>>1741748I might have overestimated IQ level of an average /n/eantherthal. So.
American railroads ( and those influenced by them ) fully embraced MU controls and assemble trains on the block-by-block basis adding/removing locomotives as necessary. The rest of the world rarely uses MU controls, for some reason, preferring to use semi-permanently coupled multiple section locomotives. In spute of MU being clearly superior method.
Urban legend claims that in communist countries the reason for preference of multiple section locomotives was that because work laws required "one loco equals one crew". So in order to work around this railroads just wink-wink their way into MU by making those multiple section monsters.
RZD is the biggest offender here, as they have TONS of these. Diesel and electric alike. There is even a quad-section 11MW locomotive for 3000V system. The most funny example is pic related - 3M62 triple section loco, which is semi permanently coupled tripled of M62s where the middle cabs were gutted and lazily shut off. You can even see the bodywork for the headlights in the B-unit.
Russians went full bore on this - there are tons of two-section locomotives, tons of triple sections ( VL80s, VL11s and newer types ) and quad section even. The one I posted is Shan 24 - six-section unit for a Chinese mining company.
The funniest part about all of this is that in the US the MU controls are so standarized that you can couple F-Unit to SD70ACE-t4 and it will work. Meanwhile transit authority in my town has four families of multiple unit kinds which are not cross-compatible.
