Attn: Amtrak Aficionados

[Freight Train]

Question : Did Amtrak ever run the SDP40F's & F40ph's together ? From what I read the F40ph locomotives were already being use towards the end of the SDP40F locomotives run on Amtrak and wonder if they ever cross paths with each other ?

[nickelplate759]

Apparently yes.  Here's a link to photo from 1981.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:AMTK_F40PH_292_and_a_SDP40F_with_Train_4,_The_Southwest_Limited_near_Darling,_AZ_in_March_1981_(28728387250).jpg

[learmoia]

[learmoia]

Here is one with an F7 and E8

[Tristan Ashcroft]

Here is one with an F7 and E8

Seems as though the original question is settled, so I’m all about off topic.  Are those both B units?  Are they just there for the steam generators?  Did B units have steam generators?  Where are the controls for a steam generator?  Does the A unit having HEP complicate that?  In short: I know nothing about this.

[learmoia]

I think they are.. both Bs.. I'm guessing 1 for power and one for Steam.. Amtrak retained some EA and EB units to be used as steam generators..

Half the SDPs had Steam, half had HEP?..and the Steam units were traded in for F40s????

~Ian

[Freight Train]

Wow!  Thanks very much for the photos !Definitely answered my question!😉

[nickelplate759]

I think they are.. both Bs.. I'm guessing 1 for power and one for Steam.. Amtrak retained some EA and EB units to be used as steam generators..

Half the SDPs had Steam, half had HEP?..and the Steam units were traded in for F40s????

~Ian

I believe no SDP40F were ever built with or converted to HEP, although the design allowed for it. 

[peteski]

A cool consist to model: Amtrak livery Phase I, II and III lashed up together.

[learmoia]

I believe no SDP40F were ever built with or converted to HEP, although the design allowed for it.

Correct.. I'm thinking of a group of F40s... disreguard...

Which circles back to why the 2 B units?.. .. Maybe in the Post derailment changes.. to not use the steam generators (above frame water tanks) in the SDP40s

~Ian

[nkalanaga]

I have a picture (old 126 film) of an F40/SDP40F combination on the Empire Builder in Pasco.

And, after the F40s came along, they did use old E B-units as steam generator cars on the Empire Builder.  I don't think any of the F40s they used on the EB ever had steam generators.

SDP40Fs with F-units weren't uncommon on the EB when the SDPs were first delivered.  I only remember seeing one E-unit, as a locomotive, in Pasco.  That was in the middle of the winter, in early 1972, and I wonder if they ran out of Fs for some reason.  Neither the NP or GN had any luck with them on mountain divisions.  The NP never owned an E, and the GN quickly reassigned theirs to secondary trains on flatter lines.

[Point353]