998, and the memorable parts of it all in the first person. Has to be, though, because there is nothing else like that. I picked up on quite a few inaccuracies but was prepared to cut the old man some slack… even more sympathetic now, if anything.
While on the subject of C.Lyle, I was familiar with a book about combustion engines published while I was in the engineering program in college. I now see there was a ‘revised edition’ in 2000 – anybody know what was ‘revised’ and how much better that version is?
I’d only ever read Churella’s review, so I looked… and what do you know, $5 and change with free shipping! Thanks for the reminder!
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I can not fix it. The photo is linked to from a fellow named Craig Garver. He may have simply transposed the designation in his photo ID.
It was meant to be a representative photo, not an in-depth disquisition.
Thank you for pointing out the inaccuracies, though.
Regards, Ed
Sorry, I thought you had put in one of your Flickr pages tagged with the model number and photographer’s name. I removed the comment.
Kevin, I’m still confused. Do you know if there was ever a model made of this locomotive, in either brass or plastic?
And the story of Clessie Cummins is interesting. He was financed by the William Irwin family, who was a banker in Columbus IN and whom Clessie chauferred for. Yes, Clessie was the chaufer/mechanic for the Irwin family. (the story of William Irwin is also interesting).
Cummins Engine kind of bounced around as a viable company until they landed a huge contract to supply engines for WWII trucks and equipment. And the Irwin family (actually Miller) was always very politically connected back in those days, go figure. Somewhere along the line, one of the Irwin’s failed to have a son so the family’s name took the name of the son-In-law, Miller, who ran many of the “Irwin” companies including Cummins for many years.
OT, but kind of interesting (at least to me): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Irwin_Miller
As far as I now know, there has never been a model of this locomotive.
I will be watching Shapeways.
The diesel engines Cummins supplied to the US military in WW2 were not in a widely used class of vehicles. I thought I had a picture of the truck they were in, but I cannot find it.
I knew a lot of people that personally knew Clessie Cummins. I have heard lots of stories. It is all third-hand now, so it is innapopriate to share them from me.
This man is a living legend (not me, the other guy) in the diesel world, and he knew Clessie back in the day. He shared lots of stories with me over a series of several dinners in Dallas back in 2013.
Supposedly this is the lathe that Clessie Cummins used to make the first prototypes of the P/T fuel system. It is on display in the Cummins corporate headquarters in Columbus, Indiana.
-Kevin
[;)]
I have to wonder how much similarity there is between the Cummins locomotive and the five 401 class engines GE built for the P.R.R. in 1940 (12582-6) which had 7x10-cylindered V12 power (with paired fuel lines looking very Cummins-like!) (No, that is not a typo - let’s see the first to figure it out…)
12 cylinders, 7 inch bore, 10 inch stroke.
24 Liters.
[8D]
-Kevin
And two of them [8D][8D]
But an article on the Cummins historical facility says the VL-12 was 4,618 cubic inches (!) and the engine that replaced it (NVH series, 1486 cid) was not introduced until 1949.
4 that I know of: Federal 604; Reo 28-XS; Sterling HWS160H; and White 10-ton 6x4. There are pix on the Web of all four types.
From the Cummins “100 Years 100 Milestones” slideshow:
-Kevin
Perhaps a slightly improved photo —
and the all-important insignia:
Cummins_Marque-1 by Edmund, on Flickr
Both Photos: G.E.Co.
I wonder what color she was painted? The underpinnings seem to be black, of course. A lighter shade above.
I’d hate to be a switchman and have to negotiate those side-sill steps! At night? Fuggedaboutit!
Regards, Ed
No “slightly” about it, that is a much better image.
Thank you very much. I have never seen an image of the locomotive that clear.
-Kevin
