I hear that UP has recently retired some of their B40-8s. Seems to me that UP (along with BNSF) is retiring their Dash 8s whenever they can.
I for one can’t wait until NS retires their Dash 8 locos! They are very slow to load and most are wore completely out. Most suffer from severe lateral movements when operating above 50 MPH making it for a real rough and scary ride! My guess is UP is cleansing its roster of older GE units due to lack of aftermarket parts as newer more fuel efficient locos come from the factory. I have also noticed UP is assigning their newest high horsepower six axle units to their intermodal trains which is what the B40-8 was initially designed for.
TBG
NS Locomotive Engineer
The lease on these Southern Pacific/Cotton Belt B40-8’s is up just like why some C40-8’s were let go while the bulk of the fleet has remained untouched. The leaser wanted more than Union Pacific wanted to pay to keep them (They already renewed their leases once).
It’s just normal business and hardly evidence they’re phasing out their Dash 8’s. Roads were letting things like SD40-2’s go 20 years ago when they were still very desirable road power when leases were up and they wanted too much for them, yet every class 1 out there still has hundreds of them today. Same sort of thing is going to play out here.
It will be interesting to see if they pick up the leases or purchase any of them. It wouldn’t shock me to see them all go (Although I doubt they will have any trouble selling late model standard cab B40-8’s to secondary buyers including roads like CSX and CN). Union Pacific has many more GP60’s and might feel that fleet is adequate for their limited high horsepower BB needs.