Western Railroad Discussion > MRL Trio to Pasco, WA

OS: MRL 251 West @ Babb, WA @ 00:50 7-26-2016, M-SPOPAS w/ MRL 251, 255, 260, BNSF GP60B.

Shortly after midnight I heard the classic EMD 645 drumbeat pass by my place and went out to investigate. Found the M-SPOPAS second out at Babb waiting on Amtrak #28.

Ted Curphey
Ontario, OR



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/26/16 01:57 by funnelfan.

Are there any SD45's left at all (running or stored) or have thry all left the property?

Which property?

MRL has a small number of SD45s stored for sale. MRL 382, the last active SD45 was pulled from active service a couple of weeks ago.

BNSF hasn't had any SD45s on their property for years.

Note the locomotives in the OP are SD40(-2XR) not SD45 models.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/26/16 07:36 by fbe.

No SD45s on MRL are in service at this time. The 382 had been running on the 840 Local out of Helena with a fuel optimizer setup, while married up to MRL 4308. The 382 last worked Jul01 and then sent to Livingston for storage, with the optimizer equipment to be removed and installed to a SD40-2XR. 

The 318 and the 330 have been sold to Frontier Rail, with the 318 going west to the Tri-Cities, WA area for one of their switching operations and the 330 is enroute to the midwest. I assume the 318 is working at it's new place of employment. 

The remaining MRL SD45s are in storage.
Dave in Msla

Well they should come back as a solid set or at least with more SD40's or GP's in the consist. For what ever reason BNSF has decided that EMD's older then a SD60 can no longer be running in a consist with more modern GE's or EMD's.

MRL has installed load limiting software in the SD40-2XR fleet so they can run with the newer ACe units and GE power. The newer AC power has no minimum continuous speed restrictions. So on steep grades the train get down to 10-12 mph which would get the older DC units in the 1100-1200 amps range and a 30 minute time out limit or risk burning up. So the Traction Motor Protection software limits the load to 900-1000 amps.

So lets hope BNSF just keeps the trio together anyway.

318 actually ended up going to the CCET (Cincinnati East Terminal Railway) in Cincinnati, Ohio and I believe has already arrived there.

The 330 and 332 are supposedly going to CCET too.

monaddave Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The 318 and the 330 have been sold to Frontier
> Rail, with the 318 going west to the Tri-Cities,
> WA area for one of their switching operations and
> the 330 is enroute to the midwest. I assume the
> 318 is working at it's new place of employment. 
 

Appalachianrails Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> 318 actually ended up going to the CCET
> (Cincinnati East Terminal Railway) in Cincinnati,
> Ohio and I believe has already arrived there.
>
> The 330 and 332 are supposedly going to CCET too.

CCET 318 was billed from Spokane, WA to East Pasco, WA and is in East Pasco.
CCET 330 was billed from Laurel, MT to Newtown, OH and is in Glendive, MT.