Part 1
SP Pages
SP San Jose

Krauts & Alcohaulics, Part Two: What the?
OK, so you're this fourteen year old kid who's just recently discovered that the ever-present "big" units in San Jose are actually rare Fairbanks-Morse Trainmasters, and you're getting pretty adept at sorting most all locomotive by manufacturer. Then, one Sunday you wander up Roundhouse Three from the turntable, past the sand towers and confront this curiously shaped slab of unmarked metal. What the?

Thus, in 1964 I was introduced to the Teutonic ugliness of Kraus-Maffei. I slowly walked towards the head end in bewilderment. Naturally, the darn Trainmasters were in the way, so the following was the best shot that I could get with my free-for-opening-a-bank-account box camera. Rats!

I still couldn't figure out what in the heck this thing was. Then I spied the builder's plate just in front of the head door on the fireman's side.

KRAUSS-MAFFEI??? What the???

As it turned-out, I only had the opportunity to photograph a KM cab on other time, in January, 1965,. The curse continued...This time, a darn Commute GP-9 was in the way...DOUBLE DRAT!



Ahh, but I had much better luck with the KM hood units! After a few unmemorable photographic encounters over the next couple of years, I finally scored with the following shot.


About four months after I took this January, 1967 photo, the 9120 starred in a Pacific Locomotive Association excursion. The PLA wanted a cab unit, but the last operable one, the 9101 (formerly, 9001, above), was too far gone to perform.

This day, the 9120 was MU'ed to the 9111. Just prior to this photo, they had been hostled under the sand pipes for servicing:



id619 The odd angles on both KM classes were required so that the engines could fit within tight European railway clearances that they would encounter on the way to the docks for shipment to the states. This surely didn't do much for their esthetics, eh? Their Teutonic brows, a.k.a. windshied sun visors, didn't help either. They actually werte pretty tall units, as you can see from the below photo of the 9107 MU'ed to F-7A # 6470.

By the time that I took this photo in June, 1968, only four (at most) KM were still operating. In early October, the 9107 became the last Kraut to turn a revenue wheel.

The 9113 was reincarnated the next year as Camera car SPMW1166 and currently resides at the California State Railroad Museum (see roster, previous page), as the only surviving SP hydraulic.


Since we began with an end, we'll end with an end. Below, you'll find the 9111 sitting under the sand tower at the same time as the above photos of her. That's one massive side sill!