Ex-B&O E8 to Bennett Levin

Tom F · **Joined:** Mon Jul 02, 2018 8:04 pm **Posts:** 314

Thomas Cornillie wrote:

According to a post on Trainorders (below), B&O E9 36 was scrapped today (11/2/2020), along with a PRR N8 and a yet-to-be identified PRR RPO.

https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?2,5132101

According to these photos, the equipment was tipped off their trucks last week:

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=5424067

What a waste! Not sure what is going through these peoples brains when they make these decisions. Hardly any E units left out there. I doubt if there are more than 30 in any condition.

Steamguy73 · **Joined:** Wed Dec 24, 2014 3:15 pm **Posts:** 635

Given what I’ve seen from photographs, the E unit was nothing more than a parts unit, and was in pretty poor condition. While it’s not at all favorable to lose a locomotive, I don’t believe this one ever had a prospect of being more than a decaying parts source

Also, correction: B&O 36 is an E9, not an E8.

Alexander D. Mitchell IV · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2020 10:37 am

I was told at the time it was acquired that it was acquired strictly as a "spare nose" in case either of the two PRR E8s "ran into" a problem at a crossing. And, as I reiterated years ago, so much was already gone from that loco that it was good for little else. (I was inside it at one point.)

Perhaps the same sleuths "documenting" the scrapping can tell us if they're carving out the nose to be put into storage or not.

And, NOT to be ghoulish or sound like I'm wishing ill on anyone, but at this point, having acknowledged the technical and logistical infeasibility of running the PRR E8 duo on the main lines in a PTC era, the locomotives' owner(s) has to be working in a long-term "exit plan" to sell or otherwise transfer the Tuscan equipment to new homes/owners............... As a multi-millionaire brewery owner told me a while back when I asked about long-term plans, "If you don't have an exit strategy as soon as your business is worth something to others, you're a fool bent on self-destruction!"

filmteknik · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2020 11:33 am

Worst case scenario, if you have trucks and a nose, it should not be that hard to fabricate the rest. That said, if someone really wanted one, as far gone as this one was, that would have been a better starting point than starting with nothing at all. A pity.

Mobil1fan · **Joined:** Sat Nov 13, 2010 2:28 pm **Posts:** 21

Tom F wrote:

Thomas Cornillie wrote:

According to a post on Trainorders (below), B&O E9 36 was scrapped today (11/2/2020), along with a PRR N8 and a yet-to-be identified PRR RPO.

https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?2,5132101

According to these photos, the equipment was tipped off their trucks last week:

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=5424067

What a waste! Not sure what is going through these peoples brains when they make these decisions. Hardly any E units left out there. I doubt if there are more than 30 in any condition.

Speaking of E units, what's the plan with the 4 units in Cleveland?

S. Weaver · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2020 1:25 pm

E.B. Levin wrote:

I'm thinking about changing my name to McIntyre....And about the E-9 hulk, its official status is "SET ASIDE-PENDING DISPOSITION", but it may go to the 098 "BACKSHOP WORKLOAD"....Keep one thing in mind, the 4020 and 4021 were just a little bit better then this piece of junk when Conrail got them from Amtrak for some even worse SW's. In the immortal words of Charlie Medovich "Let me worry about it".

Beautiful commentary, my friend.

E.B. Levin · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2020 2:04 pm

"....Clean-Up on Aisle Four...!"

Alexander D. Mitchell IV · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2020 2:48 pm

filmteknik wrote:

Worst case scenario, if you have trucks and a nose, it should not be that hard to fabricate the rest.

You might want to remember that the EMD E/F carbody is a girder truss frame bridge between the trucks, not just a slab frame with sheet metal.

Never mind prime movers and generators.

davew833 · **Posted:** Thu Nov 05, 2020 3:17 am

As evidenced by the photos on Trainorders, the nose from #36 wasn't saved, unless it was crudely hacked off above the pilot, whose twisted remains are evident in the wreckage. Levin had another spare nose from an ex-BN E9 inside the JT shops at one time, and given that his E8s don't get around much any more, there probably wasn't any justification for having a spare nose for each locomotive.

Alexander D. Mitchell IV · **Posted:** Sat Nov 07, 2020 4:11 pm

I am reposting, at his personal request, an official response from the principal involved (with one or two spelling corrections):

Quote:

I have heard from several friends that the clean up on our track 4 has given some of the foamers living in their mothers' basements a fair amount of angst. I have been too busy herding goats in Orbisonia and chasing butterflies in Altoona to even read their drivel. However you could me the great favor of informing the great unwashed of a few pertinent FACTS.

The salvageable parts from B&O 36, such as the trucks, found a new home. We kept one truck as a spare and one went to NY where another E unit needed a new foot. When we bought the E units we also bought a spare nose from Pielet Bros. It was off of a Metra unit. It has been stored indoors. There was no need to save the nose of 36 as it required much work to bring the nose back to salvageable condition.

With regard to the PRR BM70 [baggage car], all the hardware, couplers, and brake cylinders went to a tourist railroad here in PA at no cost.

If the naysayers want to stop moaning and do something productive, tell them to join the Friends of the EBT.

PMC · **Joined:** Sat Oct 17, 2015 5:55 pm **Posts:** 2876

Quote:

foamers

The instant that a person resorts to an ad hominem attack they have lost the argument.

Alexander D. Mitchell IV · **Posted:** Sat Nov 07, 2020 6:22 pm

There was no "argument."

The owner was stating facts about his property/former property, and opinions about those with no vested interest in said property commenting on said "conversion of assets."

I will state that the "anguish" over at TO was minimal, confined to 1-2 people at best and a few other "can't save 'em all" remarks. There may have been other commentary elsewhere online of the "why didn't ne1 save it??" banality, but I'm not looking for it.

PMC · **Joined:** Sat Oct 17, 2015 5:55 pm **Posts:** 2876

Alexander D. Mitchell IV wrote:

There was no "argument."

You're right, it was more like an unhinged diatribe. I don't follow train odors, and I didn't participate in this thread, but it certainly didn't seem relevant to the discussion here.

choodude · **Joined:** Wed Jun 29, 2016 11:58 am **Posts:** 327

PMC wrote:

Quote:

foamers

The instant that a person resorts to an ad hominem attack they have lost the argument.

To quote the great Michael Joseph "Ozzie" Myers of Abscam fame: "money talks in this business and bullshit walks."

Brian

Alexander D. Mitchell IV · **Posted:** Sat Nov 07, 2020 8:24 pm

I suppose he might have been taken more seriously if he had just referred to them as "nattering nabobs of negativity"? You know, the favored term of someone who routinely referes to the omnipotent tools of the industry as "diseasels"?