When I was much younger in 1968 I worked as a brakeman out of Revelstoke, BC. Occasionally FMs from the Cranbrook Division found their way up to our division. We all hated them!!! They were awkward to work from. Look at those steep, shin-banging steps. The windows were ridiculously narrow. But, what really drove us nuts was their absolute unreliability. We were lucky if we ever got home. Sure, they had an interesting dual crankshaft, valveless engine that apparently worked OK in submarines in WW II, but it's a drag when half your units crap out struggling up the hill to Glacier in 1968. Only the legendary cheapness of the CPR kept them from the scrappers' torches.
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For an unreliable engine there sure are a lot of them still running today in museums. Ask the sub guys it was the EMD units that never finished a patrol. The problem with the FM's was both EMD and GE put great pressure on railroads to run the FM's into the ground, and I will admit they were harder to work on, but they didn't blow cylinder packs between 92 day inspections like the EMD units did.
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