I was wondering if there was an explanation why many early UP passenger diesels featured slots in the pilot. I haven’t noticed it so much on other UP locos, neither have I seen it on locos of other railroads.
Was this just a styling feature, or did it serve any practical purpose, such as ventilating something?
Ed Dyball,
London,
England
Pure speculation by me – but I always assumed the slotted pilot
was an effort to resemble the steam locomotive pilots - perhaps to cut down on weight?
The 844 image is from this website: http://www.venturea.com/real.htm
Dave Nelson
Hi Dave,
I had an idea that somewhere, in my meagre library of US railroad books, I had a book that passed a comment about these pilots, and I have now found it.
In Jeff Wilson’s book “E Units : Electro-Motive’s Classic Streamliners”, he states that Union Pacific’s early E units (thru E7) had cast pilots. By implication, that must mean that most other railroads’ pilots were of some other construction, sheet metal of various thicknesses perhaps. And judging by the amount of minor damage and dents to be seen on the locos illustrated in various publications, maybe it wasn’t such a daft idea. I wonder why they stopped using them?
Regards,
Ed