ALC-42E Acquisition and Planned Operation

Wouldn’t the FDNY have to approve and sign off on the “battery pack car” before it could be used through the tunnel into and out of Penn Station? If I’m not mistaken they have to sign off on any new dual mode locomotive before it can be used into and out of NYP or GCT.


One major concern among fire departments and fire safety experts regarding the use of electric cars/EVs (btw they’re NOT *electric* cars, they’re BATTERY cars…) is that in the event of a fire the fire department would have to use a special type of foam to put it out. And if it happens in a tunnel it gets even more risky.

Railjunkie wrote:I hate to make this slightly political. But here goes. The new dual modes will be dragging a tender to house a battery box correct?? If I'm wrong sorry. But for the point of this discussion lets say they are. Which should only be used to get into and out of Penn a distance of less than a mile. Maybe MNRR lets Amtrak use their third rail between CP12 and Croton North station doubtful but perhaps. A distance of 23ish miles. You are then burning extra fuel to get this dual mode Yugo up to speed in and out of station stops and restrictions for another 400 miles. Savings???

Meanwhile Click and Clack in some third world country are burning coal by the metric tone because they don't care about the environment they just know they need to make money to pull themselves out of poverty. How does this all tie together Amtrak styling and profiling looking good to the tree huggers. Click and Click just try to survive. What we do here will have little effect on the environment unless we get ALL countries to buy in.

It is quite literally all about optics and zero substance. Just look at the comments on social media from climate alarmist cult members who say they will flat out REFUSE to ride a train until there are wires strung up coast to coast… in spite of generally similarly minded commentators such as John Oliver correctly pointing out that trains contribute to only *2%* of all transport emissions. Mass formation psychosis is very real. And very stupid. Yet when the time comes to dispose of said batteries… maybe *then* reality will set in.

Railjunkie wrote: ↑Mon Sep 09, 2024 8:05 pm Again why does it need to be so complicated for one f'ing mile of railroad. A simple pantogragph or third rail shoes will suffice. The more "stuff" you add the more complicated it becomes. The complicated it becomes the less it wants to work. Trust me on this, been playing trains for almost 27 years and its getting worse not better.

One could argue that batteries are simpler than catenary or third rail because the train's power supply is self contained.

NH2060 wrote: ↑Tue Sep 10, 2024 5:08 am Wouldn’t the FDNY have to approve and sign off on the “battery pack car” before it could be used through the tunnel into and out of Penn Station? If I’m not mistaken they have to sign off on any new dual mode locomotive before it can be used into and out of NYP or GCT.

One major concern among fire departments and fire safety experts regarding the use of electric cars/EVs (btw they’re NOT *electric* cars, they’re BATTERY cars…) is that in the event of a fire the fire department would have to use a special type of foam to put it out. And if it happens in a tunnel it gets even more risky.

The MTA recently did acceptance testing of the 1st of 25 diesel / battery hybrid maintenance locomotives through the entire subway system. Concerns about the FDNY barring the technology should either have been addressed long ago or have always been brought up as reasons to generally oppose green technologies.

It should be noted that battery vehicles are statistically less likely to catch fire than petrol or diesel vehicles, so there is a tradeoff between likelihood of a fire and how it needs to be dealt with.

RandallW wrote: ↑Tue Sep 10, 2024 5:21 am

Railjunkie wrote: ↑Mon Sep 09, 2024 8:05 pm Again why does it need to be so complicated for one f'ing mile of railroad. A simple pantogragph or third rail shoes will suffice. The more "stuff" you add the more complicated it becomes. The complicated it becomes the less it wants to work. Trust me on this, been playing trains for almost 27 years and its getting worse not better.

One could argue that batteries are simpler than catenary or third rail because the train's power supply is self contained.

Once again in lugging around a battery tender car. Extra weight, extra cost to maintain, and I'm sure some whole new types of inspections and classes for the operating crews. I have a good friend who is a retired firefighter I asked him about how they go about fight lithium ion fires. He said you have to put so much water on them to put them out and with the run off you are risking polluting everything near by. It is best to just let them burn themselves out.

Stick with what you know quit trying to reinvent the wheel. Railroads are famous for this and it almost never works.

Railjunkie wrote: ↑Tue Sep 10, 2024 9:27 am

RandallW wrote: ↑Tue Sep 10, 2024 5:21 am

Railjunkie wrote: ↑Mon Sep 09, 2024 8:05 pm Again why does it need to be so complicated for one f'ing mile of railroad. A simple pantogragph or third rail shoes will suffice. The more "stuff" you add the more complicated it becomes. The complicated it becomes the less it wants to work. Trust me on this, been playing trains for almost 27 years and its getting worse not better.

One could argue that batteries are simpler than catenary or third rail because the train's power supply is self contained.

Once again in lugging around a battery tender car. Extra weight, extra cost to maintain, and I'm sure some whole new types of inspections and classes for the operating crews. I have a good friend who is a retired firefighter I asked him about how they go about fight lithium ion fires. He said you have to put so much water on them to put them out and with the run off you are risking polluting everything near by. It is best to just let them burn themselves out.

Stick with what you know quit trying to reinvent the wheel. Railroads are famous for this and it almost never works.

I'm with you, a battery pack for 1 mile is over kill. Do we know if those APV will also have powered trucks?

NH2060 wrote: ↑Tue Sep 10, 2024 5:08 am One major concern among fire departments and fire safety experts regarding the use of electric cars/EVs (btw they’re NOT *electric* cars, they’re BATTERY cars…) is that in the event of a fire the fire department would have to use a special type of foam to put it out. Yet when the time comes to dispose of said batteries… maybe *then* reality will set in.

All batteries can be recycled, including Li-ion. Here's an EPA (official enough for you?) on recycling Li-ion batteries.
https://www.epa.gov/hw/lithium-ion-battery-recycling
Disposal is not going to be a major problem.
All fire departments should have the proper foam available for extinguishing these fires in tunnels. Golly, the tunnels so used should already have a built in foam dispersing system.
If NYFD is so concerned about Li-ion battery trains, why are they not concerned about Li-ion powered buses, vans, and cars running through the many NYC tunnels? Has NYC banned Toyota Prius, Tesla, or other car brand hybrids from NYC? Why should trains be treated differently?

To tie in to another "project", if they used shoes instead of a battery they could through-run into LIRR territory. Of course, with the East River tunnel rehab that ain't happening any time soon.

Railjunkie wrote: ↑Tue Sep 10, 2024 9:27 am Stick with what you know quit trying to reinvent the wheel. Railroads are famous for this and it almost never works.

And Amtrak is the worse offender on the list.

RandallW wrote: ↑Tue Sep 10, 2024 5:51 am It should be noted that battery vehicles are statistically less likely to catch fire than petrol or diesel vehicles, so there is a tradeoff between likelihood of a fire and how it needs to be dealt with.

Is there enough data to make this statement? Even if we include battery road vehicles there must be 1m:1 or more IC:battery. I don't see how we have statistical certainty or a big enough sample size.

From Report: EVs Less Likely to Catch Fire Than Gas-Powered Cars:

Tesla reports, “The number of fires on U.S. roads involving Teslas from 2012 to 2021 was 11 times lower per mile than the figure for all cars.” Tesla, we’d note, has a financial incentive to embellish and a history of exaggeration.

We’re not aware of any conflicts of interest, however, for the Australian defense establishment or Scandinavian governments. They back up the claim.

In Norway, the research found, “there are between four and five times more fires in petrol and diesel cars, according to the Directorate for Social Security and Emergency Preparedness.” The Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency similarly found 68 fires per 100,000 cars of all types but just 3.8 fires per 100,000 EVs or hybrids.

Australia’s Department of Defence researched the same question and found that “there was a 0.0012% chance of a passenger electric vehicle battery catching fire, compared with a 0.1% chance for internal combustion engine cars.”

Motortrend notes that no agency they are aware is tracking vehicle fires such that this data could be collected publicly in the US, but does state that per the NFPA,

the leading cause of vehicle fires is mechanical failure or malfunction, accounting for 45 percent of all such fires. Electrical problems are a distant second, accounting for 23 percent of the total.

scratchyX1 wrote: ↑Tue Sep 10, 2024 11:10 am I'm with you, a battery pack for 1 mile is over kill. Do we know if those APV will also have powered trucks?

The catenary version of the APVs will because sending power to an ALC 42 locomotive's traction motors alone would not provide the desired acceleration on the NEC. It sounds like on the Empire Service version the batteries will just power the locomotive's traction motors for the brief section where it is required.

I remain a bit puzzled by the decision regarding the battery hybrid configuration used for the Empire Service. MTA/CTDOT have engaged Siemens to produce a dual mode third rail version of the Chargers. The third rail version will allow the diesel trains on the Hudson and Harlem lines to operate at sufficient speeds in electric mode to allow operating in electric mode all the way to Southeast and Croton-Harmon rather than just in the tunnels as the P32ACDMs do. They even included sufficient options in this procurement for Amtrak to exercise for the Empire Service which Amtrak could have gone with.

I haven't looked closely enough at the other specs on the Metro North units to see if there would have been any gotchas as far as running them through Albany as the whole point of the Airo exercise is to eliminate the locomotive changes, but it seems like there might have been some benefit to going with Metro North's version instead of the batteries.

I guess the one advantage of Amtrak's approach would be that the locomotive itself would essentially be common everywhere - if they went with Metro North's approach you'd still have captive units for one service, but they also could have gone with a third rail powered APV if they really wanted the ALC-42-E itself to be standard across the fleet.

lordsigma12345 wrote: ↑Wed Sep 11, 2024 7:01 am I guess the one advantage of Amtrak's approach would be that the locomotive itself would essentially be common everywhere - if they went with Metro North's approach you'd still have captive units for one service, but they also could have gone with a third rail powered APV if they really wanted the ALC-42-E itself to be standard across the fleet.

That is my thinking as well: A standardized ALC-42E that Amtrak's mechanics can train up on (being similar to the ALC-42's everywhere else), with the APV providing third rail power. All that would be required is third rail between the Spuvyil River bridge and Penn Station.

Railjunkie wrote: ↑Tue Sep 10, 2024 9:27 am [Once again in lugging around a battery tender car. Extra weight, extra cost to maintain, and I'm sure some whole new types of inspections and classes for the operating crews.

Yet, several Liberty streetcars are running across the country without any difficulty using batteries for propulsion for a part of their route. As for weight, all the new Amtrak ALC-42E locomotives will be pulling around extra weight. Transformers under the pantographs probably weigh as much as the batteries. Why pull those heavy transformers all the way to Norfolk, Roanoke, and possibly as far south as the Carolinas? Answer, to avoid changing as many locomotives in DC.

Locomotive changes are being reduced for trains in Washington DC (LD trains will still change engines) and eliminated in Philadelphia and New Haven (for some regionals, this eliminates two locomotive changes per trip).

STrRedWolf wrote: ↑Wed Sep 11, 2024 7:29 am

lordsigma12345 wrote: ↑Wed Sep 11, 2024 7:01 am I guess the one advantage of Amtrak's approach would be that the locomotive itself would essentially be common everywhere - if they went with Metro North's approach you'd still have captive units for one service, but they also could have gone with a third rail powered APV if they really wanted the ALC-42-E itself to be standard across the fleet.

That is my thinking as well: A standardized ALC-42E that Amtrak's mechanics can train up on (being similar to the ALC-42's everywhere else), with the APV providing third rail power. All that would be required is third rail between the Spuvyil River bridge and Penn Station.

The only third rail is currently between CP Empire and NYP a distance of about a mile. Buy a new Yugo then build about nine miles of third rail so you can make yourselves feel better??? When it comes to Metro North and the use of their third rail for propulsion in my opinion I doubt it. Even if they did you are still lugging around a battery box burning extra fuel or adding time for 119 of the 142 mile trip between ALB/NYP. How green are you???