Model Railroading > SD38/SD39 differences?

Is there a significant amount of detail differences between the SD38 and SD39? Significant for this purpose meaning enough difference for a manufacturer to offer one and not the other. If the SD38 was done, how much work would it be to make it into the SD39 (a la ITC)?

Thanks,

Aaron
eXtra315

The most obvious difference is that the SD39 has a turbocharger where the paper air filter box is on the SD38. As far as the door differences go, I havnt gone that far into the research....

Cya Down the Line!
--Dash

The long hood is totally different because the SD39 has a 12-cylinder engine instead of the 16-cylinder used in the SD38. The engine compartment on the SD39 is smaller because of the smaller engine and thus the number of doors and door layout is different. The generator/clean air compartment behind the cab is also larger on the SD39.


Chris Toth

Thanks for the info so soon. I was wondering, because I had heard a while ago that Atlas would be doing the SD38, and I was hoping they would also do the SD39 (in Illinois Terminal, of course). Guess that would require totally different tooling, though, eh?

Aaron
eXtra315

If you go back into the Railroad Model Craftsman in the 1980s I believe, there is an article on kitbashing both the IT SD-39 and one of their GP units... I have it somewhere if you cannot find it on your own...

Hank in AL

Railpower made the SD38 in HO scale, if you can
still find them. They don\'t have the paper filters
though. I had to add that (I think I cut one off
an Athearn GP38-2 dynamic insert), to do my
Conrail SD38.

To satisfy my curiosity, where\'d you hear that Atlas was going to do an SD38? I haven\'t heard that one yet.

Can\'t remember where I heard that at. Maybe I was thinking of something else. Were these units popular enough to warrant a mfr. coming out with them in plastic?

X315

Just off the top of my head, late at night, I can come up with the following roads as owners. There are bound to be more and some roads had multiple paint schemes.

DM&IR, C&NW, Conrail, UP, SP, BRC, SLSF, BN, BNSF, NAR, Sou Ry BC,

Oops, some of these were SD38-2\'s. You get the idea, the market is probably there even if the actual numbers don\'t approach those of the SD40/SD40-2 models.

SD39\'s were limited to IT, SP and ATSF. Maybe the UP and BNSF have inherited a few.

Original domestic SD38 owners were B&LE, EJ&E, DT&I, McCloud River RR, and Penn Central. BC Hydro, B&LE, and Missabe also owned the alternator equipped SD38AC variant. Thanks to mergers, you can add Conrail, NS, and CSX to the owner list (off the top of my head here). Overall, 67 units were built for domestic service.

For the SD39, only 54 units were built, with SP, ATSF, IT, and M&NS making up the original owners. With mergers and sales, BNSF and SOO can be added to the roadname count.

> For the SD39, only 54 units were built, with SP, ATSF, IT,
> and M&NS making up the original owners. With mergers and
> sales, BNSF and SOO can be added to the roadname count.

As well as NS and Guilford for the IT units.

D\'oh! Forgot about the Guilford units (I know that everyone else tries to!). Did any of the ex-IT units get NS paint?

Lighter wrote:

>
> > For the SD39, only 54 units were built, with SP, ATSF, IT,
> > and M&NS making up the original owners. With mergers and
> > sales, BNSF and SOO can be added to the roadname count.
>
> As well as NS and Guilford for the IT units.

SP_8299 wrote:

> Did any of the ex-IT units get NS paint?

Norfolk and Western black, but none were repainted into the NS scheme before they were retired in August 1984.

Chris Toth

Copper Basin in AZ has (had?) some SD39s, doesn\'t Indiana Harbor Belt have one too?

There have also been lots of export SD38 orders to South Korea, South America, Saudi Arabia and others. Also, the UP and others have converted SD40-2s and SD40s into SD38-2s and SD38-3s (and also GP40s and GP40-2s into 38s). They are nice sounding units. Thanks in advance for any info.
P.S. The GP39s have the same differences to the GP38s as their SD counterparts.

rustedflange wrote:

> Copper Basin in AZ has (had?) some SD39s, doesn\'t Indiana
> Harbor Belt have one too?

I think the CBRY ones were ex-SP. IHB had 2 of
the ex-CBRY ones (via HATX, but they were still in
CBRY paint, and you could see the old SP lettering
showing thru on at least one of them). I believe
both the IHB ones are now stored/retired.