The Euros have never understood the US freight locomotive business - equipment that runs 24/7/365. E.G. Krause-Maffei
I cannot rationalize that UP roster list versus the loconotes list of delivered units. Therefore I assume it is wrong and I wouldn’t trust it. For example, the Builder dates are nonsensical and they don’t give a delivery date. Similarly, a lot of those units that rrpicturearchives has are not considered delivered to UP yet. I recommend ignoring such websites and sticking with Loconotes. If there is a definitive source, that’s it. For example, 3018, 3019, and 3026 were just delivered. and SD70ACe-T4C 9090 was delivered in January. Which isn’t listed even though that site was updated in February. I’d dump that site as a source.
Muncie just started to Ramp up T4 production, they were building T4C units. So I would imagine things will continue apace.
YoHo1975 (2-12):
The thedieselshop.us UP roster is a loose one that is free. I don’t have the will or the money to subscribe to every facet of railroading websites. It sounds like the loconotes website (of unknown extension) is accurate, but I’m not sure how it could be in light of the process you described, which process suggests the outfit doesn’t need contributors, which in turn suggests a contradictory situation …Maybe more information is needed to clear up the confusion.
It is understandable that Progress Rail would now do manufacturing in the U.S., at Muncie, but given the ever extending time to complete the orders for F125’s and SD70ACe-T4’s, one has to wonder if Progress Rail tried some things that didn’t work as expected and those things now are dilemmas for them. Of course, it is a good time, I suppose, for Progress Rail to unscramble nightmare problems because the industry is not too interested anyway in new power with all the power in storage among railroads. Should be interesting to see what finally happens in the months to come.
K.P.
Loconotes is free. It used to be a Yahoo group, but they’ve recently moved to groups.io https://groups.io/g/loconotes/topics If you ever read Railfan and Railroad, their Roster info comes from loconotes. The T4 units were being built in Mexico, because Muncie was set up for SD70ACe-T4C production. I’m unsure if Mexico had excess production issues, but I do know that Muncie couldn’t be building T4C units if they weren’t going to build a duplicate number of T4 units.
Siemens will have to build a 6 axle version of its charger. That would be the only way to get the weight on track per loco 4400 HP to take full advantage of all that tractive effort.
A six-axle North American freight version of the Charger would be breaking new ground for Siemens as their freight locomotive designs have been oriented to smaller European freight trains.
Don’t forget that Siemens was a partner to EMD for AC-drive traction equipment in the SD60MAC/SD70MAC/SD80MAC era, so I suspect they know more about the North American heavy-haul freight locomotive market than you might think…
I’m not sure why a monocoque design would be necessary (or particularly appropriate) for the freight market in North America. I’d expect either a revised version of CECX 1919 (for the Cummins QSK powerplant family) or something along the lines of the ‘testbed’ applications of parts of the Charger structure to hood units. One of the main issues remains the desirability (or lack of same) in using excess DEF to permit the prime movers to operate at higher efficiency and still meet Tier 4 final and later standards.
Three-axle trucks: you really don’t have to look beyond ‘Flexi-Float’ to figure out what Siemens could do for a locomotive in any North American freight speed range. (Or, really, any prospective high-speed freight operation in a passenger corridor, were a good business model for one demonstrated). And I don’t see a reason why modern Siemens three-axle trucks couldn’t be integrated under a monocoque structure, with only nominal extension of the structure as currently made (there appears to be considerable overhang with long truck wheelbase in the passenger versions) for what might need to be larger fuel tanks.
Considering the charger has a design limitation that only allows limited dynamic brake capacity as is, would that be a good idea?
A monocoque or in the case of the Charger a semi-monocoque design is chosen to save weight, about 20,000 lbs per unit but cost more to build.
A standard freight locomotive is ballasted to the allowed axle loads. It doesn’t make sense to save weight in the construction and add as ballast.
We haven’t seen any long time experiences with EGR in the GE ET44AC or EMD SD70ACe-T4 yet, so perhaps the railroads might perhaps reconcider.
On the other hand EPA will release a Tier 5 sometime and it wiil require the use of SCR.
In the final rule regarding the emission limits is discussed that locomotives would need SCR to comply to Tier 4. The manufacturers found a way around SCR.
From that perspective I’m not sure if it was a wise decision in the long term to go for solely EGR
As long as you get a semi-monocoque design within the axle load limits with two-axle trucks there is no need for three-axle trucks.
The European experience is that two-axle trucks track better than three-axle trucks at higher speeds therefore the use of B-trucks.
What I read about three-axle radial (steerable) trucks, the expierence is mixed so that in many cases the steering mechanism was disabled.
Regards, Volke
If there will come a Siemens freight locomotive for the American market it won’t be based on the Charger. Components might come from the Charger but it will have a standard frame, hoods, cab but not a semi-monocoque.
Dynamic brake capacity would not be a problem either.
Regards, Volker
Certainly the implementation of radial steering in a C truck is important; I’m still not particularly convinced that the “GE” version with all those outside levers actually does what it’s supposed to … even after having looked at the patent and built some kinematic models.
Theoretically a three-axle steerable truck can have zero effective fixed wheelbase and still exhibit geometrically-correct radial geometry, something that none of the two-axle steerables I’ve seen have been able to do without active assistance. What tends to happen (in my opinion) is that very-low-mass axles allow the leading axle to guide a two-axle bogie frame well into high-speed-optimized curves, where the bogie frame is constrained in yaw by proper secondary-suspension design (e.g. those very long external springs) and hence the trailing-axle geometry is not impaired from likewise reasonable lateral accommodation. While I think you could get this kind of action from a three-axle truck with the virtual pivot over the center axle, you implicitly have to arrange the center axle to float laterally, over a range that might extend to several inches, and this is (again in my opinion) difficult to arrange passively; naturally any arrangement that mechanically conjugates movement of the leading axle with motion at the trailing axle is NOT going to help high-speed accommodation, and if there is measurable yaw control of the bogie/truck frame you may induce trailing-wheel wear in the same process that reduces it at the leading axle. You may note that even with increased wear problems documented since at least 1995, EMD continues to offer predominantly steerable HTCR trucks on domestic production (and I don’t remember a North American Class I ordering an EMD product without them since Conra
I don’t think there is anything in the ‘engine’ that needs to be redesigned – and I speak as not the greatest fan of Cat anything on locomotives – but there are certainly some issues regarding the implementation of the SCR system that go beyond those I’ve seen stated.
I do think they made the right choice, once SCR was deemed necessary, to use ‘more’ DEF to allow the engine to operate under the best possible performance conditions without things like obligate EGR to ‘partially mitigate’ NOx that would be addressed anyway by the greater SCR use. At any rate that’s the same thing I would have done in their shoes. The question at Metrolink appears to be that some aspects of the DEF delivery system are inadequate, and perhaps more ominously that Cat/Progress after all these months doesn’t seem to have an adequate fix. This may still be problems in the control logic related to political provisions in the emission-systems control (e.g., complete inability to run the engine with inadequate ‘perceived’ DEF-system delivery) but it’s been an awfully long time without any third-party confirmations of what the actual problems are.
Almost certainly months longer than anything rationally related to the transfer system from DEF storage to the ‘day tank’.
The Sound … and a SD70ACe-T4 Playing Games
For those interested, I was northbound on Cajon Blvd. by the Blue Cut area of Cajon Pass today in Southern California, and came upon a UP eastbound. I finely caught up to the head-end at a parking spot adjacent CP CAJON, and for the first time heard the prime mover in Run 8. (All the other times they were downhill.)
GE four-strokes have a chug beat, whereas SD70M (and others) two strokes have a high speed wind to them. The new SD70ACe-T4 had kind of a distinctive three stoke sound! Never heard anything like that before!
So, having missed photographing the unique sounding unit, Summit was visited. After a long time with camera in hand, and three westbound trains passing, the effort was given up. NO PICTURES AGAIN! It was found to be parked at the inaccessible location of CP SILVERWOOD for an unknown reason. I guess the unit, UP 3014, was determined not to let any photos be taken of it …
I find the Tier-IV units of both builders to sound quite similar (although I’ve only heard a live SD70ACe-T4 once, and it left me seeing visions of giant vacuum cleaners), which makes sense as they are both powered by large V12 4-stroke engines with EGR.
The GE chug has been muffled, and a whole lot of whooshing added over top.
It is a shame that the jet-like shriek and roar of the GM 2-stroke has been silenced.
K.P., here is the notorious UP 3014 leading stacks on February 23:
kgbw49 (2-24):
Yah, that’s the guy (UP 3014)!
That engine sure wouldn’t cooperate for me! I wonder if that railpictures.net photographer later that day had to bribe the SD70ACe-T4 to get that picture. (Ha ha)
K.P.
Want to agree, I’ve heard both the GE and the EMD Tier 4s. Neither of them sound like their brethren, but they do sound alike. It’s due to all the exhaust equipment.
What a shame indeed. I remember arriving to CUS and walking past the two F40s on the head end sounding like two Pratt & Witney JT80s than two locomotives. Pretty impressive sight and sound in the darkness of Chicago Union.
Turbos muffle the exhaust sound somewhat then they had to add exhaust mufflers about 15 years ago. In time they be completely silent like cars they they can add Lionel Train Sounds or something. The engineer can selectwhat hewants his train to sound like.