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 Post subject: Nevada Northern Reactivates ex-Phila. Electric GE 45-tonner
PostPosted: Sun Apr 17, 2022 7:29 pm 

Joined: Sun Aug 22, 2004 1:51 pm
Posts: 11482
Location: Somewhere east of Prescott, AZ along the old Santa Fe "Prescott & Eastern"
First, the video:
https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=355123273341513

More info:

Quote:
Preservation is never easy. Decisions have to be made constantly. This video shows a preservation paradox that I faced. I received a call from a cement company in Utah years ago. They had an operational 45-ton locomotive that they didn’t need anymore. They wanted to donate it to the Nevada Northern Railway Museum. They had asked railroad museums in Utah, but no one wanted the locomotive.
I thanked them for the offer, but I explained that out mission was first preserving the Nevada Northern Railway and then secondly preserving artifacts from railroads in Nevada. I again thanked them for thinking of us and then I asked, “Since I’m not accepting the locomotive what’s your next step.” The reply was, “Since no one wants the locomotive, we’re just going to cut it up and scrap it.”
My thought was, “Oh man, I can’t let that happen.” So I accepted their donation. Once the locomotive was delivered, we stuck it in the engine house and moved on to more pressing projects. So it just sat there waiting its turn. We dinked around with it over the years but never had much use for it, until now.
We have received a grant to open the railroad track from our museum to the White Pine Public Museum which is a mile down the old mainline towards downtown Ely. Track construction should commence in the fall and once done we will be operating ping-pong trains between out two museums.
The idea is from our history. When the Nevada Northern Railway was built, they bought up all of the land where the railroad is today. The railroad’s intent was to force the town of Ely to move to what today is known as East Ely. When our depot was first built, it was named Ely.
Short version, things did not go the railroad’s way and the town refused to move and the name of the depot was changed from Ely, to Ely City, and to finally to East Ely. Because the town would not move, most of the stores, bars and churches remained in downtown Ely. Since the railroad’s employees lived in East Ely, the railroad operated commuter trains between the two communities that were nicked named Ping-Pong trains.
Once the track is reconstructed between the two museums, we will start operating ping-pong trains once again between the two museums. And the 45-tonner will be the ideal locomotive for this duty. It won’t use much in the way of fuel, it’s cute and those side rods are really cool.
It was years after I accepted the locomotive that we found a new use for it. We will finish restoring her and get her into compete service this fall. This is a win-win for the 45-tonner, the two museums and railroad preservation.
From Wikipedia: The 45-ton locomotive was equipped with two 150 hp (110 kW) Cummins diesel engines, each driving a GE 1503 generator which, in turn, drove one of the two GE 733 traction motors, one per truck. In early models, the second axle on each truck was driven with side rods. Later models had chain drives inside the trucks that served the same purpose.
The GE 45-ton was extremely versatile, and many variants existed. It has a high weight to power ratio and has excellent traction, rated to be able to pull 20 loaded freight cars on level track. They were built with a short wheelbase for use in industrial plants, yards, and other places where clearances were tight. Although intended as switchers, they sometimes served mainline duties, although nearly all had an imposed speed limit of 20 mph (32 km/h) due to the double reduction gearing of their traction motors.
According to the Diesel Shop: Our locomotive was built for the Pacific Electric Railroad in November 1949. Correction it was built for the Philadelphia Electric. (This esplains the "double-jointed couplers.) Once the locomotive is restored, we will number it 620. Why? Because we have a 25-tonner that is numbered 310. Since this locomotive is almost twice as large, we thought 620 would be appropriate.
-Mark S. Bassett, President NNRY


Now the REST of the story:

Quote:
https://www.facebook.com/nnry1/posts/10159804833771764

Quote:
PE stands for Philadelphia Electric Company NOT Pacific Electric
Yesterday, I posted a video of a GE 45-ton diesel locomotive. This is a locomotive that was donated by a cement company to the Nevada Northern Railway Museum. Years ago a researcher called me and asked for the serial number. We found it and sent it off to him. He listed the locomotive as previously belonging to the Pacific Electric Railroad (PE) and I took the post at face value.
When I posted the video, I mentioned the locomotive was from the Pacific Electric. Fans of the Pacific Electric posted that the railroad never had any 45-ton GE locomotives, but did have some GE 44-ton locomotives.
Now the question became, was the locomotive a 44-tonner or a 45-tonner? We solved that issue and found that the locomotive was indeed a 45-tonner. That meant that it could not be a Pacific Electric locomotive. So what was the heritage?
More internet searches seemed to indicate the locomotive had once belonged to the Philadelphia Electric Company, i.e. PE. Okay burned once, the staff closely examined the locomotive. They noticed hints of what could be a logo under lots of layers of paint.
The carefully stripped off the paint. As they did so, the logo of the Philadelphia Electric Company was revealed. I’d say that was proof position, that our locomotive is from the PE, except its from the Philadelphia Electric Company not the Pacific Electric. Mystery solved.
My thanks to the posters who first pointed out that it was unlikely our 45-tonner was an ex-Pacific Electric locomotive. And my thanks to the staff, who carefully removed years of built up pain to reveal the Philadelphia Electric Company logo!
So does anyone have photos of her in service in Philadelphia?


For the roster fanatics:
GE order number 281-4580, serial number 30481. Formerly Martin Marietta Cement, then Southwestern Portland Cement, then Ash Grove Cement West, northeast of Leamington, Utah. Unknown how it got to Utah from Philly or when.

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