Best EMD Locomotive

MEC 407--
Probably not a bad choice. The SD30-T2 is SO far from actuality that it's hard to make reasoned guesses about the characteristics it WOULD have had IF it had existed: after all, the "Tunnel Motor" radiator option wasn't introduced until about a decade after GP30 production ceased. It's not like, say, the "SD59" which-- even though it was never built or (as far as I know) designed or offered to the market-- we can be be fairly confident about: IT would have been something filling in the "equation"
X:{GP59,SD60)::SD39:{GP39,SD40} !
In general I feel the "almost real" unactualized possibles are the most interesting: one can learn soething about the principles of locomotive design and application by thinking through what they would have been like (and WHY they were never built).
(((Which doesn't mean I don't ALSO occasionally enjoy far-fetched* possibilities like the SD30-T2, so thanks for the picture (and subsequent explanation)!)))
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*One of the foundational works on the logic of counterfactual reasoning, the late David Lewis's book "Counterfactuals" uses "far-fetched" as a technical term! David, who was a professor of Philosophy at Princeton, was also an avid railfan: he was disappointed that his publisher wouldn't let him have, as jacket art for a book on the metaphysics of "possible worlds," a picture of one of the locomotives the Great Western Railway (Britain) had designed but which was never built because of the nationalization of British railways.

Allen, there were numerous never-builts, some of them are quite fascinating. Sorry you are so far away from us, if you were in the US perhaps you could get to a showing of INSIDE EMD sometime. The program has a segment with a selection of some of the most interesting and memorable never-builts, like the AMT-125 and the SDL45-2.

SD40-2 I have always was the best unit all time.

My favorite would be SD70MAC. They sound awesome when throttling up and they have great horns!

The GP30 is an engineer's engine!

PCook--
I was a grad student at the U of Pittsburgh in the 1970s, turning into a rail fan. (There's nothing like a Ph.D. dissertation in progress to get one interested in other things!) One day I sneaked into a conference on High Speed Rail that was held on campus, and saw a presentation on the AMT-125. What struck me was that the configuration -- streamlined "power car" at each end with 6 or 7 coaches in between -- seemed like a clone of British Rail's then-new HST, which went into service as the "InterCity 125". (The 16-645 engines in the AMT-125's locomotives would have given 3000hp [[3300 hp by UIC rating conventions?]] as opposed to the 2250 from one of the 12-cylinder Valentas in a BR HST power car, but given the difference in weight between American and British rolling stock, the power-to-weight ratio might have been similar.)
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Other recollections from conference:
>>>>A couple of EMD engineers laughing and exclaiming "Oh, those cats!" when I told them I had gone to the 50th anniversary factory open house and seen some of the first Chessie GP40-2 a few days before they showed up on the Panther Hollow line bihind the Pitt campus.
>>>>The GE rep trying to keep a straight face when making his scripted claim that Amtrak's (about to go into service) E-60 were a "worthy successor" to the GG-1.
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And yes, I lament my geographical challenge every time I see an announcement of one of your "Inside EMD" presentations!

SDL45-2?
Let me guess. Design sketch presented to potential customer, Saudi Government Railway, who then decided to go with the slightly more conservative SDL40-2 instead?

Those GP30 in NKP or D&RGW colors looked good. I won't say a good thing about those SD70 or SD60 or anything with a safety cab. Call me old-school but you shouldn't have to look at the rear of an engine to tell who built it. All safety cabs look the same to me.

I'm still not quite clear on how a safety cab represents "safety", or anything other than a sales pitch. Especially because the cab itself is the same width, just the short hood grew. And now that some railroads are going back to a control stand rather than a desktop, the physical layout has reverted to conventional. What do we gain other than a gimmick? Maybe somebody can clue me in, because I wasn't under the impression railroads bought things for kicks. (Although my suspicions were raised with NS and IC bought SD70's w/ conventional cabs.)

Now that they got you use to running on these wide body motors with the desktop controls now they want to revert to the control stands. I don't like the control stands on these wide body's. They should have stayed with desktops.

Safety cabs do include a number of features that make them safer than conventional cabs, such as full-height collision posts.

Here is Sean Graham-White's description of what makes a safety cab a safety cab (and thus, safer than a conventional cab):

Typical features that make something a Safety Cab:
- a new, full-width nose constructed of half-inch steel plate and
welded to 74, instead of 30, inch tall collision posts
- the front door is also constructed of half-inch steel and opens
outward to prevent it being pushed inward during a collision
- the cab's front windows are angled and heated. Angling the windows
prevents an accumulation of snow by deflecting it, and frost and fog
are prevented by heating the windows
- increased insulation reduces noise and makes it easier to regulate
the cab's climate
- a second door between the front door and the cab itself also
reduces drafts and increases crew protection
- high-backed chairs feature arm and footrests
- an improved electric heater below the cab, and an enclosed toilet
in the nose.

I THINK THE BEST I SEEN IN MY TIME WAS THE GP35'S AND THE 38SERIES THEY WERE THE BEST ONES THEN THE SD35'S

Getting back to the GP30. How about the GM&O paint scheme. I think for black and white it was pretty sharp. The old GM&O heads called them "skunks".

Mine is the F40C these were very reliable locomotives a passenger versition of the SD40-2 being built on a SD40-2 frame. They were the best Metra had.