the_traveler
Engineer
I must be an exception, since my riding Amtrak only aged me 25% faster! :lol: (But it is worth it!
)
Why did Amtrak shelve the P40's?
- Thread starter Mike S.
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)AlohaI must be an exception, since my riding Amtrak only aged me 25% faster! :lol: (But it is worth it!
Every time I get off of a train I feel younger, Does this make a double exception?
G
Guest_Yerry_*
Guest
Another difference: Engineers could use stretch braking on the P40's, which was why they lasted so long on the Auto Train.
About the time F40 #390 was new (84? 85? need to dig up my equipment PO notebook), TRAINS had a short article listing which companies invested in which railroads. It listed "GE Capital" as a major investor in Amtrak equipment trusts. SO, on my next trip I started looking a little closer at locos, and sure enough, most F40's had "GE Capital, Lessor" in one-inch lettering at the bottom of the cowling.
Who owns, leases, buys and sells railroad locos is hardly like our doing the same with automobiles. Tax reasons. According to RR accountants, no class 1 railroad has purchased a "new" loco in years-- they're all "rebuilds". Railroads routinely "sell", trade, rebuild, stretch, and modify freight cars they don't own-- as long as the equipment trust holder gets their money, they're happy. Throw some paperwork around, and everyone's happy, until years later when some RR historian tries to decode the mess. After the RailBox debacle where RRs had to take ownership of RBOX 10000 - 19999 when loans defaulted, Trustors started taking closer looks at what was going on.
Some years ago, In the yards in Grand Rapids, MI, I was shown a huge pile of cut-up steel plates; they were the reporting marks (car number) of scrapped cars that still had equipment trusts CSX (C&O back then) was paying on. They just cut the panel out with a torch. The rest of the car was scrapped and the steel sold. When the trusts expire, the "boxcar" gets scrapped. Imagine, making payments on a 1ft x 2 ft piece of 3/8in steel! Obviously a space-saver when compared to the long line of Pere Marquette Berkshires that sat in St Joseph, MI until the mid '60's, when their trusts finally expired and they got scrapped (except for 1223 and 1225).
About the time F40 #390 was new (84? 85? need to dig up my equipment PO notebook), TRAINS had a short article listing which companies invested in which railroads. It listed "GE Capital" as a major investor in Amtrak equipment trusts. SO, on my next trip I started looking a little closer at locos, and sure enough, most F40's had "GE Capital, Lessor" in one-inch lettering at the bottom of the cowling.
Who owns, leases, buys and sells railroad locos is hardly like our doing the same with automobiles. Tax reasons. According to RR accountants, no class 1 railroad has purchased a "new" loco in years-- they're all "rebuilds". Railroads routinely "sell", trade, rebuild, stretch, and modify freight cars they don't own-- as long as the equipment trust holder gets their money, they're happy. Throw some paperwork around, and everyone's happy, until years later when some RR historian tries to decode the mess. After the RailBox debacle where RRs had to take ownership of RBOX 10000 - 19999 when loans defaulted, Trustors started taking closer looks at what was going on.
Some years ago, In the yards in Grand Rapids, MI, I was shown a huge pile of cut-up steel plates; they were the reporting marks (car number) of scrapped cars that still had equipment trusts CSX (C&O back then) was paying on. They just cut the panel out with a torch. The rest of the car was scrapped and the steel sold. When the trusts expire, the "boxcar" gets scrapped. Imagine, making payments on a 1ft x 2 ft piece of 3/8in steel! Obviously a space-saver when compared to the long line of Pere Marquette Berkshires that sat in St Joseph, MI until the mid '60's, when their trusts finally expired and they got scrapped (except for 1223 and 1225).
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