Talk:Electro-Motive Diesel/Archives/2014

Possible sale

Reuters put out a story yesterday saying a sale was likely to be announced "this week". Going to track that and keep the article up to date. Wonder what the new name will be? Logical would be "Electro-Motive Corporation" again, but with the current corporate fad for stupid meaningless names, who knows? —Morven 23:06, Jan 11, 2005 (UTC)

So will this article be renamed to Electro-Motive Diesel, Inc. as per this announcement from 4 April 2005?

"Greenbriar Equity Group LLC, Berkshire Partners LLC and certain related parties today announced the completion of the acquisition of Electro-Motive Division from General Motors. The company, which will be named Electro-Motive Diesel, Inc. (EMD), is one of the world’s largest manufacturers of freight and passenger diesel-electric locomotives."

"The transaction covers substantially all of the Electro-Motive businesses, including North American and international locomotives; power, marine and industrial products; the spare parts and parts rebuild business; and all of Electro-Motive’s locomotive maintenance contracts worldwide. Both the LaGrange, Illinois and London, Ontario manufacturing facilities are included in the agreement."[1]Plasma east 02:08, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I do not think that Wikipedia articles have to be primarily named with the company's most recent name, when it is still not commonly used. Wikipedia naming policy would have to agree. —Morven 18:58, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)

When the first two words of the article ("General Motors") are blatantly wrong, something should be done to correct this. And the REDIRECT from the old name can catch and handle all the people who aren't up-to-date.

Atlant 11:57, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Technically, the article is not wrong. This article is about General Motors Electro-Motive Division (GM-EMD), its history and locomotive production, and not (yet) about Electro-Motive Diesel, Inc. The connection between the two corporate entities is made, now it's time to wait to see what the new EMD does. To be fully accurate, we should probably replace "is" with "was" in the lead sentence since GM-EMD is no longer, but I'm not so certain that a page move is needed at this point. I'm more in favor of keeping this article where it is to concentrate on GM-EMD's history. As the new EMD makes its own history, we can evaluate whether or not we need to create a new page for the newly spun-off company. Also, if we add a large amount of information on Electro-Motive Corporation or Winton Engine Company (GM-EMD's predecessors), we can determine if those need to be split off into their own articles too. slambo 12:54, Apr 15, 2005 (UTC)

I am objecting to having two articles. END was almost completely independent at the time of the sale. For years GM had a “hands of” approach. Very little investment was put into EMD and the sales, project management, engineering , customer support, and marketing was done almost exclusively in house. It would be like splitting a persons biography into article for each marriage they have, or breaking up a history of England’s industrial revolution into the reigns of George III and George IV. Splitting it up would only be appropriate if you expected this buy out to create a fundamental and disastrous shift in company policy and wanted to protect GM-EMD’s legacy. This would be an emotional reaction and not a scientific one. 69.213.70.93 19:37, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Sold!

Somebody is going to have a LOT of Wikilinks to edit, 'cause this article really should be renamed to Electro-Motive Diesel, Inc.. See...

Atlant 16:06, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

GMD vs. EMD

A good start - there are some important parts of the corporate history which are missing:

• EMD was based in Lagrange and created new-builds through until Lagrange operations were downgraded in the early 1990s (after NAFTA).

• GMD (General Motors Diesel) was a Canadian subsidiary created to avoid excessive Canadian duties on import locos. GMD's London, Ont. plant was newer than Lagrange, and coupled with a co-located GM Defence operation (now General Dynamics Land Systems), it offered cheaper production of locomotives. After the Canada-U.S free trade agreement, and later NAFTA, GM decided to consolidate at London.

• It may make sense to have a separate corporate entry for EMD, another for GMD, and keep this one for GM-EMD (a more recent name, IIRC).

Plasma east 03:59, 3 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I don't see that we need a breakout yet. But it's also worth mentioning that that loss of production capacity cost EMD quite a few orders. La Grange still produces engines and systems, it just doesn't assemble locomotives anymore. —Morven 07:07, Mar 3, 2005 (UTC)

• Since User:Morven didn't appreciate my bold editing, here's my defense: I think the "General Motors" bit is extremely misleading for people seeking current corporate information about the company. I'm thinking we could follow the model of Lockheed Corporation and Lockheed Martin. I think that Electro-motive Diesels should be a stub on its own, that way people who, maybe know about the company or its investors or whatnot will expand on it, and it can be categorized outside of the locomotiphile world.

--Robojames 20:18, 31 May 2005 (UTC)

Uh, guys? It looks like whoever thinks Electro-Motive Diesel is in La Grange doesn't know what they're talking about (and that may include whoever does their website), because a good look at a map will show that EMD is entirely within the suburb of McCook. You can see for yourself if you enlarge the map at Wikimapia at: http://www.wikimapia.org/1443251/McCook-Quarry EMD is located on the north side of 55th Street just north of the McCook Quarry. Moreover, McCook's boundaries extend north to 47th Street and west to East Avenue, which definitely includes all of EMD, both the plant and the office buildings. La Grange doesn't begin until you hit East Avenue. Never mind what the post office does with its delivery routes -- EMD is in McCook. PERIOD. End of story. Also, it begins to sound more and more like EMD is the same company that once belonged to General Motors, only it's changed hands a few times since. The Hawthorne Works Museum of Morton College in nearby Berwyn, IL has a display about EMD (they're local -- their curator did the research and ought to know). This is exactly what it says:

Electro-Motive The Electro-Motive Division (EMD) of General Motors was at one time the word’s largest builder of railroad diesel locomotives in North America. With aggressive marketing and sales tactics, EMD once and for all ended the dominion of the steam locomotive on the world’s railroads, ushering in the age of the diesel engine. In 1935, General Motors (GM) chose McCook as the location for its new factory complex since the town sat on a stable, limestone foundation that could support the massive machinery required by the new complex. The greater Chicago area also provided GM with a skilled labor force to operate the facility. By 1940, this skilled workforce of 12,000 drove EMD production to almost one locomotive per day. In the early years of World War II, EMD temporarily suspended locomotive production to aid the war effort, making diesel engines for the Navy. EMD did not return to locomotive production until 1943, when locomotives were needed to break up war time transportation bottlenecks. By 1960, the dieselization of American railroads was effectively complete as EMD consolidated [its] position as the dominant locomotive builder in the United States. After the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement came into effect in 1989, EMD decided to move all locomotive production to the GM plant in London, Ontario, ending locomotive production at the McCook complex in 1991. The Illinois facility, however, continues to manufacture large diesel engines.

So you see, this should end the debate ... about a couple of things. Mrtraska (talk) 00:14, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

The nav box template...

It just occurred to me that the existing Template:EMD diesels should probably be renamed to something like Template:GM-EMD diesels and the existing template name should be used for the "new" EMD's products. We could keep adding new models to the existing template, but this seems a natural place to split off as new models are developed. The only real drawback that I see is that we'd have to go back and update the existing EMD locomotive articles to point to the new template name, but as that's a finite set of articles, it wouldn't be as big of a job. Thoughts? slambo 14:12, Mar 9, 2005 (UTC)

Um, why?

The split hasn't actually happened yet anyway (it's agreed, but not implemented) and the new company's range is tiny (SD70M-2, SD70ACe, GP20D). And all of these were developed under GM ownership anyway.

I can't see any reason to split at all. —Morven 16:45, Mar 9, 2005 (UTC)

Cut and paste move

User:Robojames took it upon themselves to move all the content to Electro-Motive Diesels and turn this page into a redirect. I undid this; such a move should only be done as a proper move to keep the history, and with consensus which I don't think was achieved.

Several people including myself argued that the new company should have a separate article, divorced from all the GM-period history. I'd like to sound out how broad an approval that has. We'd keep this article as a coverage of the history. —Morven 20:06, May 31, 2005 (UTC)

I agree. The GM-EMD article should discuss the history of the GM division, while the Electro-Motive Diesel article should describe the new company created from GM-EMD's sale. slambo 20:28, May 31, 2005 (UTC)

See my comments above. I think the new page is necessary, it's incredibly misleading as is. I don't see why the history can't be under that page, but I'm not going to argue against it having its own page. --Robojames 20:31, 31 May 2005 (UTC)

Essentially, the example provided is what I was picturing here too. Keep the main historical information on GM-EMD (Lockheed Corporation is historical information), put information on the new company under the new EMD article (like Lockheed-Martin in your example). The history section on the new EMD article shouldn't be much more than one sentence per paragraph from the GM-EMD article. We go in-depth on GM-EMD's history here, and reference the history that is given in detail here on the new EMD article.

I'm not objecting to having two articles, just pointing out that they should concentrate on their own topics. As the new EMD builds new locomotives of its own, listing them on the GM-EMD page seems less and less relevant, however, we don't need to hold a detailed discussion about GM-EMD's first- and second-generation diesels on the new EMD page (while it would be relevant here). slambo 20:39, May 31, 2005 (UTC)

Another point about GM-EMD. I don't know how you want to work this in, but EMD did not exist as a Division of GM until January 1, 1941. On January 1, 1941 the Electro-Motive Corporation and Winton Engine were merged into the Electro Motive Division. Before that all locomotives were built by the Electro Motive Corporation or EMC. See Kalmbach's Second Diesel Spotter's Guide. -- SSW9389

Well, Kalmbach's may be wrong, because when the Electro-Motive plant was built in McCook in 1935, it was called the Electro-Motive Division then and GM built the plant, so go figure. There are village records in McCook that confirm this, as does the history of the village published by the village itself: Wesby, Vernon, ed., History and Progress of the Village of McCook, Village of McCook: 1976 They were there at the time, so they should know. Nuts to Kalmbach. Mrtraska (talk) 00:41, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

Note that you can easily "sign" Wiki talk postings by including four tildes (~~~~) at the end of your post. When you press (Save page), these will be replaced by your username in a handy Wikilinked form. A timestamp will also be appended.

Atlant 16:04, 14 October 2005 (UTC)

I have fixed the cut and paste move and merged all the May 31, 2005 edits to the history of this article. If you are reading this, please report any other cut and paste moves to Wikipedia:Cut and paste move repair holding pen. Thank you. — FREAK OF NUR_xTURE (TALK) 10:47, Dec. 22, 2005

Technical issue

"The 567, named for its displacement-per-cylinder of 567 in³ (9.3 L), was a two-cycle (or two-stroke) supercharged engine with overhead camshafts and four exhaust valves per cylinder."

I might be wrong but doesn't a 2-stroke diesel have ports and not valves?
204.155.16.114 02:50, 22 July 2006 (UTC)-EMD engines have inlet ports & exhaust valves

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the debate was Move. Splitting the articles as mentioned below can be done later, and it would be better to keep the edit history with the new company name. —Wknight94 (talk) 00:59, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Requested move

General Motors Electro-Motive Division → Electro-Motive Diesel – EMD was sold by GM more than one year ago so the article title should reflect its current name Will74205 07:20, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Survey

Add "* Support" or "* Oppose" followed by an optional one-sentence explanation, then sign your opinion with ~~~~

• Support -- Seems like an easy call to me, at least if the Encylopedia is to accurately reflect reality. Atlant 12:54, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
• Oppose. I think it makes more sense to split the history and keep separate articles for the two phases since they really aren't the "same". Frankly I think it is bad enough to keep "revising" in order to keep up with different corporate stylings, but in this case the change goes beyond that. Mangoe 13:37, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
  • What about make Electro-Motive Diesel the main article and points to this article in the EMD's history section. As it current stands, the GM-EMD is set up as the main article, which does not reflect its present status. --Will74205 23:22, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Opinion -- EMD inherited the assets and products that formally fell under GM-EMD, and GM-EMD didn't start being GM-EMD in the beginning, although it was GM-EMD the longest. --Will74205 18:27, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
• Support change. It's the name of the company now, the older name is historical. Herostratus 18:22, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Discussion

I put up a move request because this article cannot be moved the normal way. Move to the Electro-Motive Diesel has some obstacles that only an Admin can solve. --Will74205 20:19, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm still undecided on this question. It seems logical to move the article to the new name since GM sold the entire division to the new company, and we generally keep articles here under the last or the most common company name, mentioning the previous names and alternate names somewhere in the text and making redirects from the alternate names. However, as a model builder, I'm more inclined to think of GM-EMD as defunct with a new company building locomotives based on its last offerings (but I can really think of no logical reasoning for this idea). I guess I'm more in favor of the move than not, but something still doesn't seem quite right to me. Slambo (Speak) 20:34, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Query about correct model numbers for EMD

Hi there

I was hoping to contribute some additional articles on some of the Clyde/GM locomotives built by Clyde Engineering in Australia under licence from GM EMD.

To ensure a correct naming convention is maintained for these pages, I'm wondering if anyone can point me in the right direction regarding actual EMD model numbers. Eg:

• ML1 - modified EMD FP7 series AIA-AIA with lowered carbody - EMD designation A16A
• ML2 - modified EMD FP7 series Co-Co with lowered carbody and two cabs - EMD designation AA16

I'm guessing the correct thing would be for these articles to be titled EMD A16A and EMD AA16 respectively. However, there's a whole bunch of other Clyde/GM products (eg the A7, A16C, G6B, G16C, G26C, AAT22C-2R, etc) where I'm not sure if the model designation is the EMD one, or is akin to the ML1/ML2 designation.

Any assistance regarding naming conventions of GM EMD products, or resources anyone can point me to on this would be greatly appreciated! Zzrbiker 22:50, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

BL20-2

Can somebody please add the BL20-2 to the section at the bottom of the article that has links for all the locomotive models? I'd do it myself, 'cept I'm still a newbie and am not quite sure how to do it. Thanks! — BMRR 23:26, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Done. Thanx for the heads up. Ken (talk) 17:23, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

LaGrange vs McCook

All of the addresses for EMD are for the city of La Grange, Illinois, not McCook, Illinois (http://www.emdiesels.com/lms/en/utilities/contact_us/index.htm) Can someone explain why the sidebar entry says McCook and not LaGrange? Dav2008 22:56, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

The building is in McCook, the mailing address is LaGrange. 12.168.6.143 18:12, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

This is correct; McCook location -- I've actually driven by it myself. This section of McCook used to be considered part of La Grange maybe 70 years ago, but not for decades (similar to Stinson Airport in McCook, which also used to be considered part of La Grange when it first opened, though that's been closed since 1958).Mrtraska (talk) 23:03, 9 November 2012 (UTC)

BTW, please see my comment under GMD vs. EMD, because I'm correcting this page to list McCook as the address. Never mind what crazy things the post office does with its delivery routes -- any good map will show that EMD lies entirely within McCook. In fact, when you look up the address on Google maps, it comes up in McCook. Which makes even the company's website wrong. I am correcting the EMD page accordingly. Y'all will just have to live with that. Mrtraska (talk) 00:24, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

McCook, which predates EMD, has never had a post office. East Ave is the East side of LaGrange, which does. The only residences in McCook are NE of Joliet and 1st (Ill 171), my guess would be served by the Lyons P.O. Before ZIP that would be tough, two McCooks. You still address unincorporated as the serving P.O. The address McCook may only date from ZIP, when names no longer mattered. Local guess.Sammy D III (talk) 18:34, 20 July 2013 (UTC)

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Biased sentence

While hardly ever is anyone the absolute inventor of any system, Harold L. Hamilton most probably comes close to being called the "father of the diesel locomotive."

If anyone is the "father" of DIESEL locomotive it must be Rudolf Diesel. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.110.203.90 (talk) 19:49, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Rudolf Diesel invented the diesel engine, not the application of the engine to railway locomotives. It is the combination of diesel prime movers and railway locomotives that is credited to Hamilton. Slambo (Speak) 20:00, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Ha! Such credit to Mr. Hamilton would be highly undeserved. Hamilton was in the business of designing and selling gas-electric rail cars which he had others build for him. That's what he created Electro-Motive to do (but did not originate that either). EMC had nothing to do with diesels until GM bought them and Winton and started the development of 201 diesel engine, with two of them on display while under development at the Chicago World's Fair (and another sent off to the Navy for evaluation). That's what led to the 201, which in production version is called the 201A, to be used on the original Zephyr train, other articulated streamlined trains, the early switchers and the early E passenger locomotives. The genesis for that engine was in 1933-1934. So how does Hamilton rate credit for marrying diesels to railway locomotives when the Ingersoll-Rand / ALCo / GE consortium was already selling non-experimental diesel switchers as far back as 1926? That's not to denigrate his considerable constributions but to say he was the father of the diesel locomotive is patently ridiculous. A favorite uncle perhaps. BTW, in case anyone cares, one of the original prototype Winton 201's (not 201A's) from the World's Fair is on display at Illinois Railway Museum. Filmteknik (talk) 03:44, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

The man who was most instrumental in General Motors purchasing first Winton Engine Company and then its primary customer Electro_Motive Corporation was Charles F. Kettering. Kettering was General Motors Head of Research. It was Kettering's interest in researching and improving the diesel engine that led General Motors to first Winton and then EMC. --SSW9389 13:35, 14 October 2011 (UTC)--SSW9389 13:35, 14 October 2011 (UTC)--SSW9389 13:35, 14 October 2011 (UTC)--SSW9389 13:35, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Article has been edited to address this "opinion" statement. It now states that Hamilton was simply a pioneer, rather than "the father" of the diesel-electric locomotive. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.192.108.176 (talk) 22:03, 6 January 2013 (UTC)

It's probably a good idea to steer well clear of references to "fatherhood" in the context of inventions, particularly in the case of good ones. As the old adage says, "Success has a thousand fathers..." - Zzrbiker (talk) 22:18, 6 January 2013 (UTC)

Egypt

20 May 2009

EGYPT: Commissioning has begun in Cairo of the first 15 of 40 Electro-Motive Diesel JT42CWRM locomotives being supplied to Egyptian National Railways. They are the first Series 66 family to be delivered outside Europe.

The JT42CWRM will be deployed on passenger routes.

They have 12-cylinder 12N-710G3B engines, and EM2000 microprocessor controls which provide diagnostic information for maintenance. The cabs are air-conditioned and have easy-access emergency exit doors.

EMD has supplied locomotives to ENR since the 1950s, and says ENR will have a total of 681 EMD-powered locomotives when deliveries of the current order are completed in the third quarter of the year.

Tabletop (talk) 06:42, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Multiple issues

Can someone have ago at fixing the multiple issues - especially the "weasel words" bit which should be easy to prune out. -- Issues with section on Hamilton have been fixed.

Also can someone expand on the history 1960-70 - .... weird that the history section doesn't mention either the SD40 or SD40-2.

Also the images - I suppose the images shoud match what is in the text - and should also show the most important models - I had a go at this - but don't really know the history - again a SD40 type image should be squeezed in there. Someone could find an early railcar image or something as well for the pre-WW2 section.Mddkpp (talk) 14:00, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

October 2012 edits

I reverted your edit because it did not appear to add any further encyclopedic information, and undid cleanup work I did. The article does not need overblown coverage or meta-discussion relating to "globalisation issues".

It does not need a separate section "Recent history and closure" (2years) which is longer than the history of the plant (60years).

If there is additional information please add it, without making retrograde edits to reference formatting. Oranjblud (talk) 16:03, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

Hi. Can you please stop reverting the EMD article - you're undoing valid changes - and it's not clear to me what new information you are adding. If you want please tell me what the new part it is you want to add.

One of your sources is a blog and is not suitable.

Some of the additions you are adding are simply not in the source you gave http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/03/business/workers-locked-out-at-caterpillar-locomotive-plant-in-canada.html?_r=0 eg dental costs. Additional the version you written is not correct eg during labor talks with the Canadian Auto Workers, EMD stated that the labor costs at EMD Muncie are about half of those at EMD London -EMD did not state this, CAW did.

If you can find information relavent to the article which is not in the version you reverted from, please use the talk page of the article to discuss or mention this this.Oranjblud (talk) 20:11, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

There were other issues with the version of the article you created - you stated The London factory was threatened in 2011 when EMD opened a locomotive final assembly plant in Muncie, Indiana - but this is not verified by either of the two sources given.Oranjblud (talk) 20:19, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

Your version also included the statement Negotiations with the CAW never resumed, and it has been suggested that Caterpillar's intention all along was to close the plant (despite denials to the CAW during labor negotiations), which was confirmed in February 2012. - none of this information was verified by the reference given, and the statement included unattributed speculation.

I understand that this is a complex subject, and there is potential to say more about the topic - but the content of your edits is not acceptable in its current form - specifcally - see the guidelines relating to verifyability and attributability - see WP:VERIFY and Wikipedia:Attribution. Oranjblud (talk) 20:24, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

My response to your points: The article does not need overblown coverage or meta-discussion relating to "globalisation issues". The sentence was already in the article before my edits, so I moved it to the end instead of eliminating it entirely.

It does not need a separate section "Recent history and closure" (2years) which is longer than the history of the plant (60years). The London plant closure was a major issue in Canadian news, although having a separate article for this would be too much detail.

you don't need a separate section or article- one paragraph should do

Some of the additions you are adding are simply not in the source you gave http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/03/business/workers-locked-out-at-caterpillar-locomotive-plant-in-canada.html?_r=0 eg dental costs. Additional the version you written is not correct eg during labor talks with the Canadian Auto Workers, EMD stated that the labor costs at EMD Muncie are about half of those at EMD London -EMD did not state this, CAW did. I'll move my sources to the bottom of the paragraph so that will cover the entire thing, as oppose to doing a sentence-by-sentence.

Yes the company did state this : quote "The company’s Web site about the labor dispute, though, said that the cost of wages and benefits for its workers in Illinois, who are represented by the United Automobile Workers, is about half that for the London plant" [2] -

Your version also included the statement Negotiations with the CAW never resumed, and it has been suggested that Caterpillar's intention all along was to close the plant (despite denials to the CAW during labor negotiations), which was confirmed in February 2012. - none of this information was verified by the reference given, and the statement included unattributed speculation. Negotiations did never resume after the lockout. Referring to the Torstar editorial piece, I carefully distinguished between the fact and opinion. It is fine for the news to suggest "that the intention was to close the plant all along". The fact was the quote from the CAW boss describing negotiations when he queried if the plant might be closed and Caterpillar said no.

Reporting one person's opinion may or may not be a good idea - did you mean this source [3]? - it' doesn't come across as a very balanced view

:There were other issues with the version of the article you created - you stated The London factory was threatened in 2011 when EMD opened a locomotive final assembly plant in Muncie, Indiana - but this is not verified by either of the two sources given. I don't think that this is too farfetched, indeed EMD did use the threat of the Muncie plant to try to force wages down in London. In a sense the Muncie plant did somewhat improve EMD's bargaining position by making London more expendable. Touranushertz (talk) 03:45, 9 October 2012 (UTC)

The problem is wp:synthesis , and wp:verify - simply reporting what you think to be true is not enough

Copvios you added

EMD London came under ownership of Caterpillar when it paid $820 million to acquire EMD in 2010. Caterpillar gained control of one of few major locomotive manufacturers in the world, as the only other major North American rival was General Electric. It has been suggested that Caterpillar wanted to take advantage of EMD's made-in-Canada technology as well as it's customer base that was the largest in the world. In order to get the takeover approved by the Canadian government, http://www.thestar.com/business/article/1126643%2013caterpillar-likes-to-play-hardball-so-let-s-play-hardball

with 50% pay cuts in most categories, elimination of a defined-benefit pension plan, reductions in dental and other benefits and the end of a cost-of-living adjustment copyvio from http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/economy/manufacturing/video-how-caterpillars-emd-shutdown-left-a-london-family-struggling/article549346/

You didn't source these before - now you have provide a source it is clear you are simply copying text from other work - this is not helpful - I will simply take this to administrative attention if you revert to a problematic version one more time. I am not going to keep cleaning up after you. All material must meet WP:VERIFY WP:ATTRIBUTION AND WP:COPYPASTE -I can't emphasise this enought, the article already had issues - it doesn't want more.

Oranjblud (talk) 12:08, 9 October 2012 (UTC)

I haven't been involved in the recent edits, and I see no reason to get involved, but I would just like to properly defend some of the original phrasing, which I added back in January 2012, and which was directly sourced with inline citations to the newspaper article, was completely NPOV, and contained absolutely nothing undue, nor OR, nor any other negative aspect. First of all, there is nothing "overblown" about merely mentioning the realities that businesses face in today's global economy. It is simply a fact in the current business world that wage and benefit competition now exerts leveling force across countries. Those who seek to avoid admitting or acknowledging that fact are pushing a POV of their own, no matter which segment of a left-right political spectrum they stand on, and no matter how much they perceive themselves to be defending any kind of righteousness. The original phrasing, "... This case provides an example of the challenges of globalization, such as the labor impact of foreign ownership", is nothing more than a simple statement of fact directly echoing the newspaper article stating the exact same thing. If one denies that the sentence is factual, then one is pushing a sales pitch of one kind or another (to oneself no doubt as well as others), either that globalization poses no challenges, or that somebody or other is whining too much about any such challenges (maybe they are, maybe they aren't; it doesn't mean the challenge doesn't exist), or whatever. Similarly, the newspaper article, and this article's original phrasing citing it, is very even-handed, in that it simply stated that "... Both the company and the union say that the labor costs at EMD Muncie are about half of those at EMD London, with the implication being that either the Canadian workers level their compensation costs with those of the Americans, or face shutdown...." I almost didn't bother to comment here, but I took the time because it bugs me how on Wikipedia, very neutral things sometimes get messed with and messed with until POV bias has actually been retroactively introduced into the Wikipedia Article and Talk namespaces, ironically in the holy name of purging it. Basically, the original text stated, with references, the plain, NPOV reality, which was that London payroll expenses exceeded Muncie payroll expenses; that both the company and the union knew it, and acknowledged it; that it was going to lead to London shutdown unless the difference was substantially (if not fully) leveled, as much as that fact may have sucked for the London workers; and that this case was an example of that pattern, which has, for better or worse, been repeated a thousand times in globalized business in the past decade. It did not say, "...and the lesson here is laissez faire", nor did it say, "...and the lesson here is syndicalism". It simply stated what the unfortunate challenge was. None of the above is at all controversial except to people who either have POVs to push or suffer from hypersensitive tilt-at-windmills paranoia that someone else's POV is being pushed at their expense. Step back and chill out. Facts were merely being stated, and references were merely being cited. There was no POV pushing in the article until the bowdlerizing, cleansing, and hypersensitivity arrived. And that, simply, is what I spent my time to say here today. — ¾-10 19:58, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

Update: I want to acknowledge that some of it begins unintentionally, as one person reads the article and thinks, "hmmm, that could be taken as supporting X; I better clarify it so Y isn't slighted." So they fiddle with the wording. Then another person sees that fiddling and thinks, "hmmm, that could be taken as supporting Y; I better clarify it so X isn't slighted." Eventually the wording gets so bloated in one place and hacked into abridgement in another that it clearly would have been a better choice to just leave the original wording alone. — ¾-10 20:13, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

summary I din't have any real issue with your contribution, (but there were minor factual errors in it, see below) - the main problem was the copyright violations and general low quality edits that happended recently (not by you). The 'dickhead' who added these has now dissapeared, in the meantime I had to spend a lot of time trying to fix and source the content they added before I discovered they had just copypasted it in and given a false source for the information they added.

The current article says essentially what it said before - there where a couple of minor issues - but the main reason I have been reverting was the the recent edits added stuff that was unsourced, copied, or didn't properly match he sources.

I assume you mean an old version like this

In January 2012, union workers were locked out of the EMD London facility[16] after refusing to ratify EMD's proposed new contract. Both the company[17] and the union[18] say that the labor costs at EMD Muncie are about half of those at EMD London, with the implication being that either the Canadian workers level their compensation costs with those of the Americans, or face shutdown. This case provides an example of the challenges of globalization, such as the labor impact of foreign ownership.[16]

Source http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/03/business/workers-locked-out-at-caterpillar-locomotive-plant-in-canada.html?_r=0

I note that the part about challenges of globalization is not present (that's synthesis) - the source doesn't state that - it does mention the labor impact of foreign ownership (close paraphrasing here) - I don't have any objection to addition of more information about the debate within Canada about this topic - however I would like a reliable Canadian source to work from - not 'foreign' assertations of what the local view is.. Also a generalistic viewpoint, not the view of the union, which though valid is already stated, and predictable.Oranjblud (talk) 14:43, 20 October 2012 (UTC)

If you read your source again you will see that the company did not state that the labour costs were half at Muncie quote The company’s Web site about the labor dispute, though, said that the cost of wages and benefits for its workers in Illinois, who are represented by the United Automobile Workers, is about half that for the London plant - clue Muncie is not in Illinois. I had to fact check and correct all this - that was a pain. Also, a complex situation like this needs more than one source.Oranjblud (talk) 15:01, 20 October 2012 (UTC)

OK, thanks for responding. Glad you were not assailing the original contribution but rather the later changes. I don't think "challenges of globalization" counts as synthesis (not any kind of stretch IMO from the gist of the news article, just stating the theme involved in different words), but I liked your response and thank you for the time you contributed on the topic. I failed to notice in January that Illinois was mentioned rather than Indiana. But I do suspect that the "half" ratio still applied roughly as well in either case. Thanks again. That's one challenge of being a Wikipedian—this topic probably wasn't worth the time you ended up spending, but we (myself included) sometimes do it anyway to keep Wikipedia from sucking. I feel your pain on that ... — ¾-10 23:59, 25 October 2012 (UTC)