Nostalgia & History > N&W 422 - Si!

N&W 422 sits in the Brewster, Ohio afternoon sun on October 17, 1977. At first glance this looks like other low-nose Alco C-424's, but look again. It is in N&W paint and was originally Wabash B901. According to CPR_4000 and Steinzeit, they were originally numbered in the N&W 3900 series. (Thanks for the information. I appreciate your help.) It and several other ex-Wabash Alco C-424's were originally built for the NdeM, and I was told they came to the N&W with cab instructions still in Spanish!
In checking my notes, I found this was from the first roll of slides taken with my new Nikon, so it has double meaning to me.
Bob



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/27/15 14:34 by refarkas.

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Great story and photo Bob. It's odd that Wab was using a "B" in front of the number for units in the second generation era.

It is my understanding that they were in fact run as "B" units and not in the lead.

The story was that Alco had built these on order for the Nacionales de Mexico, and they were very near or actually completed when they cancelled the order outright. Alco was stuck with them, with all instructions and signage in español, making it far more difficult to sell them. Not wanting to have to eat them (literally), they started calling around to CMO's of railroads that still held Alco in a good light, probably saying something akin to "Boy, do I have a deal for you"! There was an advantage to the purchaser - no lead time. Wabash, who had just had Alco re-engine their FM Train Masters, was in the right place at the right time.

Wabash ran them as trailing units only, hence the "B" ("Boosters") prefix ahead of the unit number, probably out of grade crossing liability issues, less than an engineer not being bi-lingual (though that WAS part of their reasoning). The other was that they were equipped dynamic braking - something no other (contemporary*) Wabash unit had. For the price they paid, it would seem they got their monies' worth.

(*Wabash 550 and 551 [ex-FM Train Master Demo units TM-1 and TM-2] were purchased by the road with d/b's, but Decatur shops deactivated them and blanked over the openings with sheet metal. Also Wabash subsidiary Ann Arbor entire fleet of Alco FA2's were ordered WITH dynamic breaking, a facet I have yet to see explained anywhere.)

Bob

ATSF100WEST......Out

Were the B9XX series numbered in the N&W 3900's for a while? A fairly recent Classic Trains story by Dave Ingles on riding the Golden Spike Limited consist shows two N&W 3900's.

I don't think it was language thing as it would have been easy to redo that.

The seven units, B900-B906, were renumbered to 3900-3906 under N&W. IIRC, B906 was wrecked in October 1964 and eventually scrapped. N&W eventually modified the units so they could run as lead units. Though it is likely the units had Spanish instructions, I personally think it's an urban legend they couldn't run as lead units with other Wabash engines in a consist because of just that. It would be interesting to find out what kind of modification N&W made--likely electro-mechanical. N&W eventually renumbered them in the 400 series.

Victor A. Baird
http://www.erstwhilepublications.com



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/28/15 06:43 by wabash2800.