Having spent a fair amount of time black-to-the-elbows changing power assemblies and other parts on EMD engines, I though I had some understanding of them. Preston Cook's recent article makes me realize just how little I do know about them. We're really lucky to have such an expert resource on board with us.

I found the article informative and fascinating.

Any idea as to how many of the 567Us and 567Vs there are out there?

There are only a few 567U and 567V engines left now, and most of those are in SW-1 and NW-2 switchers. Very rare and now quite historically significant machines. There are also a few in buildings, where they were installed in 1938-1943 as emergency generators. I also ran into one unexpectedly a few years back that was in a dredge, still being used.

Bob, thanks for your kind comments and Hume, thank you very much for the time and effort you put into arranging the article!

I am concerned that we are approaching a situation in early diesel technology that is a parallel with what happened with the last of steam. By the time an active interest developed in the technical aspects of the machines, many of the people who were involved with designing them had passed away and that information base was lost forever. I am hopeful that we can encourage communication between the preservation community and the folks who design and build the equipment, and perhaps RyPN can play a major role in that. My thanks to RyPN for taking an active interest in these subjects.

Preston, thanks for the timely information. You are right, now is the time to start planning for 5-10 yrs down the road.

The Anthracite RR HS has a 567BC in our F3A and a 567B in our B-unit, so we have a vested interest in future parts support for these engines.

Perhaps what we need to do is start communications amongst the groups who own operating 567 diesels to develop lists of parts which are:
1st) essential to have on hand
2nd) good to have on hand but not critical
3rd) may be obsoleted soon and could benefit from a group purchase.

As you stated, since these parts are 'standardized', any custom machining becomes fairly expensive. The set-up costs for machining are often the greatest portion of the cost, and since the OEM was able to amortize the costs over many years, that was a smaller proportion of the overall part cost for a large run.

Perhaps we can identify parts that should be produced where we can still amortize the cost amongst a group of users, instead of one or two people who may need a certain part 'yesterday'. I assume RSI would be the first stop for such a discussion of spare parts


I had one question about this statement:
"With some additional modifications the 567AC and 567BC engines can use 645 engine cylinder liners and reciprocating components. This requires changing the camshaft counterweights as the piston weight is different and has to be correctly counterbalanced."

Do you mean 'crankshaft' instead of 'camshaft' counterweights? I have more experience with gasoline engines, but I don't think I've ever heard of a counterweighted camshaft before.

Thanks again for some very valuable information.

Walter

Walter, that is an excellent posting. The idea you are mentioning about having groups of museums organize to share parts and set aside items is very similar to what some of the power generating companies that use diesels do to protect their units. Realizing that stationary generators may have a very long life span with rather low operating hours, they sometimes pool their parts resources to try to cover unusual situations.

The statement about having to change the camshaft counterweights when you go from 567 to 645 reciprocating components is correct as worded in the article. The camshaft counterweights are part of the total balance solution for the engine. EMD engine crankshafts make use of a degree of cross counterbalancing, and the camshaft counterweights work to oppose the end to end rocking couple imparted by the motion of the crankshaft and reciprocating components. When you change the weight of the reciprocating components it requires a matching adjustment of the camshaft counterweights or the resulting imbalance and vibration will stress the engine mounting and foundation. I have seen the result when somebody does the pack upgrade without changing counterweights, the engine will vibrate you right across the deck without moving your feet.

There is an EMD Maintenance Instruction covering the use of 645 components in 567 engines that explains the restrictions and parts change needs pretty well. That document should be available from Rail Systems Inc. in Houma, Louisiana for anyone contemplating such an upgrade.

Preston, thanks for the explanation. I learned something new today!

I'm interested to hear feedback from other 567 operators about their current parts situations and plans for the future. Getting people together from all over the world to help solve restoration problems is one of the greatest features of this website.

Long live RyPN !!!

I to learned from and enjoyed the article. Myself and my conterpart in Chicago deal with this every day. We service locomotives(quite a few old ones) and power systems with 36 mechanics in over 12 states and are always coming up with different problem solving answers to alot of these problems. We also collect all the old paper information we can get or hands on concerning all locomotives.
We have amassed quite a bit of information and sources covering repairs and extending service life on these older units.
We learned several years ago to learn as much information from the people that had "been there and done that" before it's to late. We used to have a gentelamn working with us that was a supervisor of locomotives with the "Rock Island" till thier end. We wish we could still pick his brain on all the old units.
I'd be more than happy to help anyone and "pool' resources in helping people and groups out.
People like Mr Cook are a VERY valuable, Irreplaceable asset. Thank you for shareing!

Thirty years ago we used to include the details on the older EMD diesel engines when we taught training classes, but since the 710 came out and the population of old 567s has diminished greatly, there isn't much call for this material from commercial operators any more. I have tried to help out a few museums on projects, but getting time to do several individual trips is very difficult sometimes.

I occasionally wonder if there is sufficient interest now in older diesels to allow holding a meeting once in a while, perhaps regionally, where people from the museums could get together and discuss the diesel locomotive restoration issues with a few people who were involved in their construction. Unfortunately the time to do this is running out rapidly in the case of equipment built in the 1940s and even the 1950s. Many of the folks from the locomotive builders who worked that time period are gone already.