We have a contractor in right now replacing some power assemblies in Milwaukee Road SD10 #532 and he told us today that the prime mover is not a 567 C block as we had thought (and that records from Canadian Pacific / Milwaukee Road show). I know that a few SW1200's were built in the mid 60's with a 12 cylinder 567 E, but didn't realize that such a thing existed as a 16 cylinder in locomotive service. Does anyone have thoughts on this? Could it be that when the Milwaukee Road rebuilt these engines into SD10's in the mid 1970's that the installed different prime movers? Would they have purchased new ones from EMD? Could it be that the contractor is mistaken?

Thanks in advance for any ideas.

David Farlow
Whitewater Valley Railroad

Jeff,

Thanks for the note, your explanation helps quite a bit. The contractor indicated that the five power-packs that we ordered were for a 'c' block and since ours is an 'e' block, they aren't right so he's exchanging them for us. He says that the power-packs are almost identical except for the exhaust area that is slightly different which would allow exhaust to escape into the crank-case and would cause an over pressure condition.

I didn't mean to pick on the contractor, but I've had a few that didn't quite know what they were talking about in the past, didn't want to rule that possibility out. Was there a reason why the Milwaukee wouldn't have just had them include 645 packs in a new block other than standardization?

On a less critical note, does anyone know where we can buy replacements for the EMD logo plate that would have mounted on the frame? Surely someone has made replacements of these for a restoration. Hate to re-invent the wheel so to speak if someone knows of a supplier. I actually saw one museum paint right over one, sorry I didn't think to ask them to remove it and give it to us!

David Farlow
Whitewater Valley Railroad

I spoke with Lumpy about a month ago and got him a contact number for a shop in Omaha that did some for Bennett Levin and UP's group. It's prosigns. I don't have the info anymore, but talk to Will and see what he comes up with!

-JOe

Some owners are going to vinyl decals rather than actual builder's plates- harder and less-desirable to steal!

David,

I recall a reference to a company called Western Metal Art & Sign, out of the Seattle, WA area, that was been posted to RYPN awhile back. They apparently make, or can make, replica EMD builder's plates.

http://westernmetalartandsign.com

Mike