Here is the "flip side" of the steam replica discussion.

There were quite a few instances in the early years of dieselization where all the examples of a particular type of locomotive got scrapped without any making it into museums. In a few cases, the principal mechanical machinery and electrical rotating equipment are still "available" because they were shared with other types of diesel locomotives constructed by the same company.

So if you had lots of money to throw at a project building a replica, what would you like to build? Could you justify scrapping a pair of ALCO 539 engined switchers or RS-1s that have historic value in their own right to get the machinery to put together a DL-109?

Of course doing this could cause you serious problems with the EPA and several other regulatory agencies, lets just overlook that for now.

MX (Obviously Not My Real Name)

When it comes to diesels, I've always been a fan of "adaptive re-use" ... you know like razor blades, bumpers, door knobs and such. [J/K]

Well, I am sure there are many others on this site who feel the same way.

MX

The real issue with replicas of any type of locomotive, steam or diesel (or how about electric-- using the running gear of a GG1 to replicate a New Haven EP-4?) is this-- there are simply too many "real" locos desperately seeking attention, and too few resources (money, manpower, time, skills) to go around.

Pie-in-the-sky dreaming about replica NYC Hudsons and Alco DL-109s will simply be just that-- dreams.

50+ years after the end of the steam era, and the only replicas built and operating in the US have been the two 4-4-0s for NPS-Promontory site. We have neither the funding nor the will to do this, and both of those items will be in increasingly short supply as the nation's demographics and population change radically in the next few decades. The high-water mark of railway preservation has also been reached in Great Britain, for the same reasons.

Enjoy what we have now, support what we have now. Things are as good as they're going to get in this field, folks.

Howard P.
Hoping To Be Proven Wrong, CT

[quote="Howard P."]The real issue with replicas of any type of locomotive, steam or diesel is this-- there are simply too many "real" locos desperately seeking attention, and too few resources (money, manpower, time, skills) to go around.[/quote]

Point well taken. However, the case for replication might be made for now-gone rare, but historic units such as Westinghouse's experimental steam-turbine-electric locomotive, or Ingersoll-Rand's Model 3S diesel frieght unit.. [one wonders if the 3S might still survive if GM&O would've re-engined rather than scrapped it..]

I believe there is some confusion between Ingalls Shipbuilding (Pascagoula MS ) which built the sole 4-S for the GM&O, and Ingersoll-Rand, which provided the Price-Rathburn engines to Alco and GE for locomotives in the 1920s or so. It would have been interesting to see the 4-S with a 567 or 251, but it would have been a one of a kind, and they don't do well on larger railroads.

If someone had the money and inclination, I would think that an E-8 or E-9 could be "chopped and channelled" (hot rod terms) into a reasonable visual facsimile of an E-6 or E-7.

By the same token, I've wondered for some time if an FA or FPA could be sectioned and stretched to build a PA replica. Of course trucks would be a problem...

"We have neither the funding nor the will to do this"

Borrowing from Howard P's posting,,, it does seem to be a sad, yet true statement that we (meaning Americans) have neither the funding nor the will to replicate the (fill in your favorite locomotive here)

Yet, somehow the English have managed to replicate an A1 Peppercorn
locomotive, or at least it's nearing completion.

How come them, and not us, the supposedly bigger, more powerful of the cousins ?

There are a myriad of valid answers for this. Let me try and answer, based on 25+ years of dealing firsthand with UK railway preservation:

a) A bigger target on a smaller range.

If you are a British rail enthusiast under 67 or so years of age, you grew up under a nationalised British Rail. At best, you were loyal to one of the "Big Four" predecessors, or in extreme cases local instances of the LNWR, etc. Propose what is effectively a hulking BR Pacific that can run on almost any main line, and you almost automatically have half or better of the enthusiasts at least somewhat interested.

Furthermore, Britain is smaller. Imagine one country where, for want of a better way for me to put it, you had Frisco 1522, SP 4449, UP 3985 and 844, N&W 611 and 1218, AT&SF 3751, Steamtown, CP 2816, etc. all within a day's drive of one another. If you haven't seen the Settle & Carlisle, the North York Moors Line, the Kyle Line, etc., you just aren't trying hard enough. By contrast, I'd have to fly 2,500 miles minimum to see 4449, 1,700 or so to see UP 844, etc.

b) An inhospitable environment here. I need not go into detail here. Imagine that, if you fixed up a loco (steam OR diesel) and did the sales work, you had a pretty good shot at getting it on certain main lines--say, the D&RGW Moffatt Tunnel line, or Sand Patch, or Horse Shoe Curve, or a year's rental by the Grand Canyon or Strasburg, or weekend day trips out of Chicago.

c) A follow-up on "a": American fans are more provincial than British fans. If it ain't Pennsy/NP/ATSF/etc. or wearing real Reading colors, they aren't interested. Therefore, assuming, say, a NYC Hudson is chosen, you've just alienated 75% of the potential donors.

d) My favourite excuse: Americans in general have the attention span of a gnat and the historical awareness of a tree slug.

ADM IV's points a, b, and c tend to support the concept of a replica diesel.

Point "a" calls for a mass-produced diesel that roamed the North American continent, albeit in multiple paint schemes.

Point "b" calls for a roller-bearing, 27-point M.U., Schedule 26 brake equipped diesel, that the friendly FRA man will find familiar.

Point "c", similar to "a" would have a diesel that could be repainted, from ATSF, to PRR, to NP, to D&RGW, from time to time.


So, which diesel has this mass appeal, and is also extinct, and therefore in need of re-creation?

I would propose either a DL109, or a C-Liner. I'd like to see a Trainmaster in the colors of any road that operated them. However, I don't think it would have enough glamor to stir the blood of enough fans to get done.

Doyle is doing a PA "replica": correct body, wrong prime mover.

Aren't there C-Liners and a Trainmonster saved in Canada?

Guys, guys, guys.............

We already have enough of the public who can't tell a steamer from a diesel from an electric, who think steam loco boilers need antifreeze in the winter, who think all railroads in the USA are Amtrak, and couldn't tell an Alco PA from a Centipede from a GG1 from an FL9 if you put the Second Diesel Spotter's Guide in their hands and offered a reality-TV show jackpot for a correct identification.

Unless one of you is destined to become the next Pete Waterman or Richard Bramson, or have a way to win the lottery, quit this useless speculation and throw your support behind Bennett Levin, Chris Funnell, and others securing futures for Amtrak-compatible excursion power!

(And this is coming from the part owner of three British Rail "Deltic" diesel locomotives, mind you!!!!!!!)

Brother Mitchell, brother Mitchell, brother Mitchell. . .

I presented my thoughts, not as an endorsement, but merely to help stimulate an interesting discussion. "Useless speculation" is in the eye or ear of the beholder.

My hope was that the aforementioned discussion would either A) Produce a passionate movement for a heretofore long-lost diesel, or B) Produce a consensus that there is no such extinct diesel.

Taking my criteria of "Mass appeal" (or mass-produced), as well as "Extinct", I find it hard to find a model that fills both.

Again, can anybody think of a diesel that had a production run of, say 100 or more units, and is currently extinct? I'm having trouble of thinking of any. Perhaps an F3B or FB-1? Are there others?

If we reduce the threshold to 50 units or so, then presumably the DL-109 meets these criteria. . .

JR