Last I saw, there are FA units operating on the Grand Canyon Railway and the Wine Train in Napa. I think some other tourist trains may also be running them.
The cuyohaga valley line operates a former cn fa
Don’t know about the Wine Train, but the last I’ve read about the Grand Canyon Railway was they love those ALCO’s, the head of motive power calling them “bulletproof.”
Navy involvement was a two edged sword. Navy requirements didn’t neccessarily help an engine for railroad use. I’d recommend Eugene Kettering’s ASME paper of 1951 to anyone interested. It is available as a PDF on the web (somewhere).
It was really the 201A that was intended as a submarine engine and it had some problems imposed by the Navy (ability to withstand shock from depth charges, for example) that didn’t help in a locomotive. I think there was only one submarine that had 201A engines, and later developments by Winton using the ideas from the 567 were fitted in the wartime fleet submarines. But the Fairbanks Morse was by far the best submarine engine and that didn’t help them in the locomotive market.
The first turbocharged diesel in a submarine ever was an Alco 540, a 539 with a largely welded structure (for shock). But there may have only been one of those.
But the Navy money presumably helped EMD and Winton, and to a lesser extent Alco develop the engine designs.
The 567s in Navy vessels were
You’ll find it here, along with many other … many other interesting things. Scroll down to find it.
That is true, most of the original END plant was sold to a developer. The engine plant is still in existence, as is the locomotive testing trackge on the east side of the existing building next to the IHB railroad. The test track is being used for testing the SD70ACe-T4 locomotive and also testing the SD70ac for LPG fuel tenders and locomotives. Not every day, but occasionally.
loco6625 et.al,
David P. Morgan - editor of Trains Magazine, March 1971, p20.
ALCO in a warbonnet
"DUST OFF the bound volumes of the railroad trade press for the year 1946, and you will find them thick with coated stock and frequently with full-color ad plates of steam’s pallbearers. Come-from-behind GM, now the heavyweight, was there with its E’s and F’s, of course…Perhaps most exciting of all in retrospect, there was an impassioned, no-holes-barred pitch for a machine billed simply as the “2000.” She was Alco-GE’s A1A-A1A of her code designation’s horsepower, available in cab or booser carbody, advertised to operate a million miles before major overhaul, extolled for possessing one engine and five linear feet less that the passenger unit of the major competition. She was the PA. Santa Fe recieved the first PA’s (No. 51, a 6000 horsepower A-B-A locomotive, was proclaimed Alco’s 75,000th locomotive) and assembled a 44-unit fleet of the diesels from 1946 to 1948. All wore the system’s famous red-yellow-silver warbonnet dress, all rode the high country of Cajon and Tehachapi and the senic Surf Line to San Diego, all got a chance at some of the glittery names in their owner’s pages of the Guide, and … well, in many hearts Alco PA and Santa Fe became, and always will be, synonymous. Never mind that No. 51 and her sisters were bumped off the Super almost before the publicity prints were out of the dryer. Never mind that Santa Fe headquartered most of its PA’s at Barstow, Calif., and the square-noses seldom were more than a division or two away from those master mechanics who comprehended their turbocharged 244-model V-16’s. Never mind that to this day President John S. Reed recalls a spot on the Raton Pass which was nicknamed “Alco Curve” because that’s where it was touch and go whether a heavil
When did ATSF have PA-2s?
BTW: in case anyone didn’t know, here is something worth following if you do Facebook, or knowing about if you don’t. (Even with a MLW 12-251, it’ll be worthwhile; start agitating NOW to get the B-unit off the old Algoma Central…[:)])
Here are a few for Dr. D…
Raton Pass…
Lots of head end varnish - the Fast Mail perhaps?
Honorary steam locomotive…
Notching out for California…
Dr. D: Later when I graduated from highschool in 1968, dad took me on a cross country rail journey and on the return trip we rode the Santa Fe Super Chief from Los Angeles to Chicago. Gone were the EMD “F” unit power - replaced with another new generation of six axle GM EMD FP 45 box cab passenger units of around 3600 horsepower each - and not nearly as beautiful as the Alco “PA” and EMD “F’s”.
On a Christmas trip in Dec. 1967 to California on the combined Super Chief/El Capitan, 22 cars. I think we had 5 F-units on the point leaving Chicago. On the return trip in Albuquerque, NM they pulled 7 F-units off and put 2 brand new FP45’s on for the trip to Chicago, masive engines compared to the F’s. Dr. D’ - what part of Flint and when. Moved there in Aug. 1959 - moved away in early 1998. Bob
Question, were there any PA’s that worked in Michigan regularly, what railroad/s?
NYC had a small fleet of PA/PB’s, they may have worked into Detroit on a now-and-again basis.
Wabash’s PAs worked both the Cannonball and the Detroit Limited/St. Louis Limited into Detroit.
Three of the Wabash PA’s were still on the roster on October 16, 1964 and were actually assigned N&W numbers. Unfortunately, they were retired and sold for scrap before that actually occurred.
Only 3 or 4 of Wabash’s E8A’s were relettered and repainted in N&W colors.
ok you guys are killing me now i am going on to evilbay to find a ABBA ho PA’s
There were railroads that ran ABBA sets of PAs?
Erie-builts: yes, KCS, for a while. But that was different… and it didn’t last.
It seems Santa Fe did, at least on occasion:
http://railpictures.net/photo/390805/
http://railpictures.net/photo/390802/
Almost, but just as impressive:
Yep, that counts. Thanks for finding those shots!
Notice the 56 is the leader in all the shots. With silver overspray along the top of the pilot.
Upon closer inspection the first 2 photos were taken the same day at Clovis, NM, with the 3rd a few months later. In the comments on one the photographer remarks that the A-B-B-A set was replacing an A-B-B-B (!!!) set that had brought the train in, but unfortunately he hasn’t posted a photo of them.