For the convenience of those who have not been following along in the previous thread I have copied and pasted the earlier conversation that pertains to my question.
Louis
That has me thinking, Terry can you tell me if they do scheduled in frame rebuilds in locomotives when there is no machine work necessary like they do in trucks or do they pull the engines out for all internal engine work?
Terry
They can do in-frames, depending on what needs to be done. I've replaced power assemblies in EMD engines, and cylinder heads/pistons/liners in alcos. Rebuilding GE engines should mean removal, since operation long-term generates internal stresses that can only be relieved with the entire block out of the engine. I don't know if 251 alcos had the same issue, as my experience is limited to 539 and 244 models.
Another bit of useless trivia:
Alco used the month and year of first fire-up for their engine models. The 531 was first fired and tested in May of 1931. The 251 was first completed in February of 1951.
Imagine if they had remained in business until today, it is conceivable we could have alco 3006 engines, from March of 2006, for tier 3 emmissions .
Louis
Thank you Terry!!!
Great information as always, for the record I enjoy useless trivia about trains especially about ALCO one of my favorites!
My first model train was an ALCO Century 430 and I believe they were upgraded versions of the Century 425, but did the 430 use a higher output 251 to achieve 3000HP or was it a different engine all together?
Thank you very much for always helping me with these seemingly useless questions, but they are important in my world.
Terry
The C430 was powered by a 251E. The C425 was powered by a 251C. The 430 and 630 were the first locomotives to use AC power generation, using alternators to power the traction motors.
Willis
AC traction motors eh!, well useless trivia or not it sure is interesting. One the claims around here was they were much better at pulling a train up the grades than the GM locos, the claim was "once an ALCO or MLW engine hooked onto a consist it would pull and pull" something like that
Terry
AC power generation, as in an alternator rather than a generator. This was something not followed up on until the GP38AC. The traction motors were still DC.