CICERO, Ill. — Wabtec’s FLXdrive battery-electric locomotive No. 3000 made an appearance in the Chicago area on Tuesday, showing up as the trailing unit in a three-unit set of locomotives on an eastbound train of hopper cars. The train arrived at Cicero Yard shortly before noon, and departed a little more than two hours later, creeping around the low-speed, tight-radius curve connecting the BNSF to the Belt Railway of Chicago that is one of the Chicago area’s more notorious
bottlenecks. The red-and-gray locomotive — with a model designation of BEL44C4D — was developed by Wabtec in partnership with BNSF, and funded with a grant from a California air quality agency. It began testing in Southern California in January [see “Wabtec’s FLXdrive battery-electric locomotive begins revenue tests …,” Trains News Wire, Jan. 4, 2021]. That testing was scheduled to continue through March before the pilot program was expanded to other portions of the BNSF system. Wabtec first announced the project in 2019 [see “Wabtec has high hopes for battery-electric road unit,” News Wire, Sept. 24, 2019].
Robert, the “tank” appears to have vents. Which leads me to believe it is filled with batteries. If it didn’t have batteries I would expect it to be filled with concrete for added weight for traction.
Why does the unit appear to have a standard fuel tank?
Do we have any performance results yet?