We have discussed saving an (or many) F-40s here on the Interchange...

Dynamic Railroad Preservation and the Nevada State Railroad Museum have in fact done that we talk about. Additionally they have successfully MU'ed the F-40 with the NSRM's GP-30...

Its been a long road... DRP first saved the F-40, then had to move it from Portland to Ogden to Nevada... Its been repainted twice, once into Daylight to work with 4449, now back to Amtrak colors. NSRM staff has managed to make their GP-30 MU wiring work... not bad for a now 62 year old locomotive...

Chris Fussell (DRP) and Bradon Brickman (NSRM) have worked a minor miracle...

Yet there are only 2 Amtrak units in preservation, three if you consider North Carolina Transportation Museum gutting there complete unit to make another NPCU. One of the areas the F40s were originally designed to serve was the Springfield New Haven corridor as it was envisioned as a commuter locomotive. The fact that none have been preserves in Northeast is to me a failure of those involved with railroad preservation. There is a unit from Metrolink which may be available for a museum and that is Metrolink #800. Tri Rail may also be getting rid of there ex Amtrak unit if the rumor Mill is correct.

A picture is worth a thousand words (top photo Chris Fusell, from Railfan & Railroad). https://railfan.com/amtrak-f40-restored ... iii-paint/ I actually prefer the as-delivered scheme, Mel Lawrence 1977 photo below:

The or iginal plan for the F40's was to pull NEC Amfleet cars betwen New Haven and Boston, possibly Springfield (although SPV's were not ruled out). This is the same cycle done by Alco DL-109's pulling Osgood-Bradley "American Flyer" cars in 1941.

SDP40F's were to pull long-distance trains.

Things happen. SDP40F's didn't work out. P30CH's were so-so. F40's ran.

Phil Mulligan

VIA is rebuilding their London, ON-built versions: https://www.trains.com/trn/news-reviews ... ebuilding/

What I find kind of sad is everyone focuses on that organization's F40PH but doesn't seem to realize the other treasure they have which is an SDP40F. For those of you who don't know the SDP40F was Amtrak's first new locomotive specifically designed for them, You can see the comment from another user on this thread about it. And as he mentioned SDP40F didn't work out and Amtrak decided to use the F40PH, Amtrak actually traded in a bunch of those locomotives to be rebuilt into F40PHs and the one here is one of those rebuilds or F40PHR. It would be nice if they could get the SDP40F to look like it did in it's Amtrak days.

The "very unofficial F40PH Preservation Museum," the Grand Canyon Railway, has explicitly said that 1) their six F40's (rebuilt with lower gearing to "F40FH" are working passenger locos and not museum pieces, BUT: 2) they will be happy to work with future preservation efforts if and when the day comes that they have no choice but to replace them, starting with any future Arizona State RR Museum. (I have to say that some government "pork barrel" grant to electrify the line is not that preposterous a proposition, given "environmental concerns" in the National Park, but the current GCRY management wants nothing to do with more modern and fuel efficient GE passenger diesels, simply because of the computer-driven complexity that becomes outdated too fast!)

If I remember correctly, RPS in Fullerton has several designs 'in the can' for installing hybrid powertrains in a F40PH carbody. It would be extremely simple to modify these for 'dual-mode-lite' style electrification -- punctuated or continuous.

Speaking oF40s, I copied and pasted some information from July 1985 relating to Caltrain F40s:

"The new units had a continuous speed of 13.3 mph and a maximum speed of 82 mph. They were 56 feet long and carried 1,900 gallons of fuel, developed 2950-hp and were designated class EP429-01."

Can anyone fact-check this?

BH

Curious - where did they say that?

Keep trying to preserve F40's. They are righteous motors.

I remind everyone the most common First Generation passenger unit is the EMD E7. One is preserved (PRR 5901) and that is because it was half of PRR's first pair of road diesels.

5901 is at the RR Museum of PA in East Strasburg painted Tuscan Red with five stripes.

Phil Mulligan

The only reason there are even a few SDP40F's around is that the Santa Fe was so power short in the 80's for mainline power and literally traded most of their yard power to Amtrak for the few remaining SDF40's that Amtrak had laying around.

I said that. Unofficially.

But it IS our standard policy. We are not a museum. We acquire and modify equipment based upon our needs. The closest thing I have done to F-40 'preservation' is renumber a formerly leased unit back to it's original Amtrak number.

Stay tuned for an exciting announcement regarding one of our operational units, hopefully in the next few months.

Eric Hadder
CMO- Grand Canyon Railway

That makes sense. I guess I see Grand Canyon as much as a "museum" as many other operations that call themselves a museum but modify equipment just as much. TVRM and Spencer come to mind.

"Chris Fussell (DRP) and Bradon Brickman (NSRM) have worked a minor miracle..."

Is this a serious comment? "A minor miracle". Really? With all due respect to one of our RYPN moderators, how could anyone consider it a minor miracle that this locomotive is preserved and has been repainted? This engine was put up for auction by Amtrak in close to operating condition, while missing no major parts and missing very few minor parts. In short, it was intact and close to operational. Fussell got the idea to try and save it and put out an 11th hour call for people to give him money to do so. OK, great. So it was preserved. But is has needed very little restoration since acquisition. A few paint jobs is routine maintenance in my book. And while I am glad it has been preserved, it doesn't come even close to being a minor miracle. I'm sure we could all come up with at least 25 to 50 real restorations of locomotives, passenger cars, cabooses, RR stations, and even entire railroads, that have been far more miraculous than saving an operational F40.

I think we need to put this one in a far more rational perspective.