saw it in a book cant have had very many of these…there engines looked like the reading crusaders
UP built the shrouds after the M-10000 and M-10001 were built, idk if for pinch-hitting or just for continuity, but the colors were matching. Leaf Brown and Armour Yellow with some red thrown in there. The shrouds were applied to only 2 locomotives, a 4-6-2 and a 4-8-2. A black and white photo of them makes them look OK, but if you find a color photo, you’ll see why only two were built. Terribly ugly, definitely the worst streamlined locomotives in the nation. UP later removed them. IMHO, the 7000 Mountain-class wasn’t a very pretty locomotive, but the streamlining didn’t help at all.
Some UP fans call those strealined steamers “The Slugs.”
Looks like they changed engines at Cheyenne
http://cdm16079.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/p15330coll22/id/67515/rec/34
OP-16870 shows the same train with the 4-6-2.
http://digital.denverlibrary.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/p15330coll22/id/63539/rec/1
Thanx for posting those pictures timz, that’s it all right, the “Sluuuuuuuuuuuuuuug!”
Say it slow and let it roll up from the back of your throat, it’s fun!
Another fairly wretched example of streamlined steam as protection power for diesels was CB&Q 4000, “Aeolus”, aka “Big Alice the Goon”.
At least it didn’t blend in with dirt piles.
So as far as I understand it many streamliners were not built new but basically was putting a dress on a old pig?
Not as butt ugly as the steam turbine UP was testing at the time.
Dave
Man, you want ugly, Google the Illinois Central’s “Green Diamond”. Wow, it’s got to be the ugliest diesel ever built.
Another so ugly it’s classic situation.
False, GE BQ23-7
Oh yeah, I see what you mean. That things ug-leeeeeeee…
Doesn’t even have the “so ugly it’s classic” redeeming feature of the Green Diamond. I mean I’d buy an “O” gauge “Green Diamond” for the layout just for laughs, but NO WAY would I give space to a BQ23-7.
WHAT were they thinking?
I’m not quite sure. I guess that was wide-cab in its infancy.
I did manage to find an old Model Railroader magazine from around the time these things were being delivered to Seaboard. It was mostly how to model it, but it also included information on the prototype. The cab had 3 different levels and not 2, not 3, but 5 seats in the cab. Some examples had a small window down at the engineer’s feet for better visibility. GE had the right idea by the looks of it, just missed on the front. And the sides. And the…
Do any of these still exist? Or has CSX scrapped them? I feel like at least one (at least the cab) should exist as a reminder to GE.
Southern Rwy had a 4-6-2 that was streamlined. It looked like something out of a bad Japanese science fiction movie. As for diesels, I nominate the New Jersey Transit ALP45DP. It looks like the styrofoam packing was left on the top after it was taken out of the box!
The BQ23-7 isn’t that bad. Compare it to Pacific National’s NR class or some other Australian diesels and it looks like it would seem at home in New South Wales.
A BQ23-7 wouldn’t fit under most over rail bridges in NSW… It is about a foot too tall.
Its axle load would be far too high for main lines in Australia.
Mind you, I thought they were cool and bought the Bachmann HO model. I had to swap out the chassis to get it to run (my local hobby shop obliged when I pointed out the problem). I wouldn’t part with it now.
The two UP streamlined steam units were impressive locomotives. They had been rebuilt with Boxpok driving wheels and roller bearing rods so they could keep to diesel schedules and were used for that purpose until the “Forty Niner” was introduced to cope with bookings for the San Franciso Exposition.
The streamlining wasn’t great but didn’t last long. The two locos were the best of their type, however.
Peter
The BQ23-7 was designed to provide crew space for cabooseless runs before the age of the 2 man crew.
OK, well that explains it. As the old saying goes, “It may not makes sense to you, but it makes sense to somebody!”
It’s still ugly, though.
My old teachers used to say about this kind of design “There was no model”. Meaning the design looked fine in side and end elevations, but not in 3D reality. Many buildings have this sort of problem!
Some of the design patent drawings for the top front shrouding can be seen in Kratville’s book on the UP Streamliners (my copy is MIA so I can’t provide the page reference.) You would never believe such wicked streamlining would look so… dowdy… on those inverted bathtubs… ;-}
Here is a link to the history of the IC RR’s Green Diamond and a couple of photos.
@ http://encycl.opentopia.com/term/Green_Diamond
Link to photo of UPRR #2906… See the marker for Train #49 :
http://streamlinermemories.info/Steam/UP2906.jpeg
Link also to the 4-8-4 # 7002 assigned also to the 49’er
http://streamlinermemories.info/Steam/up7002.jpg
And this notation from the website: @ http://streamlinermemories.info/?p=325
"…In 1937, the Union Pacific inaugurated the 49er, a five-times-a-month all-Pullman train from Chicago to Oakland to complement its five-times-a-month City of San Francisco on the same route. Except for the observation car, all the cars on the Pullman train were heavyweights. To give it a streamlined aura, it shrouded tw