Empire City Railfans caught a bloated New York Central Pacemaker Freight Train being lead by an A-B-A set of Fairbanks-Morse Erie Builts. The Pacemaker, a less than carload freight train that runs on an express schedule, was captured leaving Terminal Yard and heading into Empire City. Usual power for this train on the New York Central Layout is either an A-B-A set of EMD F7s, an A-B-A set of Alco FAs, an A-B-B-A set of EMD FTs or a 4-8-4 Niagra.
Introduced to compete with EMD's E units and Alco's PAs, teh Fairbanks-Morse Erie Built offered 2000 Horsepower per unit and was available with steam generators for passenger service. Designed by Raymond Loewy and built by General Electric in their Erie Pennsylvania factory, 111 locomotives were (82 As and 29 Bs) were delivered to seven US railroads between 1945 and 1949.
The Erie Builts pulled some of premier passenger trains of the stream liner area including the Santa Fe Super Chief, Milwaukee Road Olympian Hiawatha, the PRR Broadway Limited, Liberty Limited, Admiral, Trail Blazer and Manhattan Limited.
The New York Central received a fleet of 14 2,000 Horsepower Erie Builts. Of these six were were geared for 97 miles per hour and intended for passenger service and the remaining 5 were geared for 79 miles per hour and intended for fast freight service. Eries were typically assigned as power for the Pacemaker High Speed Freight Service.
New York Central Erie Built A-B-A consist lead the Pacemaker Freight train
An impressive display of Fairbanks-Morse motive power
Nice trainset! Management has to be pleased with a consist like that!!
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