EMD celebrates 100 years

North American manufacturer commemorates milestone – its legacy visible across the globe.

AMERICAN diesel pioneer EMD, which today means ElectroMotive Diesel and since 2010 has been part of Caterpillar-owned Progress Rail, celebrated its centenary in 2022. EMD began life as Electro Motive Engineering Corporation (EMC) in 1922 in Cleveland, Ohio initially using engines built by Winton Corporation and producing a series of diesel-powered multiple units and railcars, all built by subcontractors, including the first streamlined diesel passenger multiple units such as the threecar 110mph streamlined City of Salina for Union Pacific which used it between Kansas City and Salina, Kansas. In 1930 both Winton and EMC were bought by General Motors (GM) and together later became the new Electro-Motive Division (EMD) of GM. In 1936 GM financed the construction of a new manufacturing site at La Grange, Illinois near Chicago and this grew to employ around 14,000 people producing hundreds of locos a month at its peak.

Development EMD developed new standardised two-stroke diesel engines named EMD 567 (as it had 567 cubic inches of cylinder displacement) based on earlier Winton models and these eight, 12 and 16-cylinder EMD 567, 645 and 710 engines (the numbers denoting increased cylinder capacity) remain in use – and, in the case of the 710, in production to this day. EMD sold the engines, which were also built at La Grange, for many other uses as well as in locomotives. EMD led the dieselisation of North American railroads and its E and F series locos with distinctive ‘bulldog’ noses, plus the even more numerous GP (General Purpose) series fouraxle locos replaced steam and, in some cases, early electric locos. Around seven out of 10 diesels used in the USA in the 1950s/60s were built by EMD.

Deliveries

The company exported around the world; locos built both at La Grange and those built under licence in countries as varied as Sweden (NOHAB), Germany (Henschel) and Australia (Clyde). In 1985 EMD delivered its first main line locos to the UK – four Class 59s (using the 645 engine) for Foster Yeoman (which already owned a SW1001 BoBo bought in 1980) and ultimately many hundreds of the later Class 66 version using the 710-engine design. By the 21st century, most locos were built in Canada at London, Ontario (until 2012) or Progress Rail’s new Muncie, Indiana factory as the La Grange site ceased loco production in the 1990s. To celebrate the centenary events were held in the USA and Progress Rail has put a pictorial history of EMD on its website at www.progressrail.com/en/ Company/EMD100/

KEITH FENDER One of the original EMD demonstrator locos from 1939 is preserved at the National Transportation Museum in St Louis, seen on June 9. This loco equipped with a 16-cylinder 567 engine was part of a fourunit demonstrator that was used by multiple railroads proving the case for diesel vs. steam. It has been preserved since 1961, when many of the UK’s now preserved diesels hadn’t even been built!

JULIAN HILL EMD’s famous E and F series locos with bulldog noses replaced steam rapidly in the 1940s and 50s working passenger trains. Some survived in use with commuter or short line freight operators into the late 20th century. In the livery of Chicago commuter operator F7A No. 308 was built in 1949 for the Chicago & North Western as freight locomotive No. 4083C. Rebuilt in 1961 to work double deck commuter trains, it passed to Metra in the 1980s and after replacement by newer EMD locos was used for engineering trains until the late 1990s. The loco is seen at the Illinois Railway Museum on August 13.