I must admit, I'm a little hazy on what's going on with the surviving EMD BL2 locomotives. Here's a list, which may or may not be right:

Western Maryland 81 and 82 - One's at the B&O Museum right? The other one.....?

Monon 32 - At KRM; supposedly with mechanical problems. The story.......?

Bangor & Aroostook - How many preserved? I think one is still on the BAR; true? I believe two are (were) on NRM property in Green Bay; anything happening with them? And is that all of them?

Thanks.


Les

Eyewitness Report: WM #82 was in use on a chartered "Cheat Mountain Salamander" trip on Tuesday, Oct 6. I saw it pull into Belington after dropping off passengers in Elkins.

There is one BL2 in the Cole Land Transportation Museum, in Bangor, Maine. She's indoors, but it's unlikely she'll ever come out again. There are no others in Maine, although several went to other operations as curiosities. How they've faired, I don't know.

The only other one "unaccounted for" is former BAR 54, still at the Lackawaxen & Stourbridge/Stourbridge Line out of Honesdale, Pa. By now, it seems like it's been there for 25 years or so!

Monon 32 recieved some wheel work and/or replacement this year. Last I heard, through a secondhand source, the work was complete and the front truck was back under the locomotive. I have no word on whether it is back to being operational.

What are the major mechanical differences between a BL2 and say a GP7 or GP9? Just the carbody?

I've never been inside of a BL2 before, but I've seen pictures of the inside (IIRC, the pictures posted on the Cole Museum's site are pretty good). I gotta ask this question.... how does one change a liner out of one of those engines??? I've done work inside of an F-unit carbody and there's not much room to swing a wrench in there....

You have stumbled upon the reason why there were so few BL2s built! The BL2 had a lower truss frame that the F units, but still needed some sort of truss to compensate for the weak mainframe. Otherwise it was pretty much identical to the F7 or GP7. The only major differences being the carbodies.

A BL-2 is more closely related to an F-3 than a GP-7. The Monon 32, even has an F Unit style control stand.

The BL2 was pretty much the tween design between an F unit and a geep to gain engineer visibility.

Actually, the BL2 was EMD's answer to customer requests for a road-switcher like Alco's RS series locomotives. All EMD did was cut back the F3 carbody above the truss to provide better forward and rearward visiblity for the engineer, then it shortened the carbody at both ends to make room for end platforms, which made switching much easier. It wasn't what the railroads wanted, though, since the BL2 lacked the removable hoods which made Alco's locomotives (and EMD's own switchers) easier to maintain. Most railroads either bought RS's or fitted switcher steps and footboards to their older FTs and F-units (as Santa Fe did with several of its FTs when they were bumped from mainline duties by F3s and F7s); only about fifty-five BL2s and a single BL1 demonstrator (which was identical to the BL2 in all respects) were built and none were sold outside the U.S.

Whatever became of Dan (?) Monharts collection in Illinois (somewhere on the old Chicago, Madison and Northern). I thought he had a BL2, a gorgeous E6 or 7 painted in ACL colors and some other equipment--where'd it go?

Michael Seitz
Missoula MT

And this one is supposed to be sent out for wheel work soon. Its owned by the local Chamber of Commerce in Honesdale and they intend on keeping it running AFAIK.

Michael, after Glenn Monhart died in an auto accident the Atlantic Coast Line E3A #501 was sold to the State of North Carolina DOT which has it on long term loan to the North Carolina Transportation Museum (Spencer Shops) in Spencer, NC. This puts it properly in the territory in which it spent its working life.

I do not know what's become of the BL's and F.

Steve

I don't know about his other stuff, but the E3 is a star at Spencer now.

http://www.nctrans.org/exhibits/rail_equipment1.php

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.p ... 12&nseq=10

Per this discussion: http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,1206473



Here is a photo from the 1997 EMD open house courtesy of Railpace Magazine: