"My compliments to the chef" on Burlington Bulletins 47 & 48. I've skimmed
them, and can't wait to read them cover-to-cover.
The numerous photos of C&S 839 / BN 6234, and the purchase history, were really
nice to see. I was intimately involved in it's aquisition by the Minnesota
Transportation Museum. The Chairman of our Board approached BNSF about
donating an SD9. We were thinking of one of the 6110-series that were then so
common at Northtown. Donation of an operating locomotive was not possible, but
6234 was in the deadline at Northtown with an undiagnosed ground fault. So the
Chairman, the Diesel Foreman, and I (then Collections Committee Chair) drove
over to the Northtown T yard to inspect it. The undiagnosed ground fault was
evident - covers were off the electrical cabinet, and several relays had pieces
of plastic shoved in the contacts. Obviously diagnosis had been underway when
the order to park it in the weeds came. The rest of the locomotive, however,
was beautiful. The 16-567-C prime mover had been overhauled at West Burlington
just five years earlier, where it was upgraded with 645 power assemblies and
reclassified a 16-645-CE. The traction motors had also been overhauled around
the same time, and it had nice, thick new wheels. It's dynamic brakes were
also attractive. Although our operation is in hill country, we'd always run
with a 4-6-0, an NW-2, an SW1200, or a GP-7 - none of which had dynamics.
Sold on it's value, we then went to the Collections Committee for approval.
That was an uphill sell. "Why do we need a locomotive that large - and it's
defective too?" is the argument against that I remember. Another objection was
that it was not a Minnesota locomotive, and not relevant to us. Our counter
argument was that it was in Minnesota when we found it. We did manage to
persuade the critics (mostly by pointing out the value of the parts), and in
due time the local switch job delivered 6234 to the Jackson Street Roundhouse.
There we started it up (it ran nice) and tried to move it. Sure enough, the
ground fault relay tripped immediately. After a few days testing, including a
magger, it was obvious that there was a dead short in the main generator.
Estimates to repair or replace came in near $20k. So 6234 sat for a couple
years.
The Superintendant of the Osceola operation came to the rescue. He thought it
would be a good locomotive on the hills - on slippery fall rails with our
heaviest trains - with it's extra tractive effort coming from two extra
traction motors, so he found money to get the main generator replaced.
It turned out to be everything he hoped, and after the first year it was an
obvious favorite of the crews. Not only did it have horespower and tractive
effort to spare, but the recently-overhauled prime mover and traction motors
are always reliable.
Unfortunately, the dynamic brakes had been disabled, and although we
reconnected the wires they still did not work. It was not until several years
later - after the SDP40 was donated - that a retired BN electrial/air brake man
figured out that the micropositioner relay was bad. (A device slightly larger
than an ice cube.)
The paint job was done by WSOR's Horicon paint shop - Imron with clear coat.
We chose BN Green and BN 6234 because that was the Minnesota-relevant part of
its history.
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