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[quote user="h2fe9x2"]   <div style="border-right:medium none;padding-right:0cm;border-top:medium none;padding-left:0cm;padding-bottom:1pt;border-left:medium none;padding-top:0cm;border-bottom:windowtext 1pt solid;mso-element:para-border-div;mso-border-bottom-alt:solid windowtext .5pt;"> Conclusions </div> If speeds up to 90 miles per hour could be practiced on a level road with an ordinary train, although on special circumstances resulting from a question of prestige and from the need to compete for the same traffic with a rival road, the PRR, this with heavier, longer and older trains than the Scott Special, then why is so difficult to believe that a 100 mph run could be achieved with a lighter train on a special run? One made with a single paying lunatic like Dead Valley Scotty and with a clear road ahead of the locomotive, not an ordinary run with hundreds of “innocent” passengers! And this is not physics talk. This is only to put things in perspective, considering what the technology of the day could actually do. If this 100 mph run was an impossible accomplishment, one that cannot be easily refuted by the laws of physics, then believing in this can only result from a preconceived idea, and probably it is just that: a question of belief (and a pointless one). Well, apparently the one person that does not like numbers is Mr. Hankey itself, because this information (and a lot more) was made public at the time in technical (and reliable) publications of the day. One has only to research a little and study properly what we encounter.     <div style="border-right:medium none;padding-right:0cm;border-top:medium none;padding-left:0cm;padding-bottom:1pt;border-left:medium none;padding-top:0cm;border-bottom:windowtext 1pt solid;mso-element:para-border-div;mso-border-bottom-alt:solid windowtext .5pt;"> References (supporting the information posted here and on the previous post) </div>   -          Maclean, Magnus, “Physical Units”, London, Biggs and Co., 1896 -          Cotterill, J. H., “The Steam Engine”, Third Edition, Spon & Chamberlain, 1896 -          Smart, R. A., “Performance of a Four-Cylinder Compound Locomotive”, Purdue University, paper presented before the St. Louis Railway Club, February 11, 1898 -          “Vauclain System of Compound Locomotives: Description, Method of Operation and Maintenance”, Baldwin Locomotive Works, Burnham, Williams & Co., 1900 -          “The Pennsylvania System at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition: Locomotive Tests and Exhibits”, the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, 1905 -          “Report of the Proceedings of the Thirty-Ninth Annual Convention of the American Railway Mechanical Association”, Atlantic City, NJ, June 1906 -          “Measuring Tools”, Third Edition, Machinery’s Reference Book No. 21, The Industrial Press, 1910 -          Heck, Robert, “The Steam Engine and Turbine”, D. Van Nostrand Company, 1911 -          Clayton, J. P., “The Steam Consumption of Locomotive Engines from the Indicator Diagram”, University of Illinois Engineering Experiment Station, Bulletin No. 65, January 1913 -          “Report of the Proceedings of the Forty-Sixth Annual Convention of the American Railway Master Mechanical Association”, p. 282-285, Atlantic City, NJ, June, 11-13, 1913 -          Wood, A. J., “Principles of Locomotive and Train Control”, McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1915 -          Tuttle, Lucius, “The Theory of Measurements”, Jefferson Laboratory of Physics, Philadelphia, 1916 -          Cole, F. J., Chief Consulting Engineer of the American Locomotive Company, Train Resistance in “Locomotive Hand-book”, American Locomotive Company, 1917 -          Schmidt, E. C., and Dunn, H. H., “Passenger Train Resistance”, University of Illinois Engineering Experiment Station, Bulletin No. 110, December 1918 -          Shealy, E. M., “Steam Engines”, McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1919 -          Davis, W. J., Jr., “Tractive Resistance of Electric Locomotive and Cars”, General Electric Review, Vol. 29, pp. 685-708, October 1926 -          Johnson, R. P., Chief Engineer of the Baldwin Locomotive Works, “The Steam Locomotive”, Simmons-Boardman Publishing Company, 1942 -          Kalmbach, A. C., “Railroad Panorama”, Kalmbach Publishing Company, 1944 -          Hay, W. W., “Railroad Engineering”, Second Edition, John Wiley & Sons, 1982 -          Davis, R. S., “Recalibration of the U.S. National Prototype Kilogram”, Journal of Research of the National Bureau of Standards, Vol. 90, Number 4, July-August 1985 -          Davis, R. S., “New Assignment of Mass Values and Uncertainties to NIST Working Standards”, Journal of Research of the National Institute of Standards and Technology, Vol. 95, Number 1, January-February 1990 -          Avallone and Baumeister III (editors), “Standard Handbook for Mechanical Engineers”, Tenth Edition, McGraw-Hill International Editions, 1997 -          Hugh, W. C., and Steele, W. G., “Experimentation, Validation, and Uncertainty Analysis for Engineers”, Third Edition, John Wiley & Sons, 2009 <div style="clear:both;"></div> [/quote] h2fe9x2,  <o:p></o:p> In your quote above, you ask why the AT&SF speed record is so difficult to believe.  I don’t think that it is difficult to believe so much as there is a refusal to believe it.  There is a widespread bias that nothing great that happened until the modern era of railroading.  These early speed records are a serious threat to that school of thought.  Obviously, Mr. Hanke began with the pre-existing belief that the AT&SF speed record was false before he set out to “prove” that was the case.    <o:p></o:p> Mr. Hanke says there are three reasons not to believe the claimed speed record:  <o:p></o:p> 1)      It fairly reeks of wishful thinking and corporate spin.  <o:p></o:p> 2)      There is no credible scenario in which the railroad (or anyone on the train) could have accurately timed that feat.  <o:p></o:p> 3)      It was physically impossible.   <o:p></o:p>  <o:p></o:p> People defend Hanke by saying that the record cannot be proven one way or the other.  That is true, but that is not what Hanke is saying.   <o:p></o:p> So, thanks for your effort in making a technical review of the physics of the debunking.  I would say that you have debunked author Hanke’s invocation of the laws of physics, and restored the AT&SF speed claim as standing free of bunk.
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