CREATURES FROM ERIE: THE STORY OF GE DEMONSTRATORS 606 AND 607

   Today's blog post is a very very long one. While this story is mostly about two locomotives, to understand what became of both, I had to explain what GE was experimenting with around almost every turn over twenty years. I hope it makes at least some sense...!

    In 1980, GE debuted their revised B36-7 and C36-7 and introduced the B30-7A and C30-7A, which carried SENTRY wheel slip control and various minor upgrades to the carbody GE wanted to release. While the revised Series 7 (as the 1976 "New Series" had come to be known) were competitive with EMD's contemporary 50 Series, GE had bigger plans to revise their carbody with various improvements gathered through customer commentary as well as some iterative upgrades to GE's electrical gear and the FDL. These upgrades resulted in the construction of two very unique diesel locomotives: the 4 axle B36-8 606 and 6 axle C36-8 607 came out of Erie in mid-1982 and early-1983 respectively.

606 is teamed up with a dynamometer car and is
performing tests on what is likely the BN.
Photo from the collection of Paul Amos

    Clad in a brand new GE designed blue and white paint scheme, 606 and 607 were physically very different from GE's catalog at that point, equipped with hard edged carbodies and a much bigger short hood. GE also, for the first time since 1966, revised their cab design to provide more headroom while inside. Both units were equipped with electrically blown dynamic brakes, more expansive radiator cores, and an improved central air intake.They were identical mechanically and electrically, both boasting new 7FDL16J engines and 3750 horsepower (as were B36-7's and C36-7's built at that time) through GE's GMG187 alternator. (Some parts sources have referred to the GMG187 as the GTA187, however I have yet to nail down exact part numbers.) 

Photo credit Willie Brown

    SENTRY wheelslip control (GE's answer to EMD's Super Series wheel creep) had become standard with the second generation Series 7, and the demonstrator duo carried it as well. Both units were sent out to various owners of previous Series 7 locomotives with the intent of generating new orders for what GE was dubbing New Series 8. 606 was sent to various 4 axle GE owners, such as the Burlington Northern, for trial and testing. GE's Gemini dynamometer car followed 606 on most of its quests outside the test track at Erie. A demonstration trip on the newly formed Seaboard System (later CSX) led SBD to, ironically, buy a large order of B36-7's in 1985. 607 was sent off to newly formed Norfolk Southern, whose predecessor N&W had been the biggest stateside customer of the C36-7 up to that point, with a new order of C36-7's already in production at Erie.

606 on the BN in Washington. GE was never quite able to nail down why BN bought so many
B30-7A's, and despite the efforts of 606 (and the three B32-8's delivered to BN in full
BN spec/paint a year later) , GE would have to lease B39-8's to BN to even get them
to operate any new GE product.

    606 and 607 returned to Erie to be upgraded with 3900 horsepower, being relabeled as B39-8 and C39-8 respectively. GE produced more Series 8's to go with them, making units in full railroad spec as demonstrators for specific roads. GE built three B39-8's in ATSF paint for the road to trial, made two C39-8's for NS to test, and produced a trio of V12 equipped B32-8's for BN. All eight units were sent off to their respective roads, with the intent being that the customer would purchase them at the end of the trial (GE had done this before with the U28B). Conrail, at the same time, came to GE with a 10 unit order for C30-7A's, which GE offered to replace with an equal number of new C32-8's. Conrail accepted the offer, making them the first Series 8 customer.

Don't be fooled by the paint; every locomotive in this consist is owned by GE. While they were in full
Cascade Green and carried full BN spec, GE owned 5497, 5498, and 5499 (and, of course, dynamometer car 100).

    The railroad spec units had varying degrees of success. Both BN and ATSF declined their demonstrators; ATSF's next GE purchase would be Dash 8-40B's in 1988 and BN would go on to lease a large number of B39-8's from GE owned LMX. NS, however, was sufficiently impressed enough with the Series 8 to buy both demonstrators and load up Erie with orders for more. NS would end up with the lions share of Series 8's produced, with 139 C39-8's. Conrail was not impressed with the reliability of the C32-8's, however they later purchased a single 22 unit order of C39-8's which were much more successful.

NS 8550 was one of two units made on GE's dime for demonstration on the NS. It was
identical in specification to the rest of NS' C39-8's aside from its control setup: it was
short hood forward. All other NS C39-8's were long hood forward.
Photo credit JL Scott

    606 and 607 spent a few years as warranty test units, going out in place of downed Series 7 units around the US, before coming home to Erie to be brought under the knife again. While most railroads were thoroughly impressed by the performance of the Series 8, they were very unhappy with the operating comfort. Complaints arose from mechanics and crews alike about their cramped cabs and tight hood clearances, and commented on how hard it was to get to various systems inside the carbody. GE elected to fix these issues, and bring new improvements to the Series 8 in a large upgrade. GE chose 606 to be the catalyst for these new improvements, and 606 emerged from Erie in 1986 as 808, clad in a brand new carbody with moved and improved subsystems and a much more spacious cab. 607, unlike 606, did not receive nearly as much of an upgrade, being made into a standard C39-8 and getting sent back to warranty coverage service.

The freshly rechristened 808 appeared at Galesburg Railroad
Days in 1986. While the carbody looks very familiar to the
future Dash 8, the cab is completely unique
to this one locomotive. Photo credit Alan Gaines

    The newly rebuilt 808 was sent out as a demonstrator again, being shown to various roads as the premier choice for fast freight power. While still classed as a B39-8, 808 differed greatly from all the other Series 8 locomotives produced up to that point, both physically and mechanically; GE was planning another uprating to bring the Series 8 to 4000 horsepower and was planning accordingly. One complaint on NS was that their C39-8 demonstrators were short hood forward, so to keep the possible customers interested 808 was equipped with dual control stands to allow the unit to be operated from either direction (one of the last locomotives in North America to be built with dual control stands). 808 demonstrated on the NYSW, generating an order for the Series 8's replacement Dash 8-40B. It returned to warranty service, where it spent more time on other roads. 

A C39-8, C36-7, and GE 808 lead a train on the Norfolk Southern. 808 is likely
providing warranty coverage for a B30-7A in this photo. Photo credit Sam Beck

    In 1987, the changes 808 brought to the Series 8 were introduced to GE's catalog, and the Dash 8 was properly introduced. The B39-8 and C39-8 were replaced by the upgraded and uprated Dash 8-40B and Dash 8-40C respectively, both of which did significantly better in sales; the Series 8 was discontinued. From here, things get very strange.

By now, 607 has become a standard C39-8. Here it is
in warranty coverage service on the NS.
Photo credit Paul Amos

    607 bummed around the United States as an otherwise normal C39-8 in warranty coverage service until 1988, when GE purchased MLW from Bombardier and got the rights to Dofasco's high adhesion 3 axle truck. GE intended to make inroads in the Canadian market, and were interested in trade in capability with older MLW products. 607 was rebuilt to ride on the truck for a brief period of time (while still being in warranty coverage service), gathering data for GE about the performance of the truck on a road locomotive. (Remember this, it will be important later!) It was made obsolete as a demonstrator when GE arranged to take one unit out of a completed UP Dash 8-40C order (they arbitrarily took UP 9185, with the unit becoming GE 001) and 607 was set aside at Erie. The data gathered by 607 while it carried the Dofasco trucks directly led GE to produce the Dash 8-40CM, formally introducing General Electric road locomotives to the Canadian market.

    The FRA had been discussing the introduction of improved cab construction safety guidelines, and wanted the manufacturers to introduce a new, much safer cab for their road locomotives. EMD looked to their Canadian produced GMDD cab design to produce what would become the SD60M. GE turned to MLW and their safety cabs, preparing their own improved design to introduce to the market. To produce a new safety cab demonstrator, GE returned to their now Dash 8 demonstrator 808 and sent it under the knife again in 1988, emerging as GE 809 with a completely unique "widecab" and 4000 horsepower. At the same time, one of Conrail's C32-8's (6612) was wrecked and its cab was destroyed; GE sent the cab of 808 to Conrail's Juniata shops to repair the unit with. 6612 carried the prototype GE improved standard cab until it was scrapped in the 2000's.

809 is shown here, newly rebuilt, doing crew evaluation on the Union Pacific.
Most of 809's demonstration was to get commentary on the widecab; what GE
learned from 809's demonstration time led them to create the widecab that the
rest of their catalog carried to this day.
Photo credit Bill Wilcox

    809 continued its tour de force around the US demonstrating the benefits of the safety cab to various railroads and their crews. While 4 axle diesel locomotives were all but dead as road power (barring ATSF's one off orders of the Dash 8-40BW), 809 generated orders for GE's improved Dash 8-40CW safety cab locomotive and demonstrated the benefits of the widecab over the standard "spartan" cab. It was set aside as a demonstrator in 1994 with the introduction of the Dash 9 and discontinuation of the Dash 8.

809 leads a train of Dash 8-40C's on the UP. These runs directly led to UP ordering
the first GE widecabs with the Dash 8-40CW.
Photo credit Tom Ellis

The last 4 axle product of Erie, PA rumbles past Sugar Creek,
MO with a TOFC train. Photo credit Flickr user Sneebly

    GE still had more in store for the duo. Further upgrades for the Dash 8 line included higher horsepower with a minor increase to 4135 horsepower being offered as an optional extra on Dash 8 orders after 1991, with ATSF, UP, and CNW all taking orders. GE continued to hammer away at the FDL and GMG while producing more and more Dash 8's of various type; GE produced their last 4 axle road diesel locomotive to this day with ATSF Dash 8-40BW 582.

    While the Dash 8 was selling well, and customers were very pleased with their performance, EMD appeared out of the woodwork in 1992 with a very threatening proposition: a joint venture with Siemens had brought about the SD60MAC, an AC traction motor equipped locomotive which brought highly increased tractive effort and longer motor life compared to a similar DC motor. Meeting the demand, GE once again turned to their MLW stockpile, procuring information about AC traction gathered from Canadian Pacific 4744, the lone M640, after it was rebuilt with Brown-Boveri AC traction gear. Laboratories at Erie began to piece together what would become the GEB13 AC traction motor, high adhesion truck, and radial truck (with the trucks being derived from the Dofasco high adhesion truck and its specifications, which GE had data on thanks to 607!).

Three of the four SD60MAC demonstrators
hustle a Soo Line freight through Iowa.
Photo credit Mike Danneman

 

    607, by now very out of date and almost fully replaced by GE's Super 7 in warranty coverage service, had mostly been gathering dust at Erie after GE had completed their testing of the Dofasco high adhesion truck. At the same time, the Department of Energy had been working with GE to produce experimental coal burning internal combustion engine technology, which used pulverized coal and petroleum to produce a slurry capable of being burned roughly similar to diesel fuel. 

GECX 609 waits at the NS interchange near Erie to be sent for testing on Norfolk Southern.
Photo credit Kevin Burkholder

    Norfolk Southern, a major customer of both coal in the South and GE's road locomotives, partnered with GE and the DOE to bring the coal slurry tech to the railroads, with the intent of eventually making a coal burning diesel locomotive. The project came to fruition in 1994 when 607 was rebuilt into GE 609, dubbed the C39-8CF. The unit did demonstration on the DOT's Pueblo test track and GE's Erie testing trackage, burning pulverized coal and making rated horsepower. Unfortunately for the partnership, the coal slurry, with its consistency roughly equivalent to liquid sandpaper, led to extreme premature injector wear with the unit requiring extremely frequent injector replacement; NS backed out of the partnership after a few months. 609 lay unused at Erie for a year in storage once again, the "coal fueled diesel" experiment being deemed a failure.

609, the Coal Fueled Diesel, on the test track at Erie. Despite it's  many internal changes,
it was externally very similar to a normal C39-8. Note the air intake and dynamics,
which have been upgraded to those on the Dash 8.
...Hey, that's a Super 7 back there!

    With more customer feedback and technological improvements on the way, GE prepared another catalog upgrade, and built a demonstrator AC traction locomotive numbered 4400 (renumbered from 2000). The upgrades produced for what was now dubbed the AC4400CW (a stark departure from GE's naming convention of the last generation) were brought to DC traction as well, and GE created the Dash 9-44CW. Deeming a demonstrator unnecessary (GE by this point did most of their demonstration with already completed units from other railroads), the first Dash 9-44CW rolled out of Erie in a brand new paint scheme as a publicity event (the unit, 8601, was actually the first unit in a CNW order and was immediately thereafter repainted into CNW).

 

GECX 4400 at rest at Erie. This unit occasionally comes out for testing, and was
exceptionally common during testing of Evolution AC units.
Note the trucks; GE was planning to use the Dofasco hi-ad truck, but chose
to make their own with some improvements.
Photo credit Garth McMains

899 is shown here attached to an ES44 doing
altitude tests in Colorado.
The sticker on the nose of 899 states
that this unit is a "C44-9", a class
unique entirely to 899.
Photo credit Kevin Morgan

    Orders for the brand new Dash 9-44CW's and AC4400CW's began to flood in beginning in 1994. Orders by the hundreds from newly merged and power hungry railroads across the United States (and Canada) filled Erie's shop floor to the gills. GE elected to do further testing of the Dash 9 (and, by proxy, the AC4400CW) and its associated technology by building a "laboratory control group unit" which would function roughly identically to a Dash 9. Unable to make the space to produce an entire Dash 9-44CW that would see very infrequent use, GE pulled 609 out of storage and sent it back under the knife once more. The unit emerged with a full Dash 9 hood, an uprating to 4400 horsepower, and another renumbering to 899. The unit was mostly confined to Erie, doing bench testing alongside the AC4400CW and later AC6000CW, however it occasionally ventured outside the plant to be used for high altitude testing or rare bursts of short term warranty coverage.

899, now a strange chimera of a Series 8 and a Dash 9, rests in Montreal. Note that the entire
hood has been replaced with a Dash 9 hood, however the cab and nose remain from its
time as a C39-8.
Photo credit Eric Aucoin

    GE finally stopped rebuilding the duo after the mid-1990's. 899 continued to be used as a benchmark against the AC line throughout the 1990's, and was used again as a benchmark to compare the performance of the new Evolution line introduced in 2004. 809, meanwhile, saw static testing at Erie and was used occasionally for load testing, however it was most useful after it had its rear coupler replaced with buffer and chain connections in 2009 to accommodate testing new PowerHaul locomotives for export at Erie. Both units were non-operational starting in 2016, and today only 809 moves regularly around Erie for moving and road testing PowerHauls. 899 rests in the spare equipment pile at Erie, joined by Dash 8's, Dash 9's, SD40-2's, and other GE demonstrators in long term storage out of the way, occasionally appearing as a buffer car during tests.

809 rests with 832 (the Dash 8-32B demonstrator) and 001
(the Dash 8-40C demonstrator) at the temporary storage
area of Erie. Seen in the background are the AC6000CW
demonstrators at the final assembly building.
Photo credit Paul Duda

    It's hard to believe that, when they rolled out of Erie, 606 and 607 would live the lives they did. 606 was a pioneer for GE in technology and safety gear while 607 was present for the service tests of GE's most successful locomotive designs of all time. Both units are survivors in their own right; 899 is one of two Series 8 6 axles left in the United States (the other, Pennsylvania Northeastern 8212, is the only true C39-8 left in North America) while 809 is intrinsically unique by nature of its cab and multiple rebuilds. Their fascinating tale is so intricately weaved into everything General Electric was doing with their catalog throughout their existence that I hope both of them are preserved in museums for future generations to marvel at their uniquity and importance in producing the most influential locomotives of the modern era. And, despite their age, obsolescence, and non-functional status, they both still somehow find a way to see new technology being developed at their birthplace.