>>1256035It honestly depends on the era and the locomotives themselves. ALCo was a conglomeration of smaller locomotive builders that came together as a single company, so early in the 20th Century the quality of an ALCo locomotive varied according to which formerly independent shop it came from. By the 1920's older designs had been phased out, older shops had been closed or relegated to manufacturing components and designs had been standardized across the seven formerly independent companies. Lima was the biggest steam manufacturer, ALCo was second ad Baldwin the third largest. New York Central chose ALCo to build the J class Hudsons and ended up buying 265 J1, J2 and J3 Class locomotives. Baldwin vwas more focused on high quality and small orders of specialized locomotives, often designing and building small runs of a class designed specifically for a customer that were as small as a single custom built unit. Lima churned out massive powerhouse locomotives using their "Super Power" design principles for the class one railroads.
