Diesel of the Day 7/13: GE B40-8

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Whoops, this entry is a few hours behind schedule…long night! Today’s diesel is a late-model high horsepower four-axle road locomotive: the General Electric B40-8. This guy was one of the last four-axle units offered before manufacturers and railroads started to heavily favor six-axle locomotives for road use. GE built 151 units in 1988-89. The B40-8 is a beefy diesel, powered by a 4,000 horsepower version of GE’s four-stroke 7FDL16 turbo V16. Along with its six-axle variant, the C40-8, it was the first production diesel locomotive to reach 4,000 horsepower. As trains got progressively longer and heavier through the 80s and 90s, railroads needed more and more powerful locomotives to keep up. Eventually they ran up against a wall - in this case it was horsepower per axle, fully 1,000 in the B40. What this means is wheelslip was exaggerated due to the extreme amount of power being applied to the rail through a relatively small number of wheels. This hampered performance in yard service, but the B40 made a fine road locomotive for those railroads who chose to use it. After the horsepower race culminated in the battle between the ill-fated SD90MAC and AC6000CW in the mid-90s (more locos to feature later!), the industry standardized on roughly 4,400 horsepower per locomotive to avoid problems. Quite a few B40-8s can still be found in service, though most are now in lease service or working for smaller roads. CSX had a large fleet until they were retired a couple years back. The photo today is the last B40-8 I captured on CSX, shot just down the road from my house in my local railyard.
In the sunset