BNSF MAC's in H3

[KCSHogger]

Anyone know if any of the SD70MAC type locomotives besides the 8987 and 9839 have been repainted into H3? A lot of the H2 units are looking pretty shabby these days. I think they should start with the 8814 if they havent already, it looked horrible last time I saw it. In fact, it has looked that way for several years.

 

[Conductor Rees]

Itd be better if they just retired them all.

 

[KCSHogger]

Ahhhh.... theyre not that bad, and believe me, I have ran many of BNSF's all of the KCS or ex-TFM at one time or another since about 2004. The main thing to remember with the 70MAC type locos is that they are not designed for switching. The desk top control stand could stand to be replaced with a AAR style conventional type stand to avoid the "knee knocker" effect. They just good maintenance performed on them. In my opinion, they are the last "decent" AC locos that EMD built. SD70 proper aside. I have pulled many 130 car loaded coal trains down to a drag with DP 1 X 1 and they performed beautifully, which was what they were intended for. Now for switching, work trains, whatever else as KCS uses them for sometimes, they are not as ideal as they tend to lunge and buck upon initially coming out on the throttle and are slow to load, slow to stop. I like the clean carbody lines and tear drop windshields with the "true" whisper cabs. I started a coal load once on a grade of about .8 % with 17,500 tons and BNSF 8817/8927 in 1 X 1 configuration and both units loaded up to 210 KLB (in the yellow) of Tractive effort and didnt slip, now both were relatively full of fuel, but still. You just have to be patient upon starting a train and mindful of the type of equipment that you are handling. Overall though, they are decent units. I do prefer ES44ACs for heavy haul to anything else, but they are the late model so there ya go..

 

[Conductor Rees]

I have seen some around that have been painted in h3. And I would rather have a mac than an NS but the MACs we catch need to be rebuilt. And we catch MACs alot.