The Santa Fe received a total of 100 General Electric U36C locomotives numbered 8700-8799, delivered in three orders from May 1972 to February 1975. All arrived in the yellow warbonnet paint scheme except the first six; 8700-8705 were delivered in the blue with yellow trim freight scheme. These were soon repainted to the then-new yellow warbonnet scheme. Units 8736, 8739, 8741, 8744, 8746, 8749, 8750, 8752, 8753, and 8755 received the SPSF merger "Kodachrome" scheme in the 1986 time frame, but were all eventually repainted back to the Santa Fe yellow warbonnet. Seventy of these units were remanufactured into "SF30C" locos by Santa Fe's Cleburne shops in 1985-1987. However, 27 U36C's were not rebuilt because they were leased from GE, and remained on the roster until 1992.

      The three Santa Fe U36C orders had several variations. Most notable: the first order, 8700-8735, had all the battery boxes mounted "low" along the left side, and the cab headlight base was smaller with a square profile. They did not have anti-climbers on the front pilots, and the engine access doors had the typical U-boat type round latches at the top and bottom of each door. The second order, 8736-8762, differed from the first batch as there were three battery boxes mounted "high" on the left side, stacked on the top of the low boxes, which extended the main walkway forward several feet. Also the cab headlight base was larger with an oval profile, and the front pilots had anti-climbers. The third order, 8763-8799, differed yet again, having engine access doors with a single square latch in the center of each door, similar to the later GE "-7" locos. Another variation across the entire fleet is the type of truck frames: both General Steel Casting (GSC) and Adirondack (AD) types were used. As Santa Fe serviced these units, the trucks were rearranged seemingly at random, sometimes with one of each type on the same unit!

      Written by Gregg Fuhriman.