Updated: 04 Sep 2007, 22:45 ET
(Created 31 Aug 2000)
[Ref: This is boxdp100.html (URL http://home.att.net/~Berliner-Ultrasonics/boxdp100.html )]
S. Berliner, III's
There are now more than fifty-five (55) BOXCAB pages;
see the main Boxcabs page and
the Boxcabs INDEX.
This page was split off from the Survivors Roster page 31 Aug 00.
(04 Sep 07)
There are now separate pages for each surviving boxcab.
On the Survivor Boxcabs page:
times since the counter was installed.
Other surviving gas/oil-electric/diesel boxcabs are noted on the Other Boxcabs continuation page.
Other surviving electric (and any other odd) boxcabs are noted on the Odd Boxcabs continuation page.
Since Sep 00, there is an extremely detailed and accurate site focusing exclusively on the earliest history of the ALCo-GE-IR (AGEIR) locos, John F. Campbell's " ALCO / General Electric / Ingersoll-Rand (AGEIR) Diesel-Electric Locomotives" site; I heartily recommend it to you! John Campbell has since added a complete roster of all the ALCo-GE-IR boxcab locos built in the first production run, totalling 33 units, from 1925 to 1930, but not the later Bi- and Tri-Power or GE-IR units.
The Dan Patch #100 before restoration:
Hey, folks, whatever happened to that Ingersoll-Rand demonstrator, #8835? This is a photo of her:
This following photo is NOT it; it is of #9681 (which became CNJ #1000):
Demo #8835 was the "single-ended" 1923 GE unit first demonstrated in 1924 with an I-R engine driving a 200Kw. generator and later scrapped by GE at Erie in 1926 (much more on this to follow elsewhere).
The demo unit, #8835, and survivor Dan Patch #100 have a lot in common and even
look vaguely alike at first glance (especially in being "single-ended" with a narrow
nose and a flat rear); I have attempted to highlight the
similarities and differences herein.
and the right-side Builder's Plate, itself, at about
half-size
(or a substitute - see the extra holes to the right!)
(photo © 1999 S. Berliner, III - all rights reserved - photo taken at MTM, 23 Aug 99.)
57-ton, 350-hp Minneapolis, St. Paul, Rochester & Dubuque Electric Traction Co. (Dan Patch Electric Lines) #100 at Minnesota Transportation Museum, St. Paul. Originally built by GE in June of 1913 as a two-engined (GM-16C4 - 175hp) gas-electric of 36' 4" length, sold to Central Warehouse Co., St. Paul, converted by CW in 1918 to straight electric with trolley pole, sold to Minneapolis, Anoka & Cuyuna Range in 1922, sold to Northern Ordnance in 1943, rehabilitated and renumbered #1, back to #100 in 1946, converted to diesel-electric (250-hp Waukesha 6 WAKDU) in August 1957, sold to FMC in 1964, on land bought by GN in 1966, and finally donated to MTM in 1967. Claimed by GE as first internal combustion locomotive in world (but was actually second - there was a 22-ton, 30" gauge, diesel-electric built in 1912).
The second unit built eventually ended up in Brooklyn, NY, as Jay Street Connecting Railroad #3.
FIRST I.C. LOCO! - Gottlieb Daimler built an internal-combustion-powered locomotive ca. 1890! For more information, click HERE!
(photos © 1999 S. Berliner, III - all rights reserved - photos taken at MTM, 23 Aug 99;
* - but see below.
Once there at the MTM on 23 Aug 99, I found her power plant to be a Waukesha sled, mounted sideways, with the radiator sticking out of the right side of the carbody about 2/3 of the way back! Weird! Here's the sled:
Waukesha Sled Radiator Waukesha Sled (inside view)
(outside view to rear along right side) (looking from engineer's
stand rearward)
(photos © 1999 S. Berliner, III - all rights reserved -
photos taken at MTM, 23 Aug 99)
[Thumbnail images; click on pictures for full images.].
Oh, I almost forgot; the Dan Patch and her sisters did not have the classic, roof-mounted, curved, fin-tube, convection radiators that were a trade mark of the first production ALCo-GE-IR units, and Dan Patch #100 has a door on the left front, which NONE of the ALCo-GE-IR units had.
The most obvious external similarities (other than that both are old, odd-looking, 4' 8½ gauge, steel-bodied, medium-sized, boxcab locomotives) are that Dan Patch and #8835 are "single-ended", unlike other boxcab electrics and later gas- and oil-electrics, with a pointed or curved front and a flat rear.
Another difference is that Dan Patch never had a forward-scanning radar antenna above the nose - I wonder what that gizmo up topside on #8835 could actually be?
Well, according to our redoubtable John Campbell, that was the "Art Deco" capped exhaust {over the engineer?}. Yup, per the drawings, it was the forward of a pair sticking up through the roof from a common, longitudinal, internal muffler or collector, the second being directly over the generator (aligned over the forward edge of the middle side window).
From the Other Boxcabs page 2:
26 Mar 99 - Bruce Schryver advised that "Pacific Electric had two similar units, numbers 1501 and 1502 that they received from somewhere back east. These were gas-electric, but had the same configuration. They were fitted with trolley poles to control crossing signals, and were used for short haul service in areas where they intersected non-electrified trackage" (PE ran lots of electric box motors).
Norm Metcalf of Boulder, Colorado, advised (12 Oct 00) that the units may have come from the Minneapolis, St. Paul, Rochester & Dubuque Electric Traction Co. (the "Dan Patch Line") and that their #103 is said to have become PE's 2nd #1501.
Per Norm, page 519 of Olson's "The Electric Railways of Minnesota" gives (possibly conflicting) dispositions for MStPR&DET #100 through #103.
Here are two photos from Dan Mewhinney of Dan Patch as she ran on the Minneapolis, Anoka & Cuyuna Range, with a pole, and as restored and operating:
(photos courtesy of D. Mewhinney - all rights reserved)
The MTM also has a rusted oddball, a 1930 Baldwin-Westinghouse Visibility Cab diesel, ARMCO #B-71; for the purposes of these pages, she's hereby dubbed a "semi-boxcab". There is a second B-W Visibility Cab unit, ARMCO B-73, at the Pennsylvania Trolley Museum in Washington, Pennsylvania (just south of Pittsburgh, and a Canadian-built variant, CN #7700/#77, at the Canadian Railway Museum near Montréal - see Baldwin Boxcabs for more on these units!
See my page on B-71 linked directly above and for a more-detailed history of the Dan
Patch #100, see the MTM site; because
the MTM has had a new URL since about Feb 99, with frames (what a pain!), you'll
have to click your way in to the history from the home page; start with the Jackson
Street Roundhouse, then the Equipment Roster, then scroll down Locomotives to Dan
Patch 100 and click on the name, and, voilà, Dan Patch Electric Lines 100, and scroll
down to read her history.
"The Dan Patch, the museum's rarest, most valuable, and perhaps most fragile piece of equipment, was moved today {"today" being Saturday, 06 Jan 01} from the pole barn to track 21 in the Jackson Street Roundhouse. The move was completed with no accidents, no injuries, no incidents, and no surprises. Working in close cooperation with the Roundhouse, volunteers from the Railroad laid track and moved the 60 ton Dan Patch with precision and a gentle touch, inching carefully across the turntable pit* and into the Roundhouse."
[* - Happily, there WAS a turntable (Danish) in the pit at the time! Also, "fragile" refers to its rarity, not its durability; smashing her up in a move would be akin to breaking a priceless old vase!]
Better yet, Phil sent these photos of a prior switching move (this time last year), which I termed "Patchwork" (and Phil threatened to send more Patchpix, of #100 in the Roundhouse):
It turns out that Dan Patch #100 originally had BOTH ends of the locomotive looking like the current FRONT {which makes perfect sense when you read John Campbell's account of #8835 - the original GE Rail Motor Car units were made by the Wason Car Company with both ends rounded}. It was supposedly involved in a wreck somewhere along the line (MTM doesn't know exactly when) and the rear end was squared off for its current look. Phil sent this squib from the MTM Website: "In 1914 100 was damaged in a head-on collision with passenger motor car 7 which occurred between Orchard Gardens and Lakeville. Repairs were undertaken in the 60th St. shops and in the process the damaged end was modified in appearance. The cab was extended to fully enclose the former open platform which was also squared off. A finned-tube roof-top radiator replaced the mechanical radiator."
[see below for original appearance]
(04 Sep 07)
Phil also objects to my term "single-ended" because he says it is "actually a double-ended locomotive, as opposed to single-ended; there is another control stand towards the rear, right along side the Waukesha diesel (ear plugs required! Heck, you need earplugs anywhere NEAR the thing!)" Well, I won't argue the semantics of it; the front and back of #100 (and also of #8835) are quite different and I was unable to show the rear control stand above.
Further update - John Wickre, Museum Manager at the MTM's Jackson Street Roundhouse advises (30 Jul 01) that a "contractor is ready to begin work on the turntable pit and related trackage. The turntable should be working by next spring"; it might even be ready before winter, but he can't promise that. "Once the turntable is in, {they} will be able to move equipment in and out of both the museum (Bay D) and maintenance (Bay C) sections of the roundhouse."
Uh-oh! Here is an undocumented photo; I hope I'm not stepping on any toes here - Dan Patch as restored and operating:
(04 Sep 07)
General Electric Locomotive. The gas-electric locomotive illustrated in Figs. 74 and 75 was built by the General Electric Company, Schenectady, New York, and is used by the Minneapolis, St. Paul, Rochester and Dubuque Electric Traction Company, operating what is popularly known as the "Dan Patch" electric line, which is said to be the first railroad operating entirely with an internal-combustion engine service. This 60-ton locomotive is double ended, being built with the box type of cab extending nearly the entire length of the underframe and having all the
Page 104
weight on the drivers. The wheels are 33 inches in diameter, each truck being equipped with 100-horsepower motors. The truck clearances allow for a 100-foot minimum radius of track curvature.
Power Plant. The power plant consists of two 135-kilowatt generating plants similar to the ones used in the gas-electric motor car {apparently described earlier in the work} and one engineer is required for its operation. Each of the two gas-electric generating plants is composed of a 175-horsepower, 550-rpm., eight-cylinder four-cycle gasoline engine of the V type direct connected to a 660-volt commutating-pole, compound-wound electric generator, with an outboard bearing supported by brackets bolted to the magnet frame. The cylinders have an
{Note the original "classic" double-ended boxcab appearance.}
The engines can rotate at normal speed irrespective of the speed of the locomotive and can deliver their maximum power at all times,
Page 105
a feature of advantage on grades, in case of storm, or under other emergency conditions involving sudden heavy current demands.
Auxiliary Power Plant. The locomotive is provided with an auxiliary gas-electric set to furnish power for lighting the cab, headlights, and trailers and for pumping an initial charge of air to fill the reservoirs and start the engines. This set is started by hand and consists of a vertical four-cylinder four-cycle 750-r.p.m. gasoline engine which is direct connected to a 5-kilowatt 65-volt commutating pole compound wound electric generator. The cylinders have a 3-inch bore with a 6-inch stroke, and ignition is by a high-tension magneto. The air compressor on the 65-volt circuit is of the two-cylinder railway type and has a displacement of 25 cubic feet per minute against a tank pressure of 90 pounds per square inch.
Tractive Effort. Mounted on the axles with nose suspension are four General Electric 205D 600-volt commutating-pole series-wound box-frame railway motors, having an hourly rating of 100 horsepower each. All four axles are, therefore, driving axles. The gear ration is 17:58 (a reduction of 3.41), which ratio is especially dapted for freight and switching service as it affords a maximum
Page 106
tractive effort for starting and and low speeds. the motors are ventilated by a special vacuum system operated in conjunction with the engines. The performance of the locomotive is approximately such that a tractive effort of 16,000 pounds is provided at 5 m.p.h. and 3500 pounds at 30 m.p.h.
Control of Motor Equipment. The control of the motor equipment is similar to that of the standard gas-electric motor car, with the cab installed at each end. The motors, however, are connected permanently in pairs in parallel, and the two pairs, operating like single motors, are placed progressively in series and in parallel. The controller provides seven running steps in series and six in parallel without rheostats in the main circuit. There are two additional points for shunting the fields, making a total of fifteen running points.
To produce smooth and rapid acceleration, the speed changes are made by governing the volatge through varying the strength of the generator fields, this being accomplished by movement of one handle on the controller. Separate handles are provided for throttling the engine and reversing the motors. The latter operation is accomplished by changing the motor connections in the usual manner and without stopping the engines, which always rotate in the same direction. This, in an emergency, allows the train to be brought quickly to a stop independantly of the brakes.
Construction Data. A 300-gallon gasoline tank fitted with cap and filler is installed beneath the underframing of the locomotive. The radiators are of the fin type and are mounted on each section of the cab roof, the water being circulated by the thermosiphon system. There is also a radiator draining system, the tanks being situated at one side in the central section of the cab; and a suction type of ventilator is mounted in the roof between the radiators.
The principal data and dimensions are as follows:
Total net weight..................................120000 pounds Weight, per axle...................................30000 pounds Maximum tractive effort............................32200 pounds Length between coupler faces................42 feet 4 inches Length over cab.............................34 feet Height over all.............................14 feet 10¾ inches Width over all..............................10 feet 2 inches Total wheel base............................24 feet Rigid wheel base............................ 6 feet 10 inches
[I am indebted to K. K. Wyatt, Curator of History & Technology, California State Railroad Museum (Sacramento), for this information about #101.]I also found elsewhere that M. W. Savage owned the famous race horse, Dan Patch, so his railroads became known as “The Dan Patch Line”, somewhat different from the story on the MTM site.
Roster of surviving ALCo-GE-IR (and just GE-IR or GE alone) boxcabs on Survivor Boxcabs page.
Other surviving gas/oil-electric/diesel boxcabs are noted on the Other Boxcabs continuation page.
Other surviving electric (and any other odd) boxcabs are noted on the Odd Boxcabs continuation page.
Surviving boxcabs in Mexico now appear at BOXCABS MEXICANOS. There is an American-styled boxcab preserved in England, the 1932 British Thomson-Houston.
To contact S. Berliner, III, please click here.
{Not inserted into the Boxcabs Tour sequence, yet.}
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