The locomotives of Fairbanks Morse

Thanks for this video! This was new to me. The FM diesels had most popular in Soviet Russia. It was Reverse engineering, 38D8 1/8 received under the WWII Lend Lease Navy program. After the war two since the 50s options was use on locomotives: the 10 cylinder by 2000 HP (almost 8000 TE3 and TE7 A+A two-unit set) and the 10 cylinder by 3000 HP by turbocharger (TE10 AA and ABA units). In 80s and 90s this locomotives has also continued in production because there has been no reliable replacement. You can still see a few 3000 HP old locomotives in the 21st century. Now they was supplanted by V12 four-stroke engine. Russian railfans absolutely love it for the beautiful low-frequency sound. This low sound is unmistakable, you can be heard 10 miles away on a quiet night. But crew that worked on and operated it They cursed it for it shortcomings - Oil leaks, black smoke, difficulties due to the upper crank, turbocharger, uneconomical, technical obsolescence. (sorry for my bad English).

I remember when the SP had Trainmasters running the San Jose to San Francisco commuter trains. There were alot of stations close together and the Trainmaster accelerated noticeably faster than the EMD locomotives SP also used. You wanted to be sitting down when the engineer hit the throttle, it took off! The Trainmaster had a very distinctive sound, very different from anything else.

Very cool! My grandfather worked at Fairbanks Morris in Beloit Wisconsin. He told me he would paint the locomotives for the different roads that would purchase them before they were delivered.

Tug Boats YTB's yes sir. We had to start them in the dark so the townies would not see the smoke. Love the beast .

My father in law was a SP hog head. When the Trainmasters were working the Bay Area commuter jobs on weekends they get assigned road jobs. He took a triple header to San Luis Obispo with a 89 carload train. He told me they were the strongest pulling loco's he ever operated on.

Retired US Navy Engineman here. Worked on and operated many Fairbanks Morse Diesel Engines. Mostly the 1300 KW gensets in LSD 41 class ships.

The 12 cylinder, 24 piston Train Masters were among the most beautiful sounding machines ever to roam the rails. Quiet at idle, booming like a tympani roll at acceleration. There are some high quality recordings out there, some on youtube. A lot of old films have dubbed fake sound for Fairbanks-Morse diesels so you can't rely on that. The best recordings were made of the San Francisco commute fleet in the 1970s. Wonderful sound.

As a small kid I grew up in an agricultural town served by branches of the Union Pacific and the Great Northern. The GN's head end power at the time on our stub-ended branch south of Spokane was mostly provided by Alco RS-3s and rare appearances of FAs. The UP however treated this young railfan to a kaleidoscope of Alco RS-3s, and several FM road switcher types depicted in your video. I wish now that I had been able to capture those locos on film. They were a colorful smoky lot!

I know two different Milwaukee Road retirees who worked on the small FM switchers. One of which was the exact one at Illinois Railroad Museum (which was FMs literal first locomotive). I have heard multiple times those little FN switchers could load up faster out-pull everything else in the yard in Milwaukee. I've heard phases from old MILW guys like "Those thing could pull the yard office out by the roots".

Most of the FM locomotives used Cutler Hammer switch gear if not all of them, that part of the locomotives was pretty much bulletproof of we have one at the Golden gate railroad Museum an H-12-44

Big Trainmaster fan here...thanks for the great video!

One Trainmaster survives: CPR 8905, preserved at Exporail, QC. It's not an F-M product, rather a CLC-made unit, but since you're using a pic of CPR 8909 in your video, I think it's worth an update. BTW, Exporail is a crazy fantastic place.

Fascinating history-Thanks for all your research & putting together the presentation.

A woman who was a family friend of my grandparents owned a Fairbanks-Morse television. This would have been in the 1960s in Canada.

The Fairbanks Morse H24-66, trainmaster is one of my favorites. Loved the sound of them .Back in the early 1960s I saw one of these locomotives on the Jersey Central Lines in Wilkes Barre ,PA.

In the CPR shop in Calgary, the job of working on the lower cylinders of C-Liners, H-Liners, and Trainmasters always seemed to fall to the first-year apprentice diesel mechanics. Funny how that works. Since fluids flow downhill the bottom cylinders were always covered in 'stuff' making them unpleasant to work on.

the FM opposed piston engine is one of the most efficient, space conservative power plant ever conceived. That very power plant that you so heavily criticize was the main stay of the US Navy FM series submarine fleet, and amongst submariners, on of the favorite subs in history. While FM power plants may not have been well utilized in rail applications, the general consensus of opinion among engineers, power plant operators, and a whole host of other folks is that the FM products were good, reliable, effecient and sturdy power plants.

Fairbanks Morse: "hey guys check out my new diesel" American railroads: "ew no thanks, EMD has us covered" Canada: "it's okay they didn't give ALCO a chance either, say you wanna try selling some of those to our railways?" FM: "sure, thanks Canada" 20 years later: Southern Pacific: "hey whatever happened to the guys who made those trainmasters?" B&O: "idk I think they went out of business or something" Canadian Pacific: "These are the best fucking locomotives I've ever owned"

FM # 1847 x US Army 1953 now runs at the Golden gate railroad museum, we made a SP clone out of it renumbered 1487 H-22-44 these were the most popular of all the FM locomotives the US army alone bought hundreds of them

The Tennessee' Valley Railroad Museum has one. There was a (baby?) Trainmaster on the Southern tip of Virginia's Eastern Shore, used by the Eastern Shore Railroad. I don't think that it was operational when the Bay Shore Railroad took over. Not sure of what happened to it.