It was built in the Texas Mexican shops in Laredo, Texas in 1947 using a body provided by St. Louis Car Company. It had a 1-D-1 wheel arrangement and a FVL 16 T 1600 HP @ 1000 RPM diesel prime mover built by Cooper Bessemer.
That beastie is one of four units built by Tex-Mex in 1947. They ordered carbodies from St. Louis Car Co., and put 1600 hp Cooper-Bessemer engines in them. Cute little buggers.
It looks like just a locomotive, possibly a switcher, not something for passengers. I don't know of any locomotives that are handicap accessible.
Cooper-Bessemer is a pre-WWII manufacturer of medium displacement diesels. GE used Cooper-Bessemer for some of their earlier locomotives.
I would think so, as I haven't heard of many mechanically driven diesels apart from the Krauss-Maffei units.
RDCs were mechanically driven through a hydraulic fluid coupling and a modified tank transmission similar to GM's Hydramatic.
So close, yet so far. NS's SD-40 SOU Heritage Unit is roaming SC. I found it in Columbia, but it was deep in the yard and mostly hidden in the shed. Oh well, maybe it'll hang around for a while. Sigh.
You have a wonderful ability to catch the unexpected, regardless of quality or format. Thanks very much.
There were a fair number of manufactured small, industrial type units that had a transmission or chain drive, or..... The TurboTrains had a direct drive type system. I once saw an exploded view of it, which reminded me of an automotive differential style axle setup. The company name "Voith" also comes into mind.
Nice catch, and a high short hood at that. I just had a thought - not so long ago we were impressed by 50-year-old Geeps still earning their keep. How time flies... now it's SD40s getting close to that mark and still faithfully performing their duties.
Former SOU depot at Clemson, SC shot yesterday and still used by Amtrak. I sure wish they'd hang the station name under the eaves -- it'd add a measure of authenticity to the renovation effort. Beautiful station nonetheless. Station has been moved back perhaps 40 FT from the mainline which is at my back. Alas no trains passed by during the brief visit.
Here in Europe we used to have that. In France, we even had a single 3600 hp test unit, with a double hydromechanic gearbox, that was able of heavy duty. But that design mustn't have been that successful, as this unit remained the only one of its type. Unfortunately no english spoken link about it. Dom
Now this was a real bear to change out. A brand new angle cock. "Small" tools that I use for working on automobiles just don't cut it.
This has some design similarities to Milwaukee Road depots. Such as the roof lines and eave brackets.
The big challenge was breaking the packing nut loose on the old angle cock to get it off the brake pipe. We scrounged up two huge open end adjustable wrench (Crescent type) and a trucker's cheater bar. Wedged one wrench against the car body and bent the heck out of the cheater bar on the other wrench. Still no move. Finally after heating the angle cock up with two MAPP gas torches we broke it loose. I'm getting too old for this. Some random photos:
Tyler, Texas? SSW? Did you guys put some anti-seize on the threads when re-installing that angle cock?