Brother Gustafson brings to mind a couple of thoughts about the 20-645 engine and the locomotive designs that mounted this engine.

Aside from the FP-45's mentioned, how many SD-45's are preserved ? The bulk of these units were sold to the western roads. For example, SP had quite a large fleet.

At this late date, are there any fleets of '45s still extant in railroad service ?

M-K (now MPI) developed a process to convert 20 cylinder 645 crankcases into 16 cylinder cases. Wonder how many conversions were done ?

DPK

IRM has 2 45 series locomotives:
Wisconsin Central SD45 #7525:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QH0p-JuHRXU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=InEC_yWR_vw&feature=related
...and AT&SF FP45 #92


Jeff

Erie Lackawanna 3607/CR 6072: National Museum of Transportation, St. Louis
Great Northern 400 "Hustle Muscle", BN 6430: Lake Superior Museum of Transportation
Norfolk & Western 1776 high-hood: Virginia Museum of Transportation
Southern Pacific 7457, later SP 8800: Utah State RR Museum
WC 7525/BN 6539: Illinois Ry. Museum
WC 7495/NP 3617: Lake Superior Museum of Transportation, Duluth; operable, to be repainted to NP colors
SDP45 Conrail 6670/EL 3639: Virginia Museum of Transportation (I think that's gone)
SD45T-2 Southern Pacific 6819 /9193: California State RR Museum

Insofar as downrating SD45's with 16-cyl as opposed to 20-cyl, I know Conrail did quite a bit of that with what SD45-2's and SDP45's they retained, but I don't think that happened to the ex-BN locos WC got.......

As far as I know, all WC SD45's retained their 20 cylinder engines.

The Eastern Washington Gateway Railroad also has a few (2 or 3) former Montana Raillink SD45's.
http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=289487&nseq=0

Jeff

That is correct. If I recall correctly, the WC's solution to the 20 cylinder crankshaft problem was to simply reset the fuel racks and de-rate the engine to the same rating as the sixteen cylinder SD-40. Yes, with four extra cylinders they paid higher maintenance per horsepower, but felt they were making it up in the reduced capital costs associated with buying refugees from the "cash for clunkers" program.

Impressive roster of preserved units-with two of the three SP variants accounted for.

DPK

Doing a little digging, I was surprised to find out that the 20-cylinder 645's were also a favorite of maritime applications:
http://www.tugboatenthusiastsociety.org ... rn-EMD.htm

The other surprise was that Santa Fe holds a patent on a vibration dampening system for the 645-20, with specific reference to preventing motor frame torquing leading to premature crankshaft failure. I'd always heard of crankshaft problems, but working at Forge I was puzzled because from what I heard, they didn't change the crankshaft at all. That answers THAT age-old puzzle. That's one of those things that just wouldn't have showed up until it was out on the road, and would also likely explain why it apparently never happened on boats.

I also wasn't aware that the 710-20's are still cooking for those other applications even if railroads seemed to have cooled on the idea. Which would explain why i've been just sure I've still seen 20-throws coming out of the plant at Irvine and couldn't imagine where they were all going.

Although there is one person who frequents this forum who could speak from first-hand experience, I believe that EMD made design changes to the 20 cylinder 645 crankcase-not the shaft.

There was another aftermarket device applied to ATSF SD-45's called the 'Slammer',invented by Farr. The purpose of this device was to prevent the turbo from overspeeding (and ultimately destroying itself) due to an airbox , exhaust manifold or electrical cabinet fire.

DPK

Reading about the Santa Fe "fix" for V20-645 engines is reassuring--Orange Empire has one running in ex-ATSF 98 (nee 108). Last year our Warbonnet FP45 had a special assignment: Running as the helper for Thomas the Tank Engine. We Santa Fe fans like to think that our English visitor has good taste in locomotives. If anyone asks, we tell them that English trains are shorter and lighter than North American trains, and our blue friend needs a bit of help.

Unlike the SD50's, that never seemed to quite get it quite right, the SD45's seemed to get over it. During the late 70's, ATSF certainly had complete confidence in them - unlike a lot of other power - and gave the Super C to SD45-2's, F45's, etc. Whatever they did apparently worked, but then again ATSF made stuff work consistently that other people seemed to struggle with - like the SDP40F's. Then again, ATSF of that era made a career of running stuff at 90mph and horsepower counted.

They did seem to acquire a reputation as a gas hog. I'm not sure how true that is, and I'm curious to hear what others thought that worked with them. That seems to be what's driven the wholesale downrating/replacement of the prime movers.

I was at Forge in 79-81, and even to somebody only remotely related to the crankshaft program, you knew 'something was wrong' with the 645-16 jacked up to 3500hp and a lot of people were stressed out about that one.

The twenty E3 could burn up 188 gallons an hour in run 8, the sixteen needed about 163. The actual BSFC for the two wasn't too far apart.

NH0401 is right about the crankcase changes on the 20s which were all in place by mid-1972. The later engines were much better than the early ones.

I could get into a lot of stories about these engines, but it would just get a bunch of folks irritated with me. It has all been written up before.

PC

To my knowledge, 6670 is still part of the collection, but stored off-site. (along with the "Visible E-8's" our [now Will's] 0-6-0T, and several other less presentable pieces........................)

Not sure what engines are in them, but in the East we have:

SD45 - Susquehanna 3618 - nee BN 6500 - operating.
SD45 - Susquehanna 3634 - nee BN 6542 - operating.
.F45 - Susquehanna 3636 - nee BN 6640 - recently OOS.

Many of the Susquehanna units went to Montana Rail Link, and were operating until the last few years: http://gold.mylargescale.com/Scottychaos/susquehanna/

Buffalo & Pittsburg is also running about 10 SD45's, mostly of SP heritage,
although these are rebuilt: http://www.thedieselshop.us/BP.HTML

Scot

P Cook Wrote:



"Railfan and Railroad" and/or "Railroad Model Craftsman" would be a good place to look.

WC (absorbed by CN) had a good sized fleet of SD-45's.