How loud are train horns in the cab?

When I was younger, horns were really loud to me. Whenever we came to a crossing waiting for the train, I would say probably 100 times “Are the windows up, are the windows up?”. Now, a little older and now in my teens, horns dont bother me as much. I could say that may be becuase I got into hunting on my land and the guns started making me less sensitive to loud noises.

Anyway, back to the point. Too all train engineers/conductors/conductor trainees, ect. How loud is the horn in the cab? I would imagine older GEs and EMDs like gp-38s and sd40-2s are the loudest, since its like a metal box, or is it the modern GEs with K5LAs? The WhisperCab engines are probably the quietest I imagine. Is the sound like being next to the train or louder?

Any replies welcome.

Thanks

I have often asked myself the same question and although I don’t know the answer (only train service crew members can likely answer this for us), I will point out that at O’Hare airport here in Chicago the quietest hotel in the airport area is the one (Hilton) that is actually within the airport property itself, being right across the street from the airport terminal and thus closest to the planes while at the terminal but not anywhere near them when they are taking off. Could there be a correlation here?

Depends on the locomotive. The older “spartan” cab locomotives tend t be loud to very loud, typically any older style cab requires the use of air plugs, due to noise from the horn, enigne, radio. The older wide cab locomotives tend to be somewhat loud also, but usually with the windows closed you can hold a conversation at a little louder than normal conversation, the newest cabs can be very quiet, barely hearing the horn even with the wondows open. There are a few BNSF dash 9’s that with the window closed you can barely here the horn, sometimes you wonder if te4h horn is actually blowing.

Horn placement is very important in how loud the horn is inside the cab, horns used to placed on top of the cab or right behind the cab early on, now you see a lot of horns placed well back on the engine, giving the crew a reprieve from the horn blasting in their ear. I believe GE and EMD did pay out some money in the early 80’s to settle some hearing loss issues with the railroads.

I can tell you first hand that the SD40’s are pretty darn loud. The placement of the airhorn is dead center on top of the cab unit. With no A/C “Air Conditioning” I take a 5 to 6 hour ride to Bruceton, Tn from Radnor Yard with the windows and doors wide open.

If I forget my earplugs, I pull out a set from the Crew Packs that are available on the loco’s. Plus it is in our Safety Manuals that we are to wear them at all times when on or near an Idling Locomotive.

The widebodies are wonderful and are definately the prime choice of most of our crews. You can bearly hear any noise outside the cab. With temps rising to 100 plus degrees over the past 2 weeks here in the South I have been looking forward to getting on a Lightning Bolt…

Youngengineer is right about the horn placement.The first time I really started hearing complaints from headend crews I was acquainted with, was when the F-40’s of Amtrak used some kind of a hybrid [horn]- noisemaker, coupled with their white strobe lights, created especially at night a nerve wracking environment for the head-end crewmen.

The midships placement and lowered sound levels on newer diesels is supposed to cut down on the impact of the horn on the crew’s hearing, and cab noise levels; one of the factors that helps the sound to carry is the atmospheric conditions. I live almost 2.5 miles due west of a pair of road crossings that requires the blowing of the horns twice, most of the time you cannot hear anything, but late at night and on still days , the horns can be clearly heard at my home; even with conditions of lowered sound levels durning those conditions. While in town, the road crossings immediate

We ran with a lot of reconditioned SD40s (designated SD40-3s) on DM&E — CP had rebuilt them with Q-tron, etc. CP (understandably) put good weatherproofing on the engines, including double-pane windows; they also had the horns toward the back of the unit, which, as has been pointed out, helps a great deal. Those were pretty reasonable. We also had a bunch of ex-Milwaukee Road SD40-2s built in the early '70s; those had horns on top of the cab roofs, and definitely warranted ear protection if you didn’t want to go home with a pounding headache, especially if you had a 12-hour day.

When we’d run the grain trains with BNSF power (usually dash-9s, AC44s, or ES44s), I was usually amazed at how quiet things were. I recall once asking an engineer why he wasn’t blowing for the crossings, only to be told that he was indeed blowing — it was so quiet I literally couldn’t hear it unless I specifically listened for it. By the end of the day, a person feels a lot better for a ride like that.

Wisconsin Central had the best idea, equipping each unit with headsets. I’m sure it cost them a chunk of money, but it saved a lot of guys’ hearing, and also made radio communications easier, from what I’m told. They had it just like the Air Force pilots, so you could talk into the mouthpiece in a normal tone of voice, and the guy across the cab from you could hear it through his headset. You pushed a button if you wanted to broadcast over the radio.

When I was living in Thief River Falls, I went to the yard one day to see what was going on, and there was a Trail Turn pulling into town with the horn blasting continuously. When they got back to the yard office, I asked the conductor what was happening. He said down by Oklee, the engineer had pulled on the horn for a crossing and it had stuck on. They’d been listening to that horn continuously for at least an hour. I didn’t stick around to talk to that conductor — I could tell he was in a foul mood, as I think anybody would be.

Andy Cummings

Loud, especially if you have a K5LA on the roof. We don’t have AC, either.

The wide-cabs I have been in are quiet, you feel the bell, but don’t hear the horn unless the windows are open.

How about those MILW SD40-2s with the bell right above and behind the conductor’s seat?[:O] We have one, the 4009.

The worst units were the GE U Boats and Dash 7’s with the horn on the cab roof. Mark

what railroad are you working for, I know you posted who it was before but i cant remeber, the reason i ask is you may have the rule wrong, if you work for csx not sure how they stated the rule but on ns the rule states on any loading locomotive. idling is not loading.