I’ve noticed that on a lot of Dash 9 locomotives there is a small, white, domelike square on the roof of the locomotive, directly above the cab. What purpose does this serve?
GPS and radio…
Ed
Propably an entenna built into the engine to tale to aliens. [;)]
Dash 9 had to have a way to phone home (GEM Center at Schenectady NY) and dump its current diagnostics into their computer.
As Ed said, it is the weatherproof housing for the communication antennas. (Similar in function to the domes you see protecting the Doppler weather radars)
Thanks. I like your comparison to the Doppler radar protection domes.
Since earlier response mentioned GE…the white enclosure is likely a GE LocoCAM package or one of several communication antenna enclosures for GE LocoCOMM, PinPoint, LiteCOM, or Expert-on-Alert systems/services.
Also note that GE’s Locomotive Remote Monitoring & Diagnostics Center is located at GE Rail’s HQ in Erie, PA (not Schenectady as mentioned above).
Hello and welcome [:)]. I see “reasearch and GE” in your name. You wouldn’t happen to be employed by a certain company that makes locos would you? [;)] Could you be the mother load of info we have all been looking for? [?]
Have a good day Sir,
Adrianspeeder
Was wondering the same thing myself!
mother load of what ? there is not much to know about the junk ge produces
MY cat!
davenport is correct - it is Erie (I’ve been there)…but did not get a rise out of the supposed “experts” that should know. If the fella works at Erie, maybe he can drop a few hints a-la wabash’s barb. In my case, somebody do something about the limited coupler throw on those things. The big GE units are hell on low numbered turnouts and sharp curves - all they are designed to do is go straight!..
Somebody bashing GE. I hope not a GM type person. General Motors can’t even design a fuel cap cover to work right on an automobile.
That Antenna ia for direct comminucations through the state of the art fiber optics system on board all -9 locs that way GE can tell exactly where the fire started
[:-,][:-,][:-,] …odd, They (GEM) also are watching most oth the newer EMD’s too (alledgedly GM-Hughes system was not reliable)…
please remove me from your e-mail list
I believe that was [#offtopic]
For raido comm. As a “retired” engineer, I’ve ran GE’s and EMD’s . Give me EMD’S any day& night! Bestengineer.