Nostalgia & History > General Elecrtric E33s

General Electric built eleven E33s for the Virginian Rwy.  They then were owned by the New Haven, the Penn Central as shown here, and finally by Conrail.

1. and 2. Penn Central 4603 and 4609 and train at Trenton, NJ on January 28, 1977.

3. and 4. Penn Central 4606 and 4603 and train at Rahway, NJ during the morning commuter rush on June 19, 1972.

More detail on E33s may be found at:  http://thecrhs.org/ConrailEquipment/Locomotives/Electrics/E33

Enjoy these rather rare birds,
Marty Bernard



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/02/15 19:03 by MartyBernard.

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Here is a pair during their New Haven tenure - 310 and 302 leading a freight through the New Haven station in 1965.

Ray

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When these were New Haven units, they were equipped with bus bars to allow mu operation with only one pan up. PC did away with that. Did they have the bus bars on VGN, too?

Yes the "EL-C/EF-4/E-33's" were built with the bus jumpers, likewise there are photos of pairs of them in service on the Vgn running off a single pan. 
What an awesome and unique looking road the Virginian was.   

another regrettable E-33 story ... one snowy weekday morning in the early 70s, i was 17-18 at the time, i drove over to Pavonia yard in Camden,NJ ... i usually hung out on 27th St bridge but the weather being as sloppy as it was i decided to go to the north end of the yard where the yard funneled at that time down to 4 tracks ... 1&2 running and 1&2 Cramer ...

the Cramer tracks were used by the hump crews for the bowl ... the tracks at this location are on an elevated RofW with a grass hill that i would climb to watch the action trackside ... as i get up to trackside an inbound train is coming in but i can barely see it due to the snow reeaaallly coming down but i can distinguish the units are electric motors ... he was coming in on 1 Cramer ...

i was standing in a 6-foot area between 1 Cramer and 2 running ... i noticed the conductor/head brakeman on the front porch of what i can barely make out as a box motor so i'm thinking the units are a pair of E-44s but as they got closer i was pleasantly suprised to see the pair were a set of E-33s ...

the crewman on the porch gestures and yells to throw the switch right where i was standing that was the other end of crossover from 1 Cramer to 2 running ... i'm like who me turning around to see if anybody was behind me ... there wasn't, he was talking to me so as the train is getting closer and it doesn't look like they're goin to stop i throw the switch and as the big electrics go by, the crewman gives a big wave and yells thanks as the headend motors go by with a low whine in notch 1 to yard their train ...

getting back to my regret ... between pop being a railroader, me being a railroader, and me being around thousands of railroad settings like this one, this experience was just one of the TOOOO many times i experienced being in a real railroad setting, this one encountering E-33s, and not having a camera to record the action ...

I don't think photos would have made your story any more vivid.

Marty

Did anyone catch Trains and Locomotives on RFD tv this week?  It featured some killer Virginian electric action.  I normally don't bother watching Eastern railroading when it comes up on this channel, but am I glad I decided not to delete!  What really blew me away were the Virginian's GE streamlined electric motors.  Absolutely beautiful machines, and all were scrapped.   

Note the usual gorgeous GE design and asthetics of these locomotives...