I have been looking around for info on the ALCO RS3 loco and have failed to find any evidence of its exsistance in the western parts of the US.
Did any of the ALCO born RS3 units find their way over to the west of was this a EMD and GE dominated coastline?
Look here: http://www.thedieselshop.us/Alco_RS3.HTML There were RS-3s on both coasts in North America, and north and south of the US border.
Gidday Chris, Will have to stop meeting like this, I don’t what to be come known as a stalker. [:-^]
Here’ a link which explains why the RSD 4/5s were more popular in the West.
http://www.wig-wag-trains.com/Atlas%20Pages/Locos/Atlas_Alco-RS-3_Product-Page.htm
Did find some RS3 photos though.
Northern Pacific…http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/locoPicture.aspx?id=82224
Great Northern…http://www.trainweb.org/DC/ALCO.htm
and a little jerky, but…http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQLEd7yaxmA
Spokane, Portland & Seattle…http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=71033
not in colour but Denver & Rio Grande…
http://www.ghostdepot.com/rg/images/rolling/locomotive/5200%20RS-3%20locomotive%20rgar55.jpg
Kennecott Copper Corporation… http://www.railpictures.net/photo/302358/
No doubt there are more. I would also like to thank all those who have created and allowed access to the above links.
Cheers, the Bear.
While the RSC/RSD link is for Atlas N scale models, if you are in HO, Atlas/Kato did do RSC’s in HO as well. Good old 4 axle RS3’s were the single largest class of diesel locos on my favorite prototype, Reading, which is good, since the RS3 is my all-time favorite diesel loco. I have more RS3 models than any other type, but alas non are yet ready for public presentation, all are projectsin various stages of completion.
–Randy
IIRC Great Northern’s RS-3 (and perhaps other early Alcos) were mostly assigned to the western part of the railroad, Washington and Idaho area. Of course Chicago & NorthWestern’s famous “Alco Line” of the 1960’s-70’s ran from the Mississippi River west thru southern Minnesota into South Dakota featured some RS-3s - although some had been so extensively rebuilt that they were hardly recognizable!! Later many of the CNW’s Alcos ended up in Upper Michigan in iron ore service.
That being said, proximity did play a role in who bought what. For example, Alco was in New York state, and the New York Central bought quite a few Alcos…just like the Milwaukee Road bought a lot of Fairbanks-Morse engines, since FM was a Wisconsin company.
While not strictly an RS 3, Santa Fe did operate a very late production RS 2 rated at 1600 HP which was an Alco demonstrator numbered 1600 (possibly the unit described as an RS 3 in the roster linked above). After demonstrating on ATSF, it was purchased and numbered 2110 following the numbers of an order for RSD-4s 2100-2109.
Incidentally, the Atlas information is wrong regarding the RSD-4. The RSD-4 had the GE GT581 generator, the same as the RS-3. It was the RSD-5 that had the larger GT586 generator that gave improved performance on grades.
But there was at least one RS-3 lookalike on the ATSF for twenty years (it was later renumbered 2099).
M636C
Cheers for that.
I was just not looking in the right place it seems. [;)]
It great to see some of the locos close up as I am noticing some gear that isn’t on the model I have, thought saying that with all the rebuilding that went on it would be fair to say these locos had their own characteristics making each one quite unique from each other in certain instances.
Part of the Burlington Northern…
Spokane Portland and Seattle.
Cotton Belt operated a small fleet, they proved too unreliable for parent SP who replaced them with GP nines after less then 6 years of service.
Dave
Cotton Belt had 17 RS-3s built in 1951-52. All were retired in 1968-69. See pages 236-237 of Cotton Belt Locomotives by Joseph Strapac.
The Cotton Belt RS-3s served mainly in TEXAS. None were ever painted in Gray and Scarlet.
I have seen old photos of Northern Pacific alcos at both ends of the line in northern Minnesota and in Washington state. As mentioned by others above, Spokane, Portland, and Seattle had quite a lot of Alco units, especially RS-3s considering the road’s overall size. The main thing is they just weren’t bought in large quantities like the EMD locos and were sometimes delegated to yard service in later years so you don’t see as many mainline action photos with Alco RS units on midwest and western railroads.
NP did have some RS-3s that ran out of Duluth MN that were used on freight trains and on iron ore trains between the Cuyuna Range in central Minnesota and the ore dock at Superior Wisconsin. NP also used RS-11s when they became available.
Interestingly, NP was one of the roads that operated their road switcher diesels ‘short hood forward’ so ran their RS-3s with the short hood being the front, like they ran their early GPs. Next door neighbor GN did the opposite, and ran their RS and GP diesels ‘long hood forward’.
In 1958 my outfit was loading cows at a corral west of Forsyth, Mont. I wasn’t into trains at that time but I have subsequently identified one of the diesels hostling the stockcars on the siding as a Northern Pacific RS-3. The second unit in the consist was a covered wagon A-unit; I believe it was an EMD F-unit as I remember it had different trucks – in my ignorance of the proper nomenclature to me they were just wheels but I do remember that the unit was a “streamliner” and the wheels were mounted in a different body.
Rio Grande had five. I believe they really wanted GEEPs, but EMD couldn’t fill the order in the time frame the locos were needed or some such thing. Generally, the Rio Grande was a big EMD only railroad.
I did notice there where quite a few EMD locos servicing the west coast. I have a SD9 (proto 2000) sitting in the box. It always ran really nice and I do like the paint scheme. Orange on black with the tiger stripe nose. Will have to get it out for a play soon.
They are a great looking unit all round.