The GN boxcab locomotives were the first electric locomotives purchased by the Great Northern Railway (GN) for use through the

Cascade Tunnel The Cascade Tunnel refers to two railroad tunnels (original and its replacement) in the northwest United States, east of the Seattle metropolitan area in the Cascade Range of Washington, at Stevens Pass. It is approximately east of Everett, wit ...

. Four locomotives were supplied by the American Locomotive Company; they used electrical equipment from

General Electric General Electric Company (GE) is an American multinational conglomerate founded in 1892, and incorporated in New York state and headquartered in Boston. The company operated in sectors including healthcare, aviation, power, renewable en ...

and weighed each. They were three-phase electric locomotives producing each. The specification called for 1000hp, but the actual output was substantially greater, as described by the consultant engineer Cary T. Hutchinson. They had a B-B

wheel arrangement In rail transport, a wheel arrangement or wheel configuration is a system of classifying the way in which wheels are distributed under a locomotive. Several notations exist to describe the wheel assemblies of a locomotive by type, position, and c ...

. They were built in February and March 1909, and delivered in Pullman Green. The GN numbered them 5000–5003 and they were used until May 1927. Initially three locomotives were coupled together and hauled trains at a constant speed of , but when larger trains required four locomotives the motors were concatenated (cascade control), so that the speed was halved to to avoid overloading the power supply. None survived into preservation.

References

* Great Northern Railway (U.S.) General Electric locomotives Boxcab Three-phase AC locomotives Electric locomotives of the United States Scrapped locomotives ALCO locomotives Standard gauge locomotives of the United States Railway locomotives introduced in 1909 B-B locomotives Bo-Bo locomotives {{US-train-stub