Earl Wrote:
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> The 28's were built by ALCO. The 36's were built
> by Baldwin. Baldwin always made things cheaper.
> Not necessarily better, but cheaper. It is not
> known who did the actual design of the 28's. The
> decision to put the cab deck low drove the
> decision as to where to put the air compressor.
> There was simply no place to put it on the side of
> the engine where it would not block the fireman's
> view.
>
> 36's were built as freight hogs. Riding qualities
> at speed was not much of a concern. BLW built
> what they thought was the biggest thing they could
> comfortably put on 3' gauge rails. At the time
> they were the largest rigid frame 3' gauge
> locomotives in the world, and were only eclipsed
> by the D&RGW's homebuilt K37's, which pushed the
> envelope even further.
>
> The riding qualities of the K36's are hampered by
> the very flexible, but much less stable Hodges
> trailing truck. The axle of which is located up
> against the front wall of the cab leaving nearly
> 10' of locomotive hanging off the rear. Any
> deflection the rear of the engine makes on even
> slightly substandard track is amplified by the
> time it gets to the back of the cab. That
> combined with the flexible trailing truck with
> little lateral stability makes the cab bounce
> vertically, and swing side to side. K36's also
> carry a smaller percentage of their engine weight
> on the pilot truck compared to a K-28, although
> both lead trucks are identical. More weight on
> drivers makes for a better pulling machine, but
> tends to be much less stable at speed. Another
> issue is the larger pistons and generally heavier
> rod assemblies of the K36's create a piston thrust
> issue that gets worse the faster you go, making
> the front end hunt. This is why K28's were
> allowed to run 45mph, and K-36's and K-37's were
> limited to 35mph.
>
> Lastly - an opinion - ALCO built some odd looking
> machines. Baldwin made some losers in the
> esthetics department too, but ALCO built a lot
> more of them. I've found through the years that
> if an engine has an odd proportion or feature to
> it, chances are it was built by ALCO.
>
> My feeling is the designers at the American
> Locomotive Company went to work for American
> Motors when ALCO quit building steam locomotives.
Earl in my opinion the Grande mechanical engineers were genius when designing the trailing truck for the 37's using a hybrid of what the K-36's and K-28's had and morphed them into what we see on the 37's. I think the design and building of the K-37's isn't really fully appreciated by most and the fact that they all have the ability to operate today is further testament to the D&RGW. You know I'm a bit biased when discussing the 37's, can't help it.
William
aka drgwk37
