Paul of Covington I'm wondering how you would control direction on this beast. I believe some marine diesels were (or are) direct drive, and direction is controlled by shifting the valve timing, but the text on this one says it was 2-stroke valveless.
I'm wondering how you would control direction on this beast. I believe some marine diesels were (or are) direct drive, and direction is controlled by shifting the valve timing, but the text on this one says it was 2-stroke valveless.
The 4LV38 motor is described as 'direct reversing' which means that it would be fired and injection-timing-advanced for reverse rotation. This would also affect the air injection for starting and slow speeds. The McKeen cars reversed their gas engine rotation rather than interposing or providing a separate reverse gear arrangement in their mechanical transmission.
I can see no objective reason why this would be particularly difficult to implement on an engine of the 4LV38 design.
Unless I am more than usually mistaken, you're describing the Fell-system locomotive. Here is a page with basic information on it.
And here is a bit more on the operation of the locomotive.
For those who just want to see a general diagram of the arrangement:
I have a 2-stroke snowmobile engine (gas) that has 'reverse'. When the reverse switch is activated, the engine is stopped and then fired in the reverse direction. When the switch is used again, the engine will operate in the forward direction.
I have no idea of how it was done with this beast.
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NorthWestOn Diesel-Direct vs Diesel Mechanical- I believe the D-Ms (usually small two-three axle switchers, at least in the US) could idle. Does this require a distinction?
In 1951 Rwy Age had a short article on a 2000-hp diesel-mech 4-8-4 built at Derby, in England. Anyone know how long that lasted?
UlrichBut they also must have been aware of the Heilmann steam - electric which was built at the very same location some 20 years earlier. Why wasn't that first diesel prototype then built along the lines of the Heilmann?
Perhaps because the Heilmann was overcomplicated, massively overweight, and expensive for the rail horsepower it could produce?
Transmissions were usually the difficult part of railroad designs. The clutch arrangements suitable even for large 'road locomotives' and the like did not scale well to the rail environment. Note the longstanding emphasis for steam automobiles, where a clutch is actually a useful device to get the engine warmed and free of condensate... but is seldom provided.
What we have instead is very careful detail design of the air system to provide starting power *into the train load* and to maintain the air pressure during the early starting and warmup of combustion in the prime mover, without requiring any kind of clutch or quill-drive arrangement. You have, in essence, the same starting method as the roughly contemporary locomotive that used compressed air FOR the transmission, but only having to tolerate the drawbacks of compressed-air drive for a comparatively short time.
What I would have looked for would be some kind of 'flexible gear' arrangement between the engine crankshaft and the jackshaft driving crank. Using the right springs there would cushion some of the very peaky torque coming off the engine, and perhaps eliminate some of the shock communicated from the engine to the running gear and from the running gear back to the engine -- and particularly the very high shocks in starting, during the 'cutover' to fuel injection where I'd expect some very pronounced detonation-like tendency.
(Compare the problems with rod-drive electrics, armature inertia, and broken rodwork... The PRR FF-1 used this arrangement in its jackshafts and, to my knowledge, the arrangement worked well, with no need for Kando drive or other fancy expedients.)
Of course, part of the problem was that very high output per cylinder was necessary to get the necessary horsepower, and the auxiliary-engine power wasn't very effective at accelerating the train to high enough speed to make up for the inherently slow firing rate. What the designers forgot, I think, is that an engine design which loads into a freely-revolving flywheel has very different kinetics from the same engine connected to a mechanical rods-and-wheels drivetrain; I am not surprised to find that the engine suffered severe issues with breakage.
What I don't have is any report of how well the engine ran at 'design speed', particularly with the auxiliary engine providing supercharging. As with a conventional steam locomotive, there would be a torque peak at some reasonable speed, and I have little doubt that the engineers calculated this range when designing the locomotive. Most of the problems appear to have been in other parts of the 'performance envelope'...
CSSHEGEWISCH henry6 There were diesel mechanical but more often diesel hydraulics. Krausse Maffe (SP?) manufactured some pretty big units used in Europe. Here SP and DRGW got some. They worked somewhat ok but were never reordered. Deutsche Bundesbahn was big on torque-converter drives similar to those built by KM for European railroads and for export to the United States (SP & D&RGW). Voith torque converters were also used in the Alco C643H, built for SP.
henry6 There were diesel mechanical but more often diesel hydraulics. Krausse Maffe (SP?) manufactured some pretty big units used in Europe. Here SP and DRGW got some. They worked somewhat ok but were never reordered.
There were diesel mechanical but more often diesel hydraulics. Krausse Maffe (SP?) manufactured some pretty big units used in Europe. Here SP and DRGW got some. They worked somewhat ok but were never reordered.
Deutsche Bundesbahn was big on torque-converter drives similar to those built by KM for European railroads and for export to the United States (SP & D&RGW). Voith torque converters were also used in the Alco C643H, built for SP.
The SP and D&RGW found that the Diesel-Hydraulics required more maintenance than contemporary diesel electrics and that pretty much killed the idea for North American Mainline freight operations.
In the areas of Europe and other parts of the world where Diesel Hydraulic traction was/is widely used one of the major factors was higher power-to-weight ratio, i.e. a lighter unit could pull more and this justified the additional maintenance costs. In the US and Canada the much larger loading gauge meant that weight saving was not a huge consideration for freight service.
There are a number of diesel hydraulic industrial switchers in use in North America. Some underground mining locomotives use the technology which allows them to operate in wet conditions where traction motors may short out.
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CSSHEGEWISCH Since many of the earliest railroad diesel engines evolved from marine and stationary diesels, it shouldn't be too surprising that one of the earliest attempts at a diesel locomotive used a marine-style direct drive. The engineers were basing their design on what they already knew.
Since many of the earliest railroad diesel engines evolved from marine and stationary diesels, it shouldn't be too surprising that one of the earliest attempts at a diesel locomotive used a marine-style direct drive. The engineers were basing their design on what they already knew.
But they also must have been aware of the Heilmann steam - electric which was built at the very same location some 20 years earlier. Why wasn't that first diesel prototype then built along the lines of the Heilmann?
Hi NorthWest!
Certainly CNJ's 1000 could be called the first commercially successful diesel-ELECTRIC, setting the standard for all diesel locomotives to follow. It was in use at least a good 30 years, from 1925 to 1955 or so. I'd be curious to know how long that German diesel-mechanical was in use. With its clumsy method of operation (not really a critisism, everything has to start somewhere) I can't help but think it was an evolutionary dead-end.
Still, you have to give them credit for trying. Or the blame, if you're like me and think steam rules!
Back in, I believe, the sixties or so Mercury made an outboard motor like that. Stop, pull to reverse, hit the start button or something like that.
Norm
As I recall, some marine applications used Diesels in a direct drive operation. If one wanted to go in reverse, the engine had to be stopped and restarted in the opposite direction.
Of course, turning a propeller is very different than turning wheels, as a prop can "slip" with no real consequences, whereas in an application such as this, action by the Diesel results in immediate motion of the locomotive.
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Firelock, I think that the title that goes to CNJ 1000 is "The First Commercially Successful Diesel-Electric."
On Diesel-Direct vs Diesel Mechanical- I believe the D-Ms (usually small two-three axle switchers, at least in the US) could idle. Does this require a distinction?
Overmod Firelock76I'd be interested in seeing a photo of the German unit as well. Maybe Juniatha can pull another rabbit out of her hat for us. We'll want a big favor from her, but not for the first picture: What we need her to do is paraphrase or translate the information for the "Diesel-Klose-Sulzer-Thermolokomotive" found on this German Wikipedia page. For both the page and for the discussion. I'm not going to butcher the thing with Google Translate; we should have an expert. (For even more of a headache, some references have the company that had Borsig build this locomotive as 'Diesel-Sulzer-Klose GmbH' ... or maybe 'Sulzer-Diesel-Klose' ... but that's not how the locomotive's title reads... all I can say is 'see the discussion'...) There is a brief English-language history, with additional pictures, on this Sulzer Web site.
Firelock76I'd be interested in seeing a photo of the German unit as well. Maybe Juniatha can pull another rabbit out of her hat for us.
We'll want a big favor from her, but not for the first picture:
What we need her to do is paraphrase or translate the information for the "Diesel-Klose-Sulzer-Thermolokomotive" found on this German Wikipedia page. For both the page and for the discussion. I'm not going to butcher the thing with Google Translate; we should have an expert. (For even more of a headache, some references have the company that had Borsig build this locomotive as 'Diesel-Sulzer-Klose GmbH' ... or maybe 'Sulzer-Diesel-Klose' ... but that's not how the locomotive's title reads... all I can say is 'see the discussion'...)
There is a brief English-language history, with additional pictures, on this Sulzer Web site.
Amazing. Looks like a cross between a steam locomotive and a U-Boat.
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NorthWestSo what is the technical term, diesel-direct?
Cool! I hadn't heard of the Heilmann until now. And this is from 1890! Impressive. Will have to learn more about it. Just made my day.
Ulrich Who hit on the idea of combining the diesel engine with the generator and electric motors, i.e. the diesel electric? This engine was designed along the lines of steam. Someone somewhere had to be thinking out of the box to come up with the diesel electric. Would be nice to know his/her name.
Who hit on the idea of combining the diesel engine with the generator and electric motors, i.e. the diesel electric? This engine was designed along the lines of steam. Someone somewhere had to be thinking out of the box to come up with the diesel electric. Would be nice to know his/her name.
By the time the first Diesel locomotive was built there already had been at least one Steam- electric design built and operated:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heilmann_locomotive
So it must have been logical to pair the IC engine with an electric transmission to overcome the problems with the direct mechanical drive.
I know the first Diesel-electric railroad vehicle was a self -propelled railcar operated in Germany and built with Swiss technology. That was introduced in 1914. Supposedly Fiat built the first diesel electric locomotive in the early 1920's.
A diesel-mechanical locomotive with no clutch?? I would doubt that this locomotive, unlike CNJ 1000, was anything other than strictly experimental.
Okay, that makes sense...the locomotive reminds me a lot of early Swiss rod electrics, minus the pantograph. The fact that it couldn't idle is very interesting!
Diesel-mechanical
Interesting, never heard of this before! So what is the technical term, diesel-direct?
timz Note the locomotive has no transmission, except for the side rods. The diesel can't run when the locomotive is stationary-- as I recall it used compressed air to get itself moving.
Note the locomotive has no transmission, except for the side rods. The diesel can't run when the locomotive is stationary-- as I recall it used compressed air to get itself moving.
The compressed air setup does more than that. Starting AND some of the low-speed working is done by the compressed-air system (note the substantial bank of air pressure tanks), with the compressed air doubling as a source of enhanced combustion oxygen. In a sense, this might be thought of as a 'booster' version of that 1-E-1 locomotive (was it Lomonosov's?*) which used compressed-air drive AS the transmission ... the little two-cylinder air-compressor diesel in the Klose-Sulzer design provides the starting power.
More interesting, to me, is that the little engine acts as a separately-fired supercharger. AND the setup uses water injection to increase piston thrust while lowering peak temperatures (a bit like my Snow methanol-injection rig, but that's another story... ;-})
BTW, for anyone interested, the Walsh & Clark 'locomotive' is described in the Aug 29 1912 issue (in the Commercial Motor archives). You will go blind trying to find the reference by the 'issue 390' given in the text... ;-}
*spelled "Lomonossoff" in Romanization of the classic formula, or by people who spell the composer "Rachmaninoff", etc.
Ulrich Thanks...going to see if I can get the Scientific American at the local newsstand.
Thanks...going to see if I can get the Scientific American at the local newsstand.
You probably won't find the right one there, but you can find one here. Per the site, price for a scanned copy of all pages is $1.95.
(Why I can't find the 1913 issue on Google Books as a .pdf download, I don't know. I have 1916, so it's not as if Google is ignoring Scientific American in general...)
Well isn't this interesting! This would mean the Germans had a commercially successful diesel locomotive 12 years before Jersey Central's #1000, generally considered to be the first commercially successful diesel, in the US anyway.
AND in mainline service as well. CNJ 1000 was used for switching only.
I'd be interested in seeing a photo of the German unit as well. Maybe Juniatha can pull another rabbit out of her hat for us.
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