One electric locomotive that I am curious about are the Milwaukee Road’s “Little Joes.” What was their tractive effort, horsepower, use and original use.
Thanks in advance for all the information.[8D]
Little Joe’s are called that because they were originally built to be sold to Russia. Joseph Stalin was in power and they were nicknamed Little Joes when the government stopped the sale. They were regauged from 5’ to 4’ 8 1/2" for US usage. Milwaukee Road and South Shore purchased them. I only saw the South Shore version and the pantograph had so much slop in it that it would stay in one place when the engine started for 6" to a foot before it would start to move making it a parallelagram rather than a diamond. The South Shore never taxed them and they were phased out when they went to GP38’s for freight service. they were the last electrics the South SHore had in freight service. Now the only equipment runnng off the overhead is the NICTD woned Kawasaki cars.
A total of 20 Little Joes were built. Twelve were sold to MILW, three went to South Shore, and five went to the Paulista in Brazil (5’3" gauge). The Joes in Brazil may have been the last to operate and some were re-equipped with Faiveley (single-arm) pantographs.
The Little Joes lasted longer on the South Shore than on the Milwaukee Road.
The MILW. units lasted until the end of electrafication in 1974. On the South Shore the last unit was retired in 1982.Two South Shore units are in museums.
One is at the Illinois Railway Museum.The other was at the B&O museum,but has since been moved. They had 5000 HP and were longer than a GG1.
A MILW. Joe has been preserved in Deer Lodge,Montana.
Are there any real reasons why GE locomotives seem to have turbo fires?
Does anyone know if there are design papers for the control stands Knee knockers and all the others?
Does anyone of good websites of pictures of locmotive toilets? Some have appeared writing as being unkempt in adequacy.
Sterling1-
This forum isn’t going to get your answers very quickly- over the past few weeks it seems to be quite dead in terms of posts, new topics, and people answering them. Try posting in the trains magazine forum- more people go to that one.
There is a Little Joe at Illinois Railway Museum in Union, Illinois.