I will make every effort to remember your correction. What is also interesting is that both the Romney and the Ravensglass are not only tourist mineature steam operations but are also used regularly by people for commuting to and from work. The R&E has the more interesting scenery, but both are well worth visiting and riding, and both have some really beautiful mineature live steam locomotoives to pull the trains.
What does dissapoint me greatly is there is no Sunday service on the Cambrian Coast rail line, and on Sunday one must use a bus to connect with the R&E. Yet the Cambrian Coast line itself is one of the most beautiful from the standpoint of scenery in the UK. I don't understand this. Unless this has changed since I last looked.
daveklepper As indicated in previous posts, I would probably prefer a stean turbine design to a normal piston engine, because it is kinder to the track, and has fewer wear points. Going to gas firing removes much of the maintenance work associated with steam. Iinternal combusion engines of all have lots of moving parts and far many more wear points than either pistion or turbine steam engines, which are relaively simple in comparison.
As indicated in previous posts, I would probably prefer a stean turbine design to a normal piston engine, because it is kinder to the track, and has fewer wear points. Going to gas firing removes much of the maintenance work associated with steam. Iinternal combusion engines of all have lots of moving parts and far many more wear points than either pistion or turbine steam engines, which are relaively simple in
comparison.
I have no doubt that a Natural Gas fueled steam locomotive would be easier to maintain than one burning coal or fuel oil but the fact remains that the day-to-day maintenance requirements of such a unit would be more time consuming and labor intensive than an equivalent diesel electric.
There is also the issue of water, while I imagine that you are suggesting a Henschel-type condensing tender arrangement keep in mind that that is a high maintenance system as well, even without the problems with solid particles from coal combustion damaging the fan blades as happened to the South African "Red Devils"..
I would also suggest that the price differential between LNG and diesel is not and will not be so great that we can just disregard fuel efficiency at part load when talking about the economics of Gas fueled locomotives...
Note that I restrict my comments to the question of steam traction being an attractive alternative to the railroad industry for revenue freight and passenger locomotives, there certainly may be some of the advantages you mention to using CNG or LNG fuel on engines in tourist/excursion type services...
"I Often Dream of Trains"-From the Album of the Same Name by Robyn Hitchcock
I am reasonably familiar with the requirements for servicing diesels and steamers. I think with the proper materials and design, and natural gas firing, maintenance of steamers can be reduced drastically. That is my opinion. Acoustic testing instead of teardown is a factor,
Excuse the heresy, but if you are burning natural gas, you can easily use gas turbines, perhaps in a Gen-Set kind of arrangement where you turn them on and off to modulate the fuel consumption.
The reason for steam was for burning solid fuel (wood, coal) or a petroleum waste product (Bunker C, back in the day, when there was not any use for the "dregs" of oil refining).
If GM "killed the electric car", what am I doing standing next to an EV-1, a half a block from the WSOR tracks?
That is not a steam locomotive but is a viable concept, certainly. But the genset concept implies electric drive, thus with little cost and maintenance advantage over the DE.
daveklepper I am reasonably familiar with the requirements for servicing diesels and steamers. I think with the proper materials and design, and natural gas firing, maintenance of steamers can be reduced drastically. That is my opinion. Acoustic testing instead of teardown is a factor,
I am sure that you are correct about simplifying major overhaul schedules but there are still daily maintenance tasks required by a steam locomotive that are far beyond what is required by a diesel electric.
I am doubtful that you could get the average unit availability with a new design steamer than can be had from the current EMD and GE mainline freight offerings and thus you would have a very hard sell with the railroad industry.
As you already know, the N&W had drastically reduced the time for daily maintenance of conventional coal-fired steam as compared with other ralroads, and much of the remaining time is the results of matters directly related to burning coal. More is associated with the thermal expansion and contraction that better design and materials shoiuld be able to further drastically reduced. Fufther reduction would be possible with a more advanced form a valve motion and gear for reciprocating power or advanced turbine technology.
But all does depend on the fuel being very inexpensive. Otherwise steam obviously has only one role, nostalgia.
I just checked out the Ravensglass & Easkdale. Oh wow......
And what beautiful country it rolls through. I've said it before, I'll say it again, no wonder the Brits fought like lions to keep Phillip of Spain, Napoleon, and Hitler out of it.
A little belated post concerning the Romney, Hythe and Dymchurch;
Many years ago, trains magazine had a nice article about their operation. As I recall, when the line was initially proposed during the 1920's, it's construction was protested by a bus company!
Wayne, if you look on Youtube, there are scores of videos of the R,H & D (or any other line you can come close to spelling). I got a kick out of the machine-gun exhaust of those little Pacifics at speed. The length of the trains are quite impressive, also.
john
daveklepper I will make every effort to remember your correction. What is also interesting is that both the Romney and the Ravensglass are not only tourist mineature steam operations but are also used regularly by people for commuting to and from work. The R&E has the more interesting scenery, but both are well worth visiting and riding, and both have some really beautiful mineature live steam locomotoives to pull the trains. What does dissapoint me greatly is there is no Sunday service on the Cambrian Coast rail line, and on Sunday one must use a bus to connect with the R&E. Yet the Cambrian Coast line itself is one of the most beautiful from the standpoint of scenery in the UK. I don't understand this. Unless this has changed since I last looked.
Dave
Actually there is Sunday Service provided by Arriva on the Cambrian Coast Line. Three trains a day northbound which most likely is balanced by three south bound as the same set going north is used going south. My wife and I took that train in September just past. It was beautiful from Dovey Junction on to Porthmadog where we got off. We travelled on a weekday train from Shrewsbury (actually Birmingham New Street to start)
About the train being used by local commuters.
We arrived in Harlech and stopped at 315 or 330 pm. I wondered why such a long station stop, compared to the others and then got off to take some pictures of the castle and the scenery around Harlech which like most of the Cambrian Coast Line scenery is really beautiful. What the conductor told me was we were waiting 15 minutes for the elementary and middle school kids to get on going northbound. They were a great crowd of really nice kids, in uniforms and full of chatter after a day in school. Obviously the train was their 'school bus' as it was apparent the conductor knew many of them and the train schedule was set to correspond with afternoon school dismissal for students commuting from a distance.
The last time I saw something like that was the BC Rail Service from Seton Portage to Lillooet for Seton Portage students going to and from school in Lillooet. That was a few years ago i assure you.
Charlie
Chilliwack, BC
The last time I had looked at the timetables, the service was provided by another firm, not Arriva, and the tiimetable directed passengers to use a bus service . I think at the time, the service was provided by one of the firms that runs buses as well as trains.
I am very very glad that Sunday rail service has been restored, and I hope to use the line some day and revisit the R&E. I am very greatful for the information.
As far as I know the CEO of the R&E is Lady Jenny Greton, widow of the late Lord John Greton, who save Great Western 4-6-0 Pendennis Castle. In the late summer 1962 I hosted Lord John for visits to the Boston Symphony summer home at Tanglewood and a concert there, a concert at Darmouth's Hopkins Center Spaulding Auditorium, the Mount Washington Cog (John rode the front platform with the brakeman), and a meeting with Nelson Blount and Lord John running the 2-8-0 on the regular run from Bellows Falls to Essex (Steamtown was at Bellows Falls at the time.) We had a great time. One scary bit. Ran out of gas in my '54 Ford. But we were on a mountain, and we coasted to a gas station at the foot of the mountain.
There is research going on at my Alma Mater, MIT, and in China, on making atomic power as safe to use as electricity and petroleum are today, and without worries of contamination by still radiioactive spent fuel that needs to be buried somewhere. Based on the forecasts of these researchers, I would guess that perhaps in twenty years an atomic-power steam locomotoive that is economical to operate will be possible. The question would stilll be whether other methods of converting the power to traction on the rail might be even more efficient. This is not science fiction, remember that even today the US Navy has atomic-powered submarines.
daveklepper Based on the forecasts of these researchers, I would guess that perhaps in twenty years an atomic-power steam locomotoive that is economical to operate will be possible.
Based on the forecasts of these researchers, I would guess that perhaps in twenty years an atomic-power steam locomotoive that is economical to operate will be possible.
I don't think it is possible to get adequate shielding around the reactor and still fit in AAR clearance plates. Nuclear subs can cheat a bit by using the surrounding water as a secondary shield. The big challenge is shielding against high energy neutrons, then shielding against the capture and inelastic scattering gammas.
Modular nuclear power plants would make a nice source of electric power for electrification.
- Erik
I am not up to speed on the technology of the developments I mentioned, and what you write is 100% correct, but my impression is that the problem you have mentioned is addressed with a very different kind of basic atomic reaction than exists in reactors today. The reports are from the magazine, Technology Review, the magazine received by MIT alumni. There would still be precautions necessary, but they would be at the level of precautions around use of electricity and of petroleum.
I've seen a few stories about stimulated decay of metastable nuclei, which would allow for compact shielding, but there isn't much evidence that the proposed process actually works. I've also seen several references to aneutronic fusion (i.e. fusion reactions that don't emit neutrons), but getting net energy out of those reactions is a ways off.
I think it is the second process that the articles referred to, and apparently they have gotten the process to work , to efficiently produce energy, in a lab setting. There are practical problems to solve for commercializaton, but they do appear solvable. And there is some cooperation between the two efforts, at MIT and in China.
daveklepper There is research going on at my Alma Mater, MIT, and in China, on making atomic power as safe to use as electricity and petroleum are today, and without worries of contamination by still radiioactive spent fuel that needs to be buried somewhere.
There is research going on at my Alma Mater, MIT, and in China, on making atomic power as safe to use as electricity and petroleum are today, and without worries of contamination by still radiioactive spent fuel that needs to be buried somewhere.
I presume this involves aneutronic fusion, the boron-11 cycle (the best approach using a DPF). We Princetonians have a finger in this pie.
The question would stilll be whether other methods of converting the power to traction on the rail might be even more efficient.
More efficient than utilizing the positively-charged alphas to induce current, then bottom with a Rankine cycle? There were numbers many years ago for one of the charged-particle cycles using the old mirror-machine topology that indicated a conversion efficiency as high as 94% flux-to-DC; I will now have to see if I can dig up the reference in my previous-life storage files. Erikem will probably remember it.
With the recent results that have been achieved at Lawrenceville, I think we're well on the way to observing similar numbers for aneutronic boron-11. And the plasmoid generation does appear to scale nicely to locomotive packaging...
It goes without saying that the fireman will wear lead overalls when stoking plutonium into the firebox.
rfpjohn It goes without saying that the fireman will wear lead overalls when stoking plutonium into the firebox.
Why? Plutonium is primarily an alpha emitter at rest. You can hold it in your hand and your skin provides all the shielding you need...
It's only when it gets inside you that the problems come up.
Of course, once you shovel up a critical mass in the firebox, all bets are off. But any lead you can wear wouldn't protect you at that point... ;-}
Ten bucks sez my tin foil hat will.
Overmod;
Please excuse my ignorance. I must have been mis-lead.
rfpjohn Overmod; Please excuse my ignorance. I must have been mis-lead. john
Hand firing large locomotives has been illegal since the 1930s, and the very small required mass of plutonium fuel led to the development of appropriate-scale stokers. There is plenty of room for combination lead/slag-loaded concrete/paraffin neutron blanketing on the outside of the proposed N-scale Standard HT stoker, with appropriate shielded waldoes to operate the tiny valves and jet controls. Surely someone has a picture of the arrangement (even if it is a photomicrograph)...
Pull up th following:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iajwyx02Hqw
Comments?
Thanks to all for continuing while I was away -
with best wishes for a mint 2014 !
.. and lest we forget :
keep on steaming !
Regards
Juniatha
And my best wishes for
"Good Luck !"
to all of those caught in this bitterly biting winter frost -
may springtime release you early this year !
Re: wheel "hunting":
A lot depends upon some of the suspension built into trucks, learned in passenger truck design down through the ages. If you want to experience what it is like to ride a 4-wheel truck not properly designed for even moderate speed, take a ride on the MBTA Riverside Line out of Boston.
puffy Re: wheel "hunting":
See the Handbook of Railway Vehicle Dynamics (Iwnicki, ed.; 2006), section XII, p.19ff. In my opinion that should address any questions you may have about hunting on a mechanical level, at least for purposes of a discussion like this one.
(The relevant text is accessible on the Google Books preview, accessible here in the United States, for those who can't get access to a printed copy...)
@ users Overmod and dinodanthetrainman
You are - again - hiking the thread !
To repeat what can be read in my intro :
This thread is *not* about unconventionals !
Your posts should have appeared in the thread 'Extreem Steam - about unconventionals II' - which I had especially set up for Overmod to blow his mind about plenty of unconventional and extra drives , Bowes and Besler , Cunningham and what have you applications , auxiliaries and appurtenances .
The following posts diverting from the theme of this thread have thus been moved to a new thread .
Because of this hiking I have given up posting anything in this thread anymore , especially I see no use in posting some *conventional* ( i.e. in lin with 1940s Super Power steam as built ) designs of mine like the 4-10-6 I wanted to post if discussion would have proceeded in the direction described in my intro to this thread .
Since nothing about *conventional* or classic steam is coming forward in this thread I will herewith close it .
Thanks to everyone who contributed to the theme .
= J =
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