IRM: Road Diesels and more Polling Pockets

I analyzed the diesels that IRM had outside the day I visited for polling pockets. The following table summarizes the locomotives included in this posting and the poling posting as well as some IRM locomotives posted on Facebook. An asterisk at the end of a railroad name indicates the locomotive was not listed in the IRM roster and that I got the info from the internet. (A late discovery was that The Diesel Shop has a more complete roster of IRM diesels than IRM does.) I'm investigating becoming an IRM volunteer to, among other activities, help update the roster. A trend is that Alco did not believe in adding poling pockets. This is admittedly a small data sample. I'll have to keep an eye on this trend as I investigate more locomotives. The C&NW locomotive with all of the question marks was missing both number boards. Moving the poling pocket to the back of the steps uses the engine's main frame as the contact point.

Update: Marty posted a couple of RS3s on Facebook that clearly have poling pockets.

Railroad	Number	Model	Year Built	Pockets?	Comment
Milwaukee Road	760	FM H10-44	1944	Yes
Santa Fe	543	FM H-12-44TS	1947	Yes
MN&S	21	Bald DT-6-6-2000	1948	Yes	deep pockets
C&NW	4160	EMD GP7R	1952	Yes	back of step
Illinois Terminal	1605	EMD GP7	1953	Yes	back of step
C&NW*	1689	Alco RSD-5	1954	No
MBTA*	902	EMD GP9	1956	Yes	back of step
TP&W	400	Alco RS-3	1958	No
CB&Q	504	EMD SD24	1959	Yes	back of step
C&NW	6847	EMD SD40-2	1974	No	hole, not pocket
BN	5383	GE U30C	1974	No

20150627 2064

C&NW 6847 was pulling the demonstration train of several heavyweight passenger cars. I could not find any polling pockets on it. The round dimples surround holes in the front plate.

I walked as far east as I could on their platform to get this shot of CB&Q 504. It is the first time I have seen a CB&Q locomotive in Chinese Red in real life. I can see a pocket on the engineers side, but not the fireman's side.

A closeup of a profile shot shows why I could not see the fireman's side pocket above --- it is on the back side of the step!

Digital zoom of profile picture

Unfortunately, the telephone pole and pickup truck block checking for poling pockets on the other two diesels.

I can't see a dimple on the left, but I can see one on the right. This is another diesel that is missing from the roster. From a video of it starting after 10 years of disuse, I learned it was an EMD GP7. (It looks like they started cranking it by the 0:22 mark.) They took a video of the guts after finding and freeing up the seized cylinder. From AngleFire I learned it was built in 1952.

I learned from Diesel Shop that MBTA 902 was a Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority EMD GP9 built 6/1956.

BN 5383 is a GE U30C built in 1974. It runs on "Adir 6 Whl" trucks with GE 752 traction motors powered by a 7FDL16 prime mover. I could not find any pockets on it.

Toledo, Peoria and Western 400 is an Alco RS-3 built in 1958. It runs on AAR-B trucks with GE752 traction motors powered by a 12-251B prime mover. I could not find any pockets on it.

David Kamptner posted an IRM shot to Facebook Railroad Photography. Note that Illinois Terminal 1605 has polling pockets. My shot of C&NW 6847 is at the beginning of this post, and I did not see any pockets. David got a better shot of the front of C&NW 1689, and I can't see any pockets on it.

Bonus:

IRM posted
Three F-Units and an E-Unit... at night! Another yard 5 line up with BN-1 (EMD F9A), C&NW 411 (EMD F7A), MILW 118-C (EMD F7A) and MILW 37-A (EMD E9A).  
September 17, 2015
Paul Webb shared