Poor steamers

[Anonymous]

In first person railroad stories, it's sometimes mentioned that a particular loco is a poor steamer or poor performer. Sometimes it's a whole class of locos, but often a particular loco has a reputation of being a poor steamer. I realize steam locos aren't mass produced, but what types of design or maintenance issues cause one particular loco to have a bad reputation.

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

Poor coal supply, bad water, plugged flues, etc. all had an effect on steam locomotive performance. Robert Le Massena, in "The Big Engines" (June 1968 TRAINS) observed that the performance of NP's Yellowstones would have been outstanding if they were fed a better grade of coal than the on-line sub-bituminous coal for which their huge fireboxes were designed.
Bad water was a major problem for Santa Fe, which is why the FT's were first assigned to mainline service in Arizona.

[Texas Zepher]

Weren't Erie Triplexes considered poor steamers, just because the boiler couldn't keep up enough steam for all those cylinders?

[selector]

I read a story about a British steamer, forget the class, but they were big, and every loco was a real stormer except for one. They tried everything to get it to work, until someone noticed that the valves had been installed incorrectly. The very first time they fired it up after the corrections were made, it set a record on a notoriously difficult climb!

[joseph2]

I also read the Erie triplexes had too large of cylinders and not enough steam .

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by joseph2

I also read the Erie triplexes had too large of cylinders and not enough steam .

This is a very often repeated misrepresentation. Erie had the triplexes designed as pushers to shove coal drags over one grade. The locomotive would then proceed light back to the bottom of the hill. For this service they excelled and were used for many years. The locomotive had sufficient time to build enough steam for the climb. The "undersized" firebox was designed to prevent the crew from wasting fuel and water in a service that spent the majority of the time simply sitting idle. The Triplexes could not run a manifest at speed for any distance, but they were never designed for that application. To state that a locomotive was a failure because it was unable to perform some other service for which it was ill suited, while it was able to adequately perform the work for which it was designed is all too common. There are far too many instances in the hobby press where an "expert" declares a design (steam or diesel) a failure because it did not work to expectations when one or more railroads misapplied it, while the same design was properly applied by other railroads and was successfully and economically used for decades.

Is an 0-4-0T a failure because it cannot pull the same train a Big Boy can? Conversely is a Big Boy a failure because it cannot negotiate a 100 foot radius curve? The answer is not quite straight forward. If the 0-4-0T was designed to pull 100 car trains up Sherman hill at 25 MPH it would be a failure. Likewise if the Big Boy was purchased to switch the docks and industries in a city it too would be a failure. But if the 0-4-0T was used for the docks and the Big Boy for the manifest train they would be resounding successes. As in fact they were.

[joseph2]

Thanks for the correction,I didn't realize they were designed for that purpose. Joe

[feltonhill]

rdganthracite -

I wish more had your insight regarding some so-called "experts" in the hobby press. Most are OK, but a few have misled a lot of us over the years by making the kind of declarations you cite. It's sometimes difficult to keep an open mind because of this. When new information is found and published, many minds are already closed because of misstatements read years before.

[TrainFreak409]

Well put rdganthracite, well put.[tup][tup] There aren't many that realize what the triplexes were designed to do.

Although in the model world...they can do whatever we want.[;)]

[Anonymous]

I was thinking more of one particular engine rather than a whole class, but these discussions are interesting as well.

Regarding the Yellowstone, the book "Northern Pacific Supersteam" sheds some interesting light on Messina's comments. Both the NP 4-8-4 and the 2-8-8-4 were designed to burn the company owned Rosebud coal. Both locos met or exceeded the design specifications originally requested by the NP Mechanical Department. Had they had higher quality coal, the specifications would have resulted in 4-8-2 and 2-8-8-2 locos, and the Yellowstone borrowed much from the D&RGW 2-8-8-2's that were being built at about the same time. As built, the Yellowstones lacked roller bearings and had built-up frames, so it's doubtful the theoretical horsepower power could have been used.

Regarding the Triplex, was there some type of mechanism to compensate for the decreasing weight on the 3rd set of drivers as water and fuel was used up?

[Leon Silverman]

The so-called experts lack a systems-engineering approach to locomotive design. They usually apply only one criteria to locomotive design, mainly horsepower. This is not appropriate under all conditions seen by particular railroads in particular locations. Moving trains at high speed requires high horsepower, period. However, when that same train starts going up a steep incline at slow speeds, tractive effort is far more important than horsepower. This is why the Erie Triplex was a successful engine. It was designed to generate a lot of tractive effort, which it did. It was never intended to operate at high speeds, meaning its' lack of high steam generating capacity was never a problem for its application. The Union Pacific Big Boy was considered a successful locomotive because it was able to operate in speed ranges that permitted it to utilize all of its horsepower capability. The Allegheny engine, on the other hand, had a relatively lower tractive effort capability and operated in areas that prevented it from utilizing all of its horsepower capability. When you consider how expensive the engine was in comparison to smaller, simpler designs, it was not very cost effective.
The PRR T-1 was considered a free-steamer, meaning it could obtain speeds of 120 mph at certain locations. The N & W J-1 could operate at a maximum speed of only 100 mph. It had smaller drivers than the T-1. This is why it could not go as fast. However, it was used in exclusively hilly areas and could smoothly start trains up a grade that would cause the T-1 to spin its wheels and vibrate terribly. Both designs wer considered successful because they were designed to operate under the conditions they encountered.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by up829

I Regarding the Triplex, was there some type of mechanism to compensate for the decreasing weight on the 3rd set of drivers as water and fuel was used up?

There was no provision designed to compensate for the loss of weight on the rear drivers. However, the steam supply for the 3rd set of drivers came entirely from one of the cylinders in the center set of drivers. So the rear set could only slip so much before they were temporarily out of steam.

I did not include in my former post what transpired on the Virginian. They saw the reasonable success that the Erie was having with the triplexes and ordered a somewhat larger one to test themselves. Unfortuately, the grades on the Virginian main line were much longer than those where the Erie used the Triplexes. So the locomotive often ran out of steam midway through the push. The Virginian soon gave up and turned the locomotive into a 2-8-8-0 and a 2-8-2. And one very strange looking tender. If the designers at the Virginian or at the manufacturer done a more thorough examination of the relative operating services on the Erie and the Virginian they should have realized that the Virginian needed a locomotive with more evaporation surface and a stronger draft. Had that been, done the Virginian might have also been a triplex success story.

On individual locomotives that are poor steamers compared with the rest of the class, there were cases where too many of the tubes were plugged off due to leaks, significantly reducing the evaporative surfaces. Also sometimes the thermic syphons would get clogged or broken reducing the circulation in the boiler. A plugged preheater could also cause the locomotive to require much more fuel for the same power.

[jlampke]

As a life-long, staunch fan of steam locomotives, I was disappointed to learn just how
energy-inefficient and maintenance intensive all steam locomotives are. I work aboard steam ships. Through the decades, advances have been made in all aspects of steam engineering to reduce leakage, increase heat transfer and waste heat recovery, reduce energy losses due to friction by advances in lubrication and bearing technology, the application of more advanced materials, improved water treatment, soot reduction, better insulation materials and methods, the list is long. This has resulted in better energy efficiency and reduced maintenance requirements. The maritime industry, especially the Navy, had the resources and was willing to invest in developing these advances. Sadly, the railroad industry doesn't have the resources that have been available to the Navy all these years (thanks to the taxpayers). Well, I believe that if steam railroading had lived longer, the locomotives would have developed to a much higher degree of reliability and energy efficiency.

For anyone that doesn't know, black smoke coming from the stack of a steam engine represents unburned fuel atoms. It's a significant waste of energy. Not only is the unburned fuel a loss, but it carries away heat from the fuel that was burned. Better atomization, thorough mixing of atomized fuel and combustion air and complete combustion of all fuel in the firebox will result in a smoke-free stack, minimized soot build-up on the tubes, and maximum conversion of fuel to heat energy. What's the solution? Better fuel atomizers? Forced draft blowers? It could've been done, given the time and money.

Look at the automobile. Cars of the same period of the surviving steam locomotives weren't exactly bastions of reliability either. Nowadays, it is common to hear of a car going 100,000 miles without any repairs to the engine whatsoever. Steam locomotives would have advanced too, if they had not been phased out.

Well, I know that wasn't what you asked... my apologies.... just thought you might find it interesting.

Again, to use a quote I really like:

Ah, but the entertainment efficiency is right up around 99%, at least for me.

[Leon Silverman]

JLamke:
I would hate to burst your bubble, but few of today's Naval ships, mainly the transport and amphibeous assault ships, utilize boiler-steam turbine propulsion plants. The majority of today's conventionally fueled ships use diesel or gas turbines. You seem to have overlooked the fact that steam locomotives have an open fluid cycle. The black exhaust smoke is not the only energy waister. The exhaust steam also carries off unused energy that is otherwise recovered in a marine or stationary power plant thru the condenser and feedwater heater systems.
It is possible that some increases in fuel efficiency may have been achieved with further developements of the locomotive steam engine, but you have to remember that the diesel engines clobbered the steam locomotive (which had been under developement for over 150 years) with relatively young (by today's standards) technology. Granted, the reliability and efficiency of post WWII gasoline engines cannot hold a candle to today's designs, but the same could also be said about the steam engine killing diesel engine technology of the same era.
I love steam engines, sailboats, and battleships, but I have no illusion that their day have passed.

B.S.M.E.

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

Stationary and marine steam engines are quite frequently turbines, which never panned out on North American railroads. Reciprocating marine steam engines also tended to be compounds, which faded out on non-articulated locomotives in North America with the advent of superheat.

[Anonymous]

I'm like jlampke, I love the smell, the sounds, and the size of the old steamers. Can't exactly put my finger on it, but there's just something about standing next to one of those old girls when I was a child about 5 yr old on a special kindrgsrden excursion from Fayettevile, NC to Raleigh, NC and back one day. Gusess I got bit then.




C&O F-11 #378 WITH CRAIG VALLEY SD MIXED TRAIN READY TO DEPART CLIFTON FORGE, VA OCT 1948

Looks to me that the T-1 might be burning pretty well in the photo below. Your opinions?


C&O T-1 #3032 WITH EASTBOUND COAL DRAG WEST OF NORGE, VA JUL 1952 PHOTO BY J.I. KELLY

[Anonymous]

Please excuse the typos from my previous post.....

[jlampke]

Leon Silverman: You're not bursting any bubbles here. I simply stated that given the chance to further evolve, steam locomotives could've become considerably more energy efficient than the 4 to 6% that I'm hearing now, and that with time a lot of the maintenance problems would've been solved. I listed a few examples of the areas where improvements have been made.

Just for the record, ALL of the U.S. Navy's ships (Except the nukes) burn diesel fuel today. That includes the gas turbine powered ships, the boiler steam powered ships and the diesel engine powered ships. I ran into a guy several years ago who said that all Navy ships except the nukes were diesel powered. Apparently, he had heard that all Navy ships used diesel fuel, and mistook that to mean that they were all diesel engine powered. Not even close.

I didn't overlook the fact that energy is lost in the form of steam going up the stack on a steam locomotive. Along the same lines, the exhaust steam on a ship is condensed in a seawater heat exchanger. The sea water is then pumped overboard. It's a complete loss. The reason we use a condensing cycle is because our evaporators couldn't keep up with the demand from the boilers for fresh water. That part of it hasn't got a thing to do with saving heat energy. The condensed steam from the main condenser is usually under 100 degrees f., and has to be completely re-heated again.

I've never been on a gas turbine powered ship, but I hear they are darn-near as fuel-thirsty as boiler-steam powered ships. My guess is that the Navy went to them because of their power to weight ratio, relative small size, responsiveness and relative ease of changing them out for repairs. The Navy does seem to be going more and more in that direction. Even recent auxiliaries and an amphibious assault ship, the USS Makin Island, have gas turbines.

To the best of my knowledge, the Navy has never built a major combatant that was diesel engine powered. Diesel engine power has always been relegated to 2nd rate auxiliaries, WW 2 subs and "Gator Freighters" (amphibious transports, tank landing ships and dock landing ships).

At this time, the Navy's major combatants are either nukes, gas turbines or boiler steam powered.

Diesels need not apply.

In 2001 an Amphibious Assault Ship (helo and Harrier carrier), the USS Iwo Jima (LHD-7) was built by Ingalls. It is 844 feet long and displaces 41,000 tons. Roughly
as big as the carriers we were building during WW 2. It was built with conventional (Boiler) steam powered propulsion. The Navy has never built any diesel engine-powered ships that big.

Whew! Talk about getting off the topic!![#offtopic]

Ron: Real nice pictures. The one with all the people standing along the tracks: When
and where was that taken?

Just something about a steam plant that a diesel will never achieve....... John

[Leon Silverman]

jlampke:
Energy efficiency, up to theoretical limits imposed by temperature differences, is dependent on energy recovery. Diesel engines are fuel efficient because they simply lose less energy from the fule then other systems do. In vehicles, excess heat energy can be used toheat the passenger interior. In Ships, that energy can also be used in the water evaporators. There is virtually no intermediate heat recovery in either locomotive or Naval Boiler turbine systems. In commercial marine plants and stationary utility power plants, the bleed steam from the turbine packing glands (seals) preheats the boiler feed water after it leaves the condenser. This is equivalent to recovering the energy from the steam you see leaving various vents in the steam chests of locomotive.
This is off the subject: True, the U.S. Navy has never used diesel engines in major combat ships, but that is not to say no combat ship has ever utilized diesel engines. Check the stats on the German WWII pocket battleship Graf Spre.

[Anonymous]

One fix for a poor steamer was to put an oriface plate in the smoke stack above the blast plate often engin crews would do this when they wanted to inprove the efficency of an engin they were assigned to for long periods the plate was arived at by trial and error the size of the hole made all the difference when they his on the right size they stayed with it untill they were assigned to a new engin then they would have to sneek into the shop at night and remove the oriface plate becouse the railroad frowned on un-scheduled modifacations[xx(][B)][}:)][banghead][soapbox][swg]glennbob

[BR60103]

British Railways (nationalised after WW2) built a single Class 8 standard pacific (Duke of Gloucester) to replace one lost in a wreck. It was regarded as a bad steamer and avoided by many engine crews. It underwent a major restoration job (officialdom had preserved the cylinder and valve gear from one side) and it was discovered that the ashpan had not been built to the plans and was missing a lot of air intake. The rebuilt loco has an ashpan to specification and is impressing everyone with its haulage capabilities..

[Anonymous]

4-6-4 hudsons weren't the greatest. They had too much of their weight on non-driving wheels. They were ok for passenger service but even then they may need a booster engine. I've never heard of one used for freight although it would be cool.

Some of the REALLY big engines didn't produce enoguh steam for their size. I've heard of an engine (can't remeber which one, maybe 4-14-4) that could move 200 cars, but had to stop every few miles to build up more steam.

[M636C]

There was an Australian locomotive built in 1916 that was well known as being a really bad steamer, to the extent that a poem was written about it that gained some popularity among the crews. This was a superheated 2-8-0 of the TF class, which were not well regarded when new (being sometimes called "Total Failures" using the class initials) but No 1174 was clearly the worst. A lot of effort went into checking the grate, valves, cylinders and connecting and coupling rods and the condition of scaling in the boiler but all to no avail. Then someone took out the spark arrester and was checking the stack and blast pipe, and realised that they didn't line up! Only part of the exhaust was going up the stack, the rest was destroying the draft. When that was corrected, it steamed well, and it was eventually preserved as the best known member of the class.

M636C

[AltonFan]

QUOTE: Originally posted by dingoix

4-6-4 hudsons weren't the greatest. They had too much of their weight on non-driving wheels. They were ok for passenger service but even then they may need a booster engine. I've never heard of one used for freight although it would be cool.

The IC tried to develop a 4-6-4 for merchandise service (less-than-carload freight). The experiment proved a failure, and the engine was rebuilt for passenger service.

I believe there is a formula involving tractive effort and weight on drivers. I believe the ratio can predict if an engine will tend to be slippery.

However, a number of Hudsons ended their days pulling freight trains. There is a photo of a NKP 4-6-4 in America's Colorful Railroads doing just this.

[Anonymous]

With respect to steam locomotives whole classes of engines were often considered poor steamers because of insufficient firebox grate area, a design flaw. Individual engines of the same design would vary in their steaming ability due to factors such as scale buildup which reduced heat transfer from the fire tubes to the boiler water. Others often operated with some fire tubes plugged or partially blocked resulting in the same effect. The ability of individual firemen varied widely. Some had the knack of building and maintaining a hot, even, clean burning fire while while keeping the steam pressure just shy of popping the safety valve. Others struggled mightily often over or under firing and unable to keep an even fire across the entire grate area which resulted in poor steam generation.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by dingoix

4-6-4 hudsons weren't the greatest. They had too much of their weight on non-driving wheels. They were ok for passenger service but even then they may need a booster engine. I've never heard of one used for freight although it would be cool.

The IC tried to develop a 4-6-4 for merchandise service (less-than-carload freight). The experiment proved a failure, and the engine was rebuilt for passenger service.

I believe there is a formula involving tractive effort and weight on drivers. I believe the ratio can predict if an engine will tend to be slippery.

However, a number of Hudsons ended their days pulling freight trains. There is a photo of a NKP 4-6-4 in America's Colorful Railroads doing just this.

Well, NKP did run fast freight

Seems to me a 4-6-4 is overpowered for freight service (altho, as you said, it happend on occasion) because most didn't have much more tractive effort than a Pacific, but they had more power (most of them). A lot of that extra power is doing no good, as you can't get all of it to the rail. But for high speed passenger service on realativly flat grades, a Hudson was a good engine.

[Dr Leonard]

Exhaust steam was not necessarily "lost" as far as contributing to a locomotive's pulling power. After all, it contributed to the draft for the fire, without which not much steam would have been produced in the first place. When the locomotive was stationary, a blower could be used for this purpose but when the locomotive was working harder the exhaust steam rendered the blower unnecessary. At least that's my understanding.

[METRO]

NYC of course loved the Hudsons, but they fade near the end for one of the most reliable steamers of all time, the NYC Niagras. The Water Level Route Hudsons needed some help to get going from a standing stop with a passenger train of any real size which is why NYC tried out Mowhawks as dual-purpose engines for a while but they couldn't keep steam for speeed through long distances until the L4 class. By that time however the Niagras had arived and taken over the main line heavy passenger trains along with the first generation diesels.


In looking at failures however the Pennsylvania K5 class comes to mind. The start of the many ill-fated attempts to replace the K4 Pacifics, the K5 project was probably the most conservative. Basically it was a super-K4, still a Pacific but larger in almost every way, except it wasn't that much heavier, and that proved the downfall. The K4 was well balanced and had a great factor of adhesion for such an old design. The 1929 K5 prototypes (one built by Baldwin and one by PRR at Altoona) had a factor of adhesion of 3.80 deemed too low by PRR for the kind of running that would be required of a replacement to the K4.

They were also rather fat, (dimensionally their boilers were closer to that of a 2-10-0) and not seen as being attractive enough to replace the premier passenger power. Eventually the two were put into Pittsburg-Crestline service after having been unscuessfully tried on Harrisburg-Baltimore runs. The Pennsylvania didn't ever make the K5 production, but would instead go on to make one of their more famous limited engines (and some say blunders) the T1 Duplex class as replacement for the K4.

There were not complete failures however with some of their advances going on to the M1a class Mountains, which were some of the Pennsy's best engines.

Cheers!
~METRO

[Anonymous]

The engine you're thinking of is the single Class 8 Pacific built at Derby in 1956 and restored beginning in 1974. Read the fascinating account of what the restorers discovered at http://www.dukeofgloucester.co.uk/ & http://www.dukeofgloucester.co.uk/index.php?page=restoration  (last accessed 21 May 2006). It amounts to an indictment of quality control and a vindication of the original design.