Glossary of North American Railway Terms

B-Boat: GE B23-7, B30-7 or B36-7 locomotive. By analogy with U-boat, since with the Dash 7 line, the "B" or "C" moved to the beginning of the designation.

Baby Tunnel Motor: EMD GP15-1 or GP15T locomotive, so-called because its low air intakes resemble those of the much larger SD40T-2 and SD45T-2.

Bandit: Nickname for Milwaukee Road engines after the railroad was sold to the Soo Line Railroad. The Soo covered up the Milwaukee Road name and logo on the orange locomotives with black paint, causing them to resemble bandits. Also often applied to similarly patched, second-hand locomotives, especially if the patches are crudely applied.

Big G, the: Nickname for Guilford Rail System, in reference to the large "G" emblem on their locomotives and boxcars. Also refers to Great Northern Railway.

Big hole: When a railroader's train suffers a loss of all brake air and stops or when the air brakes on the train are placed in emergency. It refers to the air ports in the automatic brake valve, the emergency portion being the biggest port or hole. Over the radio: "We just big holed."

Big Mac: Nickname given to EMD's SD70MAC, SD80MAC and SD90MAC locomotive models.

Bloody Nose: Southern Pacific locomotive (post-1959 grey and red paint scheme where the nose of the diesel locomotive was painted in scarlet red).

Bluebonnet: one of two Santa Fe paint schemes. The standard freight scheme from 1972 until the BNSF merger was dark blue with yellow on the front, with the same color division as the warbonnet scheme. It is also known as Yellowbonnet. Bluebonnet can also mean a warbonnet unit with only the red painted over, resulting in a silver and blue locomotive; this was used on passenger engines transferred to freight service after the formation of Amtrak.

Booster: (Diesel locomotive) - a cabless B unit or Slug. Although a Slug and a B unit differ slightly, (See related articles for details) both serve the same purpose of adding more tractive effort.