What EMD diesel locomotives are generally classified as 1st, 2nd and 3rd generation? Or… if that list would be too extensive is there such a list somewhere on the internet?
Jarrell
For first generation, figure everything made before the GP30 (1962). The F-units and E-units fit in here. These were mostly the engines that replaced steam.
For second generation, figure from the GP30 up to the GP-SD50. These units replaced the first-gen units for front-line duty.
For third generation, GP-SD50 and newer. Computers allowed for more pulling power, and higher horsepower.
There are still a good number of 1st and 2nd gen EMDs around, in switching and branchline service. Ease of repair, low maintenance costs and high availability keeps them around.
Good question that many can’t decided on.
Here’s the last I heard.
Boxcab-F9 first gen.
SD24–SD45 second gen.The SD24 was the first EMD locomotive to be built with an EMD turbocharged diesel engine,sixteen months before the turbocharged GP20 and 2 years before the GP30…So,diesel gurus place the SD24 and not the GP20 has the start of the second generation due to the turbocharged engine…This usually sparks a good debate between diesel gurus…
GP38- 2 to SD60 third gen–some gurus say the GP60.
SD70 (some say SD60) series-SD90MACs fourth gen.
Hello Jarrell, You can find as many answers to your question as you’ll find railroad fans with opinions, but for my money the “second generation” began with EMD’s GP20. That was the model that Electro-Motive actively sold as a replacement not for steam, which was all but gone when the GP20 was introduced, but for earlier diesels such as FTs, F2s, and F3s. This is an argument based not on any particular characteristic of the locomotive, but on its role in the history of railroading, and the fact that its builder called it the “second generation” of diesel-electric locomotives. The six-axle counterpart of the GP20 was the SD24, and it played a similar role of replacing earlier diesels on roads that needed C-C power. So long, Andy
Ok, thanks for the information guys.
Jarrell
Wiley Coyote, my favorite cartoon character. He’s resourceful and nevery gives up, but asking for help is totally out of character! Please don’t libel my hero.
Mark
Poor Wiley, he’s just misunderstood… that’s all.
Jarrell
A broad definition that I came across and like is that generally “First Generation” diesels were engines designed and bought to replace steam engines. “Second Generation” diesels were engines designed and bought by railroads to replace First Generation engines. I guess that would be similar for later generations.
So a railroad that bought say several FT sets in 1941 to replace steam engines often by the early sixties were trading the FTs in on purchases of new GPs. Or a real-life example would be the Soo Line, they bought Alco FA sets in the forties, in about 1963 they traded them in on GP-30, which came with the trade-in Alco trucks!!
Keep in mind that just like “phases” of diesels (F3 phase II etc.) the idea of ‘generations’ is a railfan / model RR idea, it isn’t terminology the railroad industry would use or even be familiar with unless they picked it up from railfan magazines.
Andy I am curious about when and where EMD made this statement. Was it in product advertising? The earliest I could trace “second generation” to was David Morgan’s Diesels West from 1963.
Ed in Thawedout, Kentucky
The definition we have learned here is common sense at work: “If the diesel engine replaced steam - It is a first generation diesel.”
Kalmbach’s “The Second Diesel Spotters Guide” is arguably one of the best sources of first generation diesel where the “youngest diesel” described are EMD’s GP40 units beginning production in 1972, and; “the youngest” Alco diesel was the M636, even after the C430, with a 1971 production date. This book has 450 pages and everything that can be considered first generation diesel.
Actually the GP40 was produce from November 1965-December 1971.The GP40-2 production started in April 1972 to December 1986.