Post!
You just have to love the home grown efforts of N&W"s Roanoke shops.
I agree, most of the best locomotives were built entirely or rebuilt in home shops.
Alco built some very significant steam locomotives, then was a key player in dieselization and almost lasted long enough to be considered the only steam builder to successfully transition to diesels. Their efforts were the stuff of legend and ended in painful failure. Alco went down kicking and screaming fielding demonstrator C430s and C636s months before the plug was pulled.
I, too, had to vote for home-built. The Great Northern Railway built and rebuilt
many steam locomotives. Notables are: the O-8 class, the heaviest 2-8-2
ever built, the R-2 2-8-8-2, among the largest and most powerful of that
wheel arrangement and the N-3, a superlative rebuild of earlier 2-8-8-0s.
The GN also rebuilt old Ten-Wheelers into Pacifics, old 2-6-6-2s into
excellent Mikados and the relatively unsuccessful P-1 4-8-2 into the
successful Q-2 2-10-2s.
N&W ROANOKE BUILT hands down winner . RON
PRRs Juniata shops built K4s’s GG1s ande many other great locomotives!
Norfolk & Western Shops were the best , they had to be for the mountain routes that was their domain.
Cannonball
And now for the rock in the Koi pond…
KAWASAKI
Built either some or all of every class of modern steam used by the Nihon Kokutetsu, from the beautiful C58 2-6-2s to the downright brutal-looking 9600-class Consolidations.
Chuck
Baldwin for me. They turned out most of my favorite narrow gauge locomotives,
ALCO
N&W’s Roanoke shops by far is my favorite builder. The J & A Class gotta love them.
Im with PBenham. Alco made the Big Boy, and I like it so much I put it in my name.
probably the longest production run by a builder would have to be LIONEL.
I usually hang around on the MR forums, but I think I’ll start hanging around on some other boards here.
EMD has to be my favorite. They really kicked dieselization off with their switchers and F units. GE with their U25Bs and Alco with their RS units have to be tied for second.
Since I did not grow in the steam era, I would name Alco as my favorite locomotive builder, their diesels that is. I like the Baldwin, Lima, and Fairbanks-Morse diesels also, but Alco gets the edge. In my part of the country, GM-EMD dominated, but an Alco RS-2 would make an appearance on the PRR’s way freight on a daily basis, and once in a while other Alcos would be seen on their road freights. About 25 miles away, the GTW had a fleet of Alco S-2 switchers working their yards and industrial tracks. I favor those models before the chopped-nose era, and mostly the hood units. So, ultimately an Alco RSD-4/5 would fill the bill.
I must agree that the engineers of N&W’s Roanoke facility were relentless in their efforts to get peak efficiency from the reciprocating steam locomotive, but Lima’s engineering staff were arguably more innovative. The “Super Power” concept was developed there, and Lima was widely considered the Cadillac of locomotive builders. Evidence of this is in the fit and finish that is revealed by veiwing builders photographs of cab interiors. Lima was a late arrival in the locomotive business, but managed to sell repeat orders to railroads that had been exclusive customers of ALCO, and Baldwin. C&O had a full roster of ALCO products until Lima was awarded the contract for the T-1 class 2-10-4. Subsequently, Lima built 2-8-4s, 4-8-4s, and 2-6-6-6s for C&O which were the mainstay of their fleet. Southern Pacific was another carrier that had a huge fleet of locomotives built by the “Big-2”, mainly Baldwin. After Lima got the contract to build (with much engineering input from SP’s motive power department) the GS-2 4-8-4, SP was so impressed with their efforts that they had Lima ENGINEER and build four more classes of what were widely regarded as SP premier steam locomotive. There are other examples as well, but these two are major reasons my vote goes to Lima.
I’ll step down from my soap box now.
Jim J.
Lima of course
Steam: 1) Lima; 2)Vulcan. Diesel: 1)Fairbanks Morse. 2) Baldwin.
Electric: Westinghouse/Baldwin/PRR (GG1) Misc: 1) Plymouth 2) Brookville