A newbie question, but that’s why I’m here:
What was considered the “front” end of the RS3 locomotive? The end near the cab or the other end?
Thanks!
It’s road specific, but transitioning from the steam age, the theory was to put the long end out front to protect the crew. Or maybe that’s just internet folklore.
If you search railpictures.net for RS3, you will see some with plows on the short end. There are pages of pictures so you can find the road name you model I freelance and the short end is the front.
My suspicion has always been that the long end forward was based on the fact that steam engines had the boiler out front so that’s the way it was done with diesels. It didn’t take long to figure out visibility was better short hood forward but it took until close to second generation diesels to realize that lowering the short hood and adding a window over it made visibility even better. The old adage in any product is form follows function
The long hood is legally the front. That’s why there’s a tiny F stencil on the sill.
If I recall correctly - and I am too lazy to go look this up - on the Chicago & North Western the long hood of the RS1 was the front, but they changed their minds for the RS2/RS3. Perhaps a reflection that the early RS1 was being crewed by guys who were accustomed to steam, and the later RS2s and 3s were crewed by guys who by that time were accustomed to F units.
There was a famous wreck in my home town in 1962 between a C&NW freight (mostly Canadian newsprint in boxcars) headed south toward Chicago which was fouled, and derailed, by an inadequately secured runaway flatcar on an industrial siding. Although that particular freight “always” was headed by GPs, on that particular day someone put an ALCO RS1 on the point so the long hood took the brunt of the impact rather than the cab. The crew was injured but survived, and they and other railroaders credited that luck to the happenstance that a long hood forward RS1 was assigned that day.
Dave Nelson
Its whichever the railroad want’s it to be. When the railroad orders the engines they specifiy which end is front and the cab is built and the locomotive painted accordingly.
Same thing with all hood diesels.
Front will always be the end with the “F” on the frame (by Federal law).
For the NYC, the long hood was always the front. And, AFAIK, it remained that way until the merger with the PRR in Feb '68. I don’t know if that practice continued with the Penn Central.
Tom
The original over-the-road diesels had the cab in front. That was the case with the articulated consists like Burlinton’s Pioneer Zephyr, the Union Pacific M-10001, as well as the EMD FTs. It was the advent of the road switcher that forced railroads to choose between running long hood or short hood forward. Since the practice of having the cab at the front of a diesel had already been established, I don’t think railroads chose to run long hood forward was due to steamers running that way.
Its ALWAYS the end with the F painted on it. Looking closely at the unit in the photograph, it looks like there is a somewhat scuffed, scratched remnant of an F directly beneath the first side handrail stanchion on the end nearest the camera. Looks like an ex-Nickel Plate unit set up to run long hood forward.
Just curious, for those RS3 locomotives that had the long hood as the front, were the controls on the opposite side than those that had the short hood as the front like EMD did? AFAIK the Bowser RS3 locomotives will be the first in plastic to have the controls in the cab so I’m just wondering what to expect. Also if railroads like the D&H and Greenbay and Western had to “flip” the engineer’s control stand when they chopped the short hoods on their RS3s how big a deal was this?
Thanks,
Ralph
Martin,
As far as I know, on most North American railroads, the engineer is on the right side of any locomotive, facing the “front”- where the little F is painted. Most of the things an engineer is governed by outside of his cab, are placed to the right of the track he is on. The C&NW guys can answer that road because they ran lefthanded as they do in Europe and other parts of the world. Some railroads ordered their locomotives with two control stands, to make it easier-and safer, when running “backwards”, but the majority didn’t. The GBW had to “flip” the control stands because as delivered, they were set up for running long hood forward. No sense in chopping the short hood if you’re gonna run steam engine style! Moving a control stand is not a big deal like an engine overhaul or other heavy maintenance. Dirty? You betcha!
Your guess is as good as mine as to what Bowser will do.
I’m curious about how many railroads besides the C&NW that ran left handed. A long time ago I read that the Santa Fe through Cajon Pass ran left handed because the left hand track had a gentler uphill grade. I believe at the top of the grade there was a flying crossover to get them back into right hand running. The UP had trackage rights through Cajon and the SP had parallel trackage.
Short answer for any diesel is “the end with the “F” on it”. In the N&W picture, it’s on the frame near the handrail close to the photographer. Which end of a road switcher was the front and got the “F” was up to the railroad.
Generally, Alco RS1/2/3s were set-up with the long-hood as the front, and EMD GP-7/9s were set up with the high short hood as the front. But some railroads always used the short hood of their road switchers as the front (Northern Pacific for example), some always chose the long hood (Great Northern or Canadian National). Some had say Alco RS-3s long hood first, but GPs short hood first.
Once the low-nose road switchers came along (c.1960) it kinda became moot as those engines were clearly built to have the short low hood as the front, like say an EMD GP-30 or Alco RS-32.
The S in RS refers to Switcher. The RS designs were intended to run equally well “forwards” or when in “reverse”. Selection of the F front end was entirely arbitrary.
Then the low short hood versions ended that option although the locomotives still run exactly the same forwards or backwards. The low short hood versions combine the advantages of the original cab designs with the double ended versatilty of the Road Switchers.
The front cab designs are still favoured for dedicated passenger locomotives.
As for the issue of occupant protection that is illusory despite attempts to build a “safety cab”. Most things a train will hit are irrelevant because the train just keeps going. Derailment protection by the cab design is feasible because the stop (deceleration forces) is over a considerable distance and enough of the “rest of the train” usually also derails and drags to a stop.
By far the most important safety device is train control systems. Zero collisions is really the only feasible protection. Then the irreducible risk of brake runaway on grades remains a significant risk in mountain railroading. Which end of the runaway locomotive you’re in is largely academic.
A pretty good case can now be made for crews to drive the train from the back end using cameras and other automated systems for observation and control.
Next step? Fully automated locomotives with no human occupant at risk. Very feasible right now in fact. Not sure passenger trains will ever be crewless, might be a tough sell.
This was 100% true for the RS-3. Some were ordered long hood front, and some short hood front.
I have heard that the “F” was important for when multiple units were run together. Something to do with how the cables were hooked up, and the lead unit had to be running with the “F” in front.
Is any of this true?
-Kevin
If it was, it wasn’t universal. I’ve seen the high nose NS GP38-2s running short hood first, coupled long hood to long hood. The long hood carries the F on those too.
NHTX, Thanks!
Ralph
With two low-hood (or S.580-compliant wide cab) engines, you can couple them long hoods together to get what is essentially a bidirectional engine with ‘cabs on the ends’, so at the cost of a little walking you always have a desktop and full lighting facing whichever direction you want to go. As I recall this was also the premise for the DD35 (with older control-stand arrangements of course!) with a couple of GPs or SDs cabs-out at the consist ends…
On fully bidirectional engines, and I think at least some of the EL RS2s and 3s that ran in commuter service on the Erie Northern branch were not turned at their end or wyed but ran around the train: the only time I rode the train south to the terminal the service was going into the old Lackawanna Terminal already and the engine was unusually in my experience running short hood leading.
Kevin asked:
"I have heard that the “F” was important for when multiple units were run together. Something to do with how the cables were hooked up, and the lead unit had to be running with the “F” in front.
Is any of this true?"
Not exactly. When diesels are MU’d, the controls in the trailing units are turned off and the lead unit control circuits are “patched” over to the other units.
The forward/reverse handle in the trailing units is set to neutral and actually removed - this action disconnects that control stand from the circuits allowing them to connect to the lead unit.
The pin configurations of the plugs “automaticly” make the end of the trailing unit that is connected to the lead unit the “front” of the trailing unit.
For more details:
Sheldon
Diesel (and electric) engines have been required to an “F” designating the front for at least a century. When switching and giving the engineer hand signals or radio commands to “go forward”, everyone has to agree which way is “forward”!
Also, although switchers and road switchers work equally well forward or back, most of them have the cab set up for one preferred direction - i.e. the controls are to the front and left of the engineer, who sits on the right hand side of the cab facing forward.
A few railroads did have diesels built with dual controls, but most did not. The seats swivel so it’s not hard for the engineer to turn 90 degrees to their left and look back when backing up, so dual controls aren’t usually necessary. (Engines with dual controls still have to have the front designated with an “F”.)