Did Southern run their diesels long hood forward? Or am I confusing them with some other railroad? If they did, was this a company policy for safety and did they do this with ALL of their diesels?
Jarrell
The Southern did run with long hood forward, and some units had dual controls for running with either hood forward. The NS carried on this practice. It was for safety reasons in case of a rock slide and such (or so I have read and been told).
BTW, nice GP30 on the other thread!!
Many of the eastern roads ran their deisels long hood forward - PRR, CNJ and others. However, I believe the main reason for this was to protect the crew in the event of a grade crossing accident. There were far more grade crossings and many were poorly marked with little protection when the first hood deisels came out. In fact, IIRC, the last grade crossing on the North East Corridor wasn’t removed until the early to the mid-80s.
-George
George and Smitty, thanks for the answers. I didn’t know that some units had dual controls. I assume that because of this Southern engineers did, at times, run short hood forward.
Again, thanks for the information.
JaRRell
The Southern Railway ran their hood units Geeps and SD’s whichever way they were facing. Most but not all had their long hood designated as the front. The way to tell is the bell is on the end designated as the front. This way they did not have to turn their loco’s at the extreme ends of their runs and waste time locating a wye or a turntable. If on a locos northbound run the short hood was forward on the return southbound run the long hood would be forward. I have several books with lots of pictures of Southern locos and when I actually bothered to check the split was about 50:50.