Single F unit on freight?

The NYO&W added footboards to some of their F units to use them as "road switchers", but the crews hated them. I think I have seen pictures of them running as single units pulling trains.

Thanks Ben, I do remember seeing these in my O&W books. 

I have videos of Lehigh Valley locals behind a single F unit. Must have been a real joy running in reverse for any distance.

Curt

You got it Curt, I did see that in one of my LV books but was not sure whether it was commonplace for them to run a single F or whether they were just short of power. I know the LV used a number of Pennsy diesels as well when they needed to supplement power. 

Occasionally on the Santa Fe Super C, Chicago-L.A.

B&O transfer, Chicago area.

Rusty

@Rusty Traque posted:

Occasionally on the Santa Fe Super C, Chicago-L.A.

Rusty

Wow. 3 cars, 6 trailers and a caboose. A real modeler's train. 😊

Mark in Oregon

Outstanding reference pics, thanks gents! While I know F units were absolutely not the ideal "roadswitcher" I think it would be neat to model something you did not see every day.

Southern Railroad of New Jersey operates some former CNJ lines that were formerly part of the Southern Division.  They have a few F units and often they run as single locomotives. 

The Erie Lackawanna used single F units on way freights, and short hops, especially when passenger service was cut.

Georgia, Ashburn, Sylvester & Camilla used a single FT in freight service. Their other engine was a 70 tonner switcher.

Georgia Northern used a single FT also.

Soo Line used single Alco FA units on branchline trains in MN and ND. The Burlington used single EMD F's on branchline trains in Nebraska and on transfer freights in Council Bluffs, IA.

@Rusty Traque posted:

Occasionally on the Santa Fe Super C, Chicago-L.A.

B&O transfer, Chicago area.

Rusty

Rusty,

I cannot imagine the Santa Fe running a three car train from Chicago to Los Angeles. 

John

Love those white Burlington F's, that may be an option since decals are readily available for them. I like the Minneapolis & St. Louis as well but cannot seem to find any diesel decals, guess its small size and 1960's CNW takeover limits interest in it?

@rattler21 posted:

Rusty,

I cannot imagine the Santa Fe running a three car train from Chicago to Los Angeles.

John

They did.  Beginning in 1968, the Super C was an expedited train with a surcharge ($1400.00 per trailer) to shippers for a 40 hour delivery.  Guaranteed six days a week.  It could run as little as 2 cars, typically ran 15-20 cars.  The train was authorized to run at passenger train speeds not to exceed 79mph.

Standard delivery time was 55-60 hours.

The U.S. Postal Service was the largest customer.

In the end though, there were too few shippers willing to pay for expedited service, complicated by the loss of the mail contract to a joint C&NW/UP operation at a lower cost.  The service ended in 1976.

Rusty

@Artie-DL&W posted:

The Erie Lackawanna used single F units on way freights, and short hops, especially when passenger service was cut.

I am in the process of acquiring some Erie Lackawanna freight cars to be pulled by two MTH Premier Powered E-8's.  What year were their E-8's re-geared and put into freight service?

I am also looking for some fallen flags assorted freight cars that might have been in the consist of an Erie Lackawanna re-geared E-8 led era freight train.

@Rusty Traque posted:

They did.  Beginning in 1968, the Super C was an expedited train with a surcharge ($1400.00 per trailer) to shippers for a 40 hour delivery.  Guaranteed six days a week.  It could run as little as 2 cars, typically ran 15-20 cars.  The train was authorized to run at passenger train speeds not to exceed 79mph.

Standard delivery time was 55-60 hours.

The U.S. Postal Service was the largest customer.

In the end though, there were too few shippers willing to pay for expedited service, complicated by the loss of the mail contract to a joint C&NW/UP operation at a lower cost.  The service ended in 1976.

Rusty

I can remember "Trackside Photos" in TRAINS magazine issues around that time would often have pictures of rather short "Super C" trains... seems like a long time ago now...

Mark in Oregon

Chas, the last run of the EL’ s flagship, The Phoebe Snow was in November of 1966, and the few remaining passenger trains lingered until the beginning of 1967. Most of the E8 engines were re-geared for freight service around then. As far as other roads still around that time, you might see D&H, of which the EL had a motive power sharing relationship. The others may have been Nickle Plate, Jersey Central, and I guess the Pennsylvania and New York Central, unless they were already merged into Penn Central.

My Father told me Southern used single F units for local freight and yard service in the Mid 60's.  This was in Princeton, Indiana.  He did not like them.

Bill

Good deal Bill.  I live in Indiana so I would prefer to find something Midwest to model. I love the Southern because of my exposure to it when I was stationed in VA and FL while in the Navy.  While the footprint in Indiana was very small, it did serve the Hoosier state which is pretty cool.  I definitely see the shortcomings of using a cab unit in local service though.

@Odenville Bill posted:

My Father told me Southern used single F units for local freight and yard service in the Mid 60's.  This was in Princeton, Indiana.  He did not like them.

Bill

Funny thing about F units: I suspect there's a large segment of the population who, when they think of a "train engine", think of an F unit. My older brother, who has no interest in trains, once said that an F unit is "what trains are supposed to look like".  Yet the people who had to use them in anything other than road service "did not like them"...and with good reason!

Mark in Oregon

For you Indiana folks, I was watching a NYC video yesterday filmed by Don Krofta in the 1950’s. Lo and behold, one scene near Greensburg, IN on the Central’s Big Four line had a single F unit on freight.

I suspect that this practice was fairly common to most railroads back in the day. While road switchers may have been preferred, if all that was available was a single F unit, that’s what got hung on the train.

Curt

Mark, I agree with you. I think most people think of F units as "the" quintessential railroad locomotive because they were included in millions of HO and O starter sets that we all grew up with.  I had a Lionel 202 Union Pacific Alco FA diesel at the head of my first "official" Lionel train, prior to that I had Marx because that is what my pop could afford and you guessed it, it was also headed by a lithographed F unit.  To this day, my wife loves the Santa Fe warbonnet F's because that is what she and her brother used to play with under the Xmas tree back in the day.

@Odenville Bill posted:

My Father told me Southern used single F units for local freight and yard service in the Mid 60's.  This was in Princeton, Indiana.  He did not like them.

I've run F units, and I didn't like them either. They were very difficult to get in and out of, like climbing up and down a wall. It was almost impossible to get your grip (your "briefcase" with your rule books, bulletins, lunch, and other things in it) in or out of the cab by yourself.

The sitting position when running was not very comfortable, either.

No thanks.

Switching with an F unit is a real PITA from what I understand and understandably so. 

@GG1 4877 posted:

Switching with an F unit is a real PITA from what I understand and understandably so.

Jonathan, I'm not an advocate of using the rear view side mirror for switching, but on an EMD F-unit, there's no other choice unless you are very tall, with very long arms, and a lot of dexterity to reach the throttle, reverse lever, and air brake valves while your head is outside the window, which on F-units built before late 1950, was low at the top, due to the control switches and headlight switches being located above the side window.

In late 1950, EMD adopted the taller side window (originally applied to E8's 1949-onward) and moved the switches to the side of the control stand.  Better for lots of reasons, but switching was still uncomfortable.

That's why, years ago on the OGR Forum, I posted a reply to a thread which inquired about what we would choose if we dieselized with only one locomotive model.  My choice was the EMD GP9 with 24RL air brake and dynamic braking, except for a small steam generator-equipped sub-group.

By the way, some of the early versions of Santa Fe CF7's still had the control stand and air brake pedestal located in the same position as on the F7 they were built from - and - in spite of a sliding window, they were uncomfortable to switch with, if you put your head out the window to see hand and lantern signals.

Getting back to the Santa Fe.  In Joe McMillan's Route of the Warbonnets, there's a photo of the Super C with F7 309, one 89' piggyback and caboose pulling into Fort Madison, Iowa.

There's also a photo of F7 222C (with footboards on the pilot) pulling one flat and caboose on a branch out of San Angelo, Texas.

Rusty

@Rusty Traque posted:

. . . There's also a photo of F7 222C (with footboards on the pilot) pulling one flat and caboose on a branch out of San Angelo, Texas.

Rusty

Santa Fe had a gold plated passenger service, a gold plated signal system, and bought the best available for mainline locomotives.

However, it was embarrassingly frugal when budgeting for yard and branch line motive power, and this is one very forgettable example.

@Number 90 posted:

Jonathan, I'm not an advocate of using the rear view side mirror for switching, but on an EMD F-unit, there's no other choice unless you are very tall, with very long arms, and a lot of dexterity to reach the throttle, reverse lever, and air brake valves while your head is outside the window, which on F-units built before late 1950, was low at the top, due to the control switches and headlight switches being located above the side window.

In late 1950, EMD adopted the taller side window (originally applied to E8's 1949-onward) and moved the switches to the side of the control stand.  Better for lots of reasons, but switching was still uncomfortable.

That's why, years ago on the OGR Forum, I posted a reply to a thread which inquired about what we would choose if we dieselized with only one locomotive model.  My choice was the EMD GP9 with 24RL air brake and dynamic braking, except for a small steam generator-equipped sub-group.

By the way, some of the early versions of Santa Fe CF7's still had the control stand and air brake pedestal located in the same position as on the F7 they were built from - and - in spite of a sliding window, they were uncomfortable to switch with, if you put your head out the window to see hand and lantern signals.

And the CF7's with recycled F cab parts looked odd!

@Rich Melvin posted:

I've run F units, and I didn't like them either. They were very difficult to get in and out of, like climbing up and down a wall. It was almost impossible to get your grip (your "briefcase" with your rule books, bulletins, lunch, and other things in it) in or out of the cab by yourself.

The sitting position when running was not very comfortable, either.

No thanks.

Rich, you mean like this, lol?

Exactly!

Getting my grip in and out of an F unit by myself was a major problem. Almost impossible. I ran Fs on the Ohio Central and on the CVSR.

@Cadillac Mike posted:

" I like the Minneapolis & St. Louis as well but cannot seem to find any diesel decals, guess its small size and 1960's CNW takeover limits interest in it? "

IIRC Microscale made sets for both colors of F's, believe they were discontinued long ago. Beautiful paint scheme.