The EMD GP15-1 is a 4-axle

diesel-electric locomotive A diesel locomotive is a type of railway locomotive in which the prime mover is a diesel engine. Several types of diesel locomotives have been developed, differing mainly in the means by which mechanical power is conveyed to the driving wheels ...

built by

General Motors Electro-Motive Division Progress Rail Locomotives, doing business as Electro-Motive Diesel (EMD), is an American manufacturer of diesel-electric locomotives, locomotive products and diesel engines for the rail industry. The company is owned by Caterpillar through its su ...

between June 1976 and March 1982. Intended to provide an alternative to the rebuilding programs that many railroads were applying to their early road switchers, it is generally employed as a

yard The yard (symbol: yd) is an English unit of length in both the British imperial and US customary systems of measurement equalling 3 feet or 36 inches. Since 1959 it has been by international agreement standardized as exactly ...

switcher or light

road switcher A road switcher is a type of railroad locomotive designed to both haul railcars in mainline service and shunt them in railroad yards. Both type and term are North American in origin, although similar types have been used elsewhere. A road ...

. This locomotive is powered by a 12-

cylinder A cylinder (from ) has traditionally been a three-dimensional solid, one of the most basic of curvilinear geometric shapes. In elementary geometry, it is considered a prism with a circle as its base. A cylinder may also be defined as an infin ...

EMD 645E engine, which generates . The GP15-1 uses a frame, has a

wheelbase In both road and rail vehicles, the wheelbase is the horizontal distance between the centers of the front and rear wheels. For road vehicles with more than two axles (e.g. some trucks), the wheelbase is the distance between the steering (front ...

of and has a length over couplers of . A total of 310 units were built for

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

railroads. A number of GP15-1s remain in service today for yard work and light road duty. The radiator section is similar to those found on the

EMD SD40T-2 The SD40T-2 is a model of diesel-electric locomotive built by General Motors Electro-Motive Division in the United States. The SD40T-2 is equipped with a 16-cylinder EMD 645E3 diesel engine producing . 312 SD40T-2s were built for three railroads i ...

and

EMD SD45T-2 The SD45T-2 is a model of diesel-electric locomotive built by EMD for the Southern Pacific Railroad. Like the later SD40T-2 it is colloquially nicknamed a tunnel motor. 247 total units (including the original EMD/SP joint venture working Prototy ...

"tunnel motors," leading some observers to incorrectly identify the units as such or as GP15Ts, and giving them the nickname "baby tunnel motors".

Original Owners

Missouri Pacific Railroad

The

Missouri Pacific Railroad The Missouri Pacific Railroad , commonly abbreviated as MoPac, was one of the first railroads in the United States west of the Mississippi River. MoPac was a Class I railroad growing from dozens of predecessors and mergers. In 1967, the railroad ...

purchased more units than the other three buyers combined. For spotting purposes, the MP models have a number of visually distinguishing features, though not all were applied consistently to the MP units: * The MP units have a grab iron ladder mounted on both sides of the long hood end; * MP's initial order of GP15-1s rode on Blomberg M trucks rather than the more common

Blomberg B The Blomberg B is a 2-axle bogie that was introduced by EMD in 1939 with the FT locomotive series; the original "B" version plus later "M" and "X" versions were quite successful and became standard equipment on a multitude of locomotive models ...

(all subsequent units were delivered with Blomberg B trucks) — and, while the standard Blomberg B truck carries two brake shoes per wheel, many MP units were equipped with only a single brake shoe per wheel; * #1555–#1574 were outfitted with the standard 81" nose, while the remaining units (all built in December 1976 or later) came with an 88" nose;

Complete list

GP15T

EMD built 28 examples of a variant, the GP15T, between October 1982 and April 1983. It was a very close cousin to the GP15-1, but used a turbocharger in order to generate more power from a smaller engine. Power was provided by an 8-

diesel engine that generated , the same as the GP15-1, but with four fewer cylinders. 28 examples of this locomotive model were built for

railroads. The

Chessie System Chessie System, Inc. was a holding company that owned the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway (C&O), the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O), the Western Maryland Railway (WM), and Baltimore and Ohio Chicago Terminal Railroad (B&OCT). Trains operated unde ...

received the majority of them as C&O 1500-1524 (25 units), while the rest went to the Apalachicola Northern in Florida as AN 720-722 (3 units).

GP15AC

The GP15AC is a variant built between November and December 1982. This model differs from the GP15-1 due to Missouri Pacific specifying new AR10 AC alternators instead of rebuilt D32 DC generators. The only external difference between the GP15AC and the GP15-1 is a straight side sill (shared with the EMD GP15T) not related to the transmission difference. 34 examples of this locomotive model were built in total: 30 for

, and four for Venezuela's IFE.

References

* * *

External links

* Sarberenyi, Robert.
EMD GP15-1, GP15AC, and GP15T Original Owners
' B-B locomotives GP15-1 Diesel-electric locomotives of the United States Railway locomotives introduced in 1976 Freight locomotives Standard gauge locomotives of the United States {{diesel-loco-stub