Railroaders' Nostalgia > Most spacious diesel cab?

SantaFe199 made reference in a thread on the Nostalgia Board about the amount of room in an F-unit cab being sufficient to deploy a tripod.
Which raises the question about which diesel had the most spacious cab?

Based on my experience, it would be the F45. I recall being invited into the cab of a BN F45. I was surprised at just how spacious it was
compared to any other model. I bet you could almost set up a ping pong table in there....

Robert Pierce
Sugar Land, TX
SWRails.com

I think I agree, F45 seems to be the roomiest loco I ever ran.
JB

     Pool table in an F45 with room to get the difficult shot without hitting the walls with the cue. . . . . . .  almost.

BN had a handful of GP50's with extended cabs to accomodate five man crews in cabooseless operation.  BSB 

BigSkyBlue Wrote:
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> BN had a handful of GP50's with extended cabs to
> accomodate five man crews in cabooseless
> operation.  BSB 

But there was 5 seats and a set of controls in there. So not that much room.
The F45 had just 3 seats and a set of controls.

BQ23-7. Just kidding, never been in one.

trainjunkie Wrote:
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> BQ23-7. Just kidding, never been in one.

Not kidding, no room with 5 seats, controls stand and conductor's desk.
As per an article in Diesel Era several years ago.

The F45's, and the Amtrak version, SDP40F's did have large cabs, but one of the worst would have be the Santa Fe GP20's. Bad enough to start with, very tight quarters for the engineer, but then they decided to install a 4th seat in the middle of the cab for us to stumble around.

Posted from Android

LocoPilot750 Wrote:
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> The F45's, and the Amtrak version, SDP40F's did
> have large cabs, but one of the worst would have
> be the Santa Fe GP20's. Bad enough to start with,
> very tight quarters for the engineer, but then
> they decided to install a 4th seat in the middle
> of the cab for us to stumble around.
>
> Posted from Android

It can be worse. How about a WP GP20 with the dual controlstands?

PHall Wrote:
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> LocoPilot750 Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > The F45's, and the Amtrak version, SDP40F's did
> > have large cabs, but one of the worst would
> have
> > be the Santa Fe GP20's. Bad enough to start
> with,
> > very tight quarters for the engineer, but then
> > they decided to install a 4th seat in the
> middle
> > of the cab for us to stumble around.
> >
> > Posted from Android
>
> It can be worse. How about a WP GP20 with the dual
> controlstands?

...or a BN 5-seat GP 30.

TAW

Add the the extreme noise in a GP 20, IMHO one of the loudest I ever ran. When they did away with cabooses in the mid '80's Santa Fe installed five seats in A LOT of old GP 9's, everyone had a place to sit but no place to put anything else!
JB

Methinks the UP Centennial cabs were just as roomy as F45 cabs, if not roomier.

Best regards,

Rob L.

I would think the F45, FP45, SDP40F and DDA40X cabs were all pretty much the same...No?

Mark

NS SD60M rebuild has nearly same room as the F45. But the stand is bigger and offset to the center more.

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and, in stark contrast with F units, E unit cabs were pretty tight, as I recall . . .

I'd agree with the others that the F45 was the roomiest cab I've been in.  As for the least roomiest it would be BN's dual control SD7s seen here in this photo.  There are five of us in the cab here, fireman L. E . Raby hidden behind the left control stand with the jacket draped over it, brakeman Gary Gay Jr on the toadstool seat in front of the door way, conductor Neal David wedged in between the water cooler and control stand, engineer Wayne Logan-also out of sight to the right seated at the control stand running the engine, and me standing behind Wayne.  We're on BN's North Houston Switcher job hauling a transfer to Basin Yard near the Port of Houston in the spring of 1980.  In the winter space would get even tighter with all the cold weather and rain gear everywhere.

Tom Kline
Houston, TX 

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The RSD4's the CNW had had dual controls and NO room and that was with 3 seats 

CP's 9000 series cowl bodied SD-40s had the biggest cab I have ever been in. We used to joke that you could hold a square dance in that cab.

Posted from iPhone