weather could also have an effect on the test datea.
I checked Turbines Westward by Thomas R. Lee - his book starts with the Turbomotives. He did write that the units did a year of reasonable service on the GN between Wenatchee and Spokane, with the units being retired in 1943 due to wheel rims thinning and the boiler on one of the units going bad.
Thermal efficiency was said to be twice that of conventional steam locomotives, but lower than the efficiency of diesel engines and to a lesser extent, gas turbines.
Lee did say that cost per horsepower was high with the Turbomotive.
erikem Wizlish One of the great unsung opportunities lost in conventional steam history, though, is the work that was done on the condensing GE steam turbines while they were running in wartime service on NP. Apparently the guys working on them had figured out all the sources of difficulty and knew in detail what to do to build a better-working locomotive using that cycle (1200 psi admission, and very large plenum volume at the exhaust to keep the effective back pressure on the turbine low). If any of those guys' notes were preserved I would very much like to read them! Minor correction, the GE Turbomotives were originally built for the UP, who tried them for a bit and then turned them back to GE. GE then provded the units to GN for helper service, where they lasted about two years. Efficiency was't up to expectations, especially with the units running on the LA&SL and the units needed a lot of maintennance. The record might have been a bit better had WW2 not prevented the R&D to get them working right. After the war, gas (combustion) turbines looked to be a lot more practical. - Erik
Wizlish One of the great unsung opportunities lost in conventional steam history, though, is the work that was done on the condensing GE steam turbines while they were running in wartime service on NP. Apparently the guys working on them had figured out all the sources of difficulty and knew in detail what to do to build a better-working locomotive using that cycle (1200 psi admission, and very large plenum volume at the exhaust to keep the effective back pressure on the turbine low). If any of those guys' notes were preserved I would very much like to read them!
One of the great unsung opportunities lost in conventional steam history, though, is the work that was done on the condensing GE steam turbines while they were running in wartime service on NP. Apparently the guys working on them had figured out all the sources of difficulty and knew in detail what to do to build a better-working locomotive using that cycle (1200 psi admission, and very large plenum volume at the exhaust to keep the effective back pressure on the turbine low). If any of those guys' notes were preserved I would very much like to read them!
Minor correction, the GE Turbomotives were originally built for the UP, who tried them for a bit and then turned them back to GE. GE then provded the units to GN for helper service, where they lasted about two years.
Efficiency was't up to expectations, especially with the units running on the LA&SL and the units needed a lot of maintennance. The record might have been a bit better had WW2 not prevented the R&D to get them working right. After the war, gas (combustion) turbines looked to be a lot more practical.
- Erik
The specific point was that a great many of the problems that made the turbines unsuccessful on UP were apparently addressed during the time the locomotives were serving in the Northwest. I don't have the reference for this; it was given as an anecdote in a report about some other kind of power (I think in Strack's discussion of the gas turbines), but will see if I can find it.
The real problem was, I think, similar to that for Baldwin's Essl design of 'modular' diesel: it was just too expensive per usable horsepower, and too complex in comparison with what EMD was discovering it could provide.
BigJimI'd say it is the nature of the beast and no one ever figured out how to make it happen any other way, at least in a railroad reciprocating steam locomotive.
The real 'key' if you decide to go for the practical efficiency and 'automatic action' of a good steam-ejector front end is not to waste any of the available energy in the exhaust steam when you are producing practical draft with it.
That is why many of the fancy ejector and nozzle arrangements work 'better', and contrariwise why some of the "improvements" -- particularly most if not all of the wacky stuff done by the Union Pacific in the '30s right up to the pepperpot stacks on the FEF-4 design -- turn out to have problems that outweigh their 'advantages'. There's a limit to the number, type, and shape of vanes in a Kylchap arrangement, too;with four probably being too much already in a standard-gauge locomotive. if you have a copy of Sinclair's Development of the Locomotive Engine handy you can predict quite a bit of how and where you put the fancy eduction stuff for best effect.
Jos Koopmans has apparently figured out that a multiple-nozzle front end works like 'that number' of smaller chimneys, in scale, in parallel. (With some interesting things probably happening in the mutual area between the jets, but I think we need CFD rather than little models to figure out what that might be...) When you have good smooth mixing, and correct acceleration of the induced flow both in speed and in orientation of the gas flow as it mixes with the flow from the nozzles, there will be a 'sweet spot' or range of best entrainment and best mass ejection for any steam exhaust flow -- which may well be either too great or too small for what the fire at the other end, and the heat uptake along the way, calls for.
On the other hand, the usual towering plumes of smoke are a clear indication that some of the exhaust energy is being used very wastefully, and the high turbulence visible as it goes is even clearer. The flip side of this, of course, is that when the arrangements are made 'better', notably in terms of the Selkirk front end and arguably in the case of the PRR T1, you start needing some form of 'smoke deflector' PDQ to keep the exhaust ... including the nice white part of the condensing steam in cold weather ... away from the engine crew's view of the world. Then you have energy being 'wasted' in aerodynamics rather than steam thermodynamics... and that adds up, probably as 'measurably' as did the progressive engaging of individual car generators in the train acceleration curves in Kiefer's motive-power report.
It is easy to forget the importance of reduced back pressure at meaningful levels of mass flow in a 'regular' two-cylinder DA engine. There are approaches like the Holcroft-Anderson system that quite effectively recover much, perhaps most, of the latent heat in the exhaust steam ... at the cost of having to produce the draft on the fire by 'more complicated means' (this being the Achilles heel of the actual use of Holcroft-Anderson on the Southern Railway in the prewar years...)
The whole subject of condensing practice on locomotives, as opposed to ships, has been discussed repeatedly here (probably much more in the years before I started reading posts). There is little doubt that it didn't get done well for any reason that involved thermodynamic efficiency (rather than water conservation) and that at least one proposed operation (the ACE 3000) would very often have been an operational disaster in practice.
sgriggsWhile I agree that exhaust steam is put to an important use when it creates draft for the fire, from a strict thermodynamic efficiency standpoint the energy in the exhaust steam is wasted because it is not doing work at the drawbar.
Now, if all of the energy could have been used in the cylinder, would there be anything left to exhaust?
I'd say it is the nature of the beast and no one ever figured out how to make it happen any other way, at least in a railroad reciprocating steam locomotive.
.
Wizlish sgriggs Finally, as you point out thermic siphons and arch tubes were replaced with circulators for a net reduction in direct heating surface area on the J3a. The primary purpose of these firebox elements is to promote water circulation throughout the boiler, and especially over the firebox side- and crown sheets. I have not seen the circulator arrangement inside the 614's firebox, but I assume they are similar to those installed on Union Pacific's Big Boys and late Challengers. Those circulators (inverted "T"s), are designed to draw water from the firebox sides and expell it at the crown sheet. I assume this change was driven by maintenance needs (I have seen it written that UP avoided thermic siphons on its big power because siphons were found to be hard to maintain in service). I have never seen any data that suggests siphons and arch tubes had an efficiency advantage over circulators, so I'm skeptical that there is a significant difference in evaporative performance. I am enjoying this technical analysis. (BTW, I do suggest retaining the spelling 'syphon' when referring to the Nicholson devices, as that's what they used...) There were three fairly major problems with Nicholsons, and one potential one that I think was the most significant of all in emergency situations. First, the things as constructed required a considerable amount of staybolting, and this had to be inspected, maintained, etc. like the regular firebox staybolting, except it was a pain to get to, to inspect, to clean, etc.
sgriggs Finally, as you point out thermic siphons and arch tubes were replaced with circulators for a net reduction in direct heating surface area on the J3a. The primary purpose of these firebox elements is to promote water circulation throughout the boiler, and especially over the firebox side- and crown sheets. I have not seen the circulator arrangement inside the 614's firebox, but I assume they are similar to those installed on Union Pacific's Big Boys and late Challengers. Those circulators (inverted "T"s), are designed to draw water from the firebox sides and expell it at the crown sheet. I assume this change was driven by maintenance needs (I have seen it written that UP avoided thermic siphons on its big power because siphons were found to be hard to maintain in service). I have never seen any data that suggests siphons and arch tubes had an efficiency advantage over circulators, so I'm skeptical that there is a significant difference in evaporative performance.
I am enjoying this technical analysis. (BTW, I do suggest retaining the spelling 'syphon' when referring to the Nicholson devices, as that's what they used...)
There were three fairly major problems with Nicholsons, and one potential one that I think was the most significant of all in emergency situations.
First, the things as constructed required a considerable amount of staybolting, and this had to be inspected, maintained, etc. like the regular firebox staybolting, except it was a pain to get to, to inspect, to clean, etc.
Agreed. The construction of a thermic syphon, with the need to seal somewhat large penetrations in the crown sheet, accommodate the thermal expansion differentials, and their internal staybolted construction make them more difficult to maintain than arch tubes or security circulators.
Wizlish Second, the things put a nice quenching surface into the combustion plume, effectively black as night to any remaining chemical action there. I suspect this is one of the reasons some roads that tried chamber syphons -- ATSF on the 3460 class, as a notable example, perhaps? -- Third -- the general flow characteristics into the syphons from where the neck attached to the boiler structure was a pathetic thing. I don't really think the people who were promoting syphons really understood what circulation in the radiant section actually does, or even how the water there behaves (Porta described this stuff as being like 'boiling milk' even with reasonable boiler water treatment, for example). I am likewise unsure if they understood properly what the effect on circulation in the convection section was when flow through the syphons was at 'full cry' The hidden 'ringer' was what happens when water over the crown gets intermittent for some reason. There was some claim that Nicholsons were 'safer' because they would pump water out over the crown and tend to quench it ... someone can probably find direct quotes or even the ads themselves; I think Richard Leonard has a couple of them on his site somewhere. It does not take much knowledge of Eisenhoffer and Leidenfrost, or of the behavior of boiler steels when repeatedly heated and quenched, to understand how ridiculous the idea was, or just what sorts of problems could develop if anyone actually came to test this "safety" idea. (As has been noted on this forum, C&O 1642 likely provided a demonstration of this...)
Second, the things put a nice quenching surface into the combustion plume, effectively black as night to any remaining chemical action there. I suspect this is one of the reasons some roads that tried chamber syphons -- ATSF on the 3460 class, as a notable example, perhaps? --
Third -- the general flow characteristics into the syphons from where the neck attached to the boiler structure was a pathetic thing. I don't really think the people who were promoting syphons really understood what circulation in the radiant section actually does, or even how the water there behaves (Porta described this stuff as being like 'boiling milk' even with reasonable boiler water treatment, for example). I am likewise unsure if they understood properly what the effect on circulation in the convection section was when flow through the syphons was at 'full cry'
The hidden 'ringer' was what happens when water over the crown gets intermittent for some reason. There was some claim that Nicholsons were 'safer' because they would pump water out over the crown and tend to quench it ... someone can probably find direct quotes or even the ads themselves; I think Richard Leonard has a couple of them on his site somewhere. It does not take much knowledge of Eisenhoffer and Leidenfrost, or of the behavior of boiler steels when repeatedly heated and quenched, to understand how ridiculous the idea was, or just what sorts of problems could develop if anyone actually came to test this "safety" idea. (As has been noted on this forum, C&O 1642 likely provided a demonstration of this...)
As with anything promoted to be a safety feature, there are limits to how effective they will be. If the crown sheet is completely uncovered, with the exception of the liquid/gas mixture bubbling out of the syphon to quench it, you will probably have film boiling (think droplets of water on a hot surface) with very little cooling of the sheet. Without proper handling of the situation by the crew, it's only a matter of time before a catastrophic failure occurs, syphons or not.
Wizlish The arch tube circulators are a bit easier to fabricate, and of course are worlds easier to inspect and manage. To an extent they have the 'thermal barrier' protection (from the arch brick) that keeps them from being as much of a cause of radiant quench. I agree with my father that it should be possible to use the technique Bulleid used on the Leader boiler fireboxes to make syphons. This specifically replaces the staybolting with full-pen-welded hollow tubes. I do not comment on anything else associated with this, like how the National Board ESC would react to it; just that it might be possible to remove the staybolting problems as an issue. Somewhere my father has some drawings of his idea of piping air inside the syphons to oriented secondary-air jets. Not as much problem either with preheat or freezing at the nozzles ... and certainly less problem with induced turbulence trying to get effective mass flow of secondary air at appropriate preheat to the 'inside volume' of an American-size firebox. (I do not know whether this was a serious idea or not; it has a certain 'grandeur' to it. But it doesn't work nearly as well, if at all really, for arch-tube circulator setups...) Meanwhile, I think there are some things going on in the front-end steam discussion that need to be addressed. Specifically, the idea that you are 'wasting' energy in the steam by blowing it out the stack. I understood Big Jim's comment to mean that any heat energy in the steam THAT WAS NOT USED TO INDUCE DRAFT was wasted ... not that it was a waste to use the steam for that purpose practically. Certainly that was a major point in what Giesl was saying. There is an ongoing technical question about whether the residual energy in the combustion gas reheats the steam in the exhaust jet, particularly when turbulent mixing and subsequent entraining of the steam, 'momentum transfer', etc. are as good as they should be. My father and Jos Koopmans know much more about this than I do. The point of much of the 'modern' front-end improvements is to make the best possible use of exhaust for drafting, or to reduce the amount of steam needed for the 'right' draft (across a very wide and sometimes epically nonlinear range of flows!), and thereby allow diversion of more of the mass, or flow, or whatever, of the exhaust steam to 'recapture' in the Rankine cycle for any combination of its mass or heat content. Whatever we do with the ongoing discussion, let's not get mixed up with "thermodynamic improvements" related to saving exhaust steam that wouild make working locomotives less effective... in actual railroad practice...
The arch tube circulators are a bit easier to fabricate, and of course are worlds easier to inspect and manage. To an extent they have the 'thermal barrier' protection (from the arch brick) that keeps them from being as much of a cause of radiant quench.
I agree with my father that it should be possible to use the technique Bulleid used on the Leader boiler fireboxes to make syphons. This specifically replaces the staybolting with full-pen-welded hollow tubes. I do not comment on anything else associated with this, like how the National Board ESC would react to it; just that it might be possible to remove the staybolting problems as an issue.
Somewhere my father has some drawings of his idea of piping air inside the syphons to oriented secondary-air jets. Not as much problem either with preheat or freezing at the nozzles ... and certainly less problem with induced turbulence trying to get effective mass flow of secondary air at appropriate preheat to the 'inside volume' of an American-size firebox. (I do not know whether this was a serious idea or not; it has a certain 'grandeur' to it. But it doesn't work nearly as well, if at all really, for arch-tube circulator setups...)
Meanwhile, I think there are some things going on in the front-end steam discussion that need to be addressed. Specifically, the idea that you are 'wasting' energy in the steam by blowing it out the stack. I understood Big Jim's comment to mean that any heat energy in the steam THAT WAS NOT USED TO INDUCE DRAFT was wasted ... not that it was a waste to use the steam for that purpose practically. Certainly that was a major point in what Giesl was saying.
There is an ongoing technical question about whether the residual energy in the combustion gas reheats the steam in the exhaust jet, particularly when turbulent mixing and subsequent entraining of the steam, 'momentum transfer', etc. are as good as they should be. My father and Jos Koopmans know much more about this than I do. The point of much of the 'modern' front-end improvements is to make the best possible use of exhaust for drafting, or to reduce the amount of steam needed for the 'right' draft (across a very wide and sometimes epically nonlinear range of flows!), and thereby allow diversion of more of the mass, or flow, or whatever, of the exhaust steam to 'recapture' in the Rankine cycle for any combination of its mass or heat content.
Whatever we do with the ongoing discussion, let's not get mixed up with "thermodynamic improvements" related to saving exhaust steam that wouild make working locomotives less effective... in actual railroad practice...
While I agree that exhaust steam is put to an important use when it creates draft for the fire, from a strict thermodynamic efficiency standpoint the energy in the exhaust steam is wasted because it is not doing work at the drawbar.
sgriggsFinally, as you point out thermic siphons and arch tubes were replaced with circulators for a net reduction in direct heating surface area on the J3a. The primary purpose of these firebox elements is to promote water circulation throughout the boiler, and especially over the firebox side- and crown sheets. I have not seen the circulator arrangement inside the 614's firebox, but I assume they are similar to those installed on Union Pacific's Big Boys and late Challengers. Those circulators (inverted "T"s), are designed to draw water from the firebox sides and expell it at the crown sheet. I assume this change was driven by maintenance needs (I have seen it written that UP avoided thermic siphons on its big power because siphons were found to be hard to maintain in service). I have never seen any data that suggests siphons and arch tubes had an efficiency advantage over circulators, so I'm skeptical that there is a significant difference in evaporative performance.
Second, the things put a nice quenching surface into the combustion plume, effectively black as night to any remaining chemical action there. I suspect this is one of the reasons some roads that tried chamber syphons -- ATSF on the 3460 class, as a notable example, perhaps? -- took 'em out rather quickly.
Third, the neck area and the general flow characteristics into the syphons from where the neck attached to the boiler structure was a pathetic thing. I don't really think the people who were promoting syphons really understood what circulation in the radiant section actually does, or even how the water there behaves (Porta described this stuff as being like 'boiling milk' even with reasonable boiler water treatment, for example). I am likewise unsure if they understood properly what the effect on circulation in the convection section was when flow through the syphons was at 'full cry'
BigJim CSSHEGEWISCH As Dr. Giesl observed in a similar situation many years ago, that exhaust blast represents a lot of wasted energy. Eh, depends on how you want to look at it. Stepping on the gas does not waste fuel, stepping on the brake does.
CSSHEGEWISCH As Dr. Giesl observed in a similar situation many years ago, that exhaust blast represents a lot of wasted energy.
As Dr. Giesl observed in a similar situation many years ago, that exhaust blast represents a lot of wasted energy.
Eh, depends on how you want to look at it. Stepping on the gas does not waste fuel, stepping on the brake does.
Stepping on the gas wastes the fuel that does not result in forward propulsion. The heat energy in the stack exhaust steam that is over and above the heat energy in the feedwater from the tank is 100% wasted.
H-8 on the move - it is impossible within the camera frame to see all the tonnage being pulled - probably not 14,000+ - but it might be quite a bit given the fact that the locomotive is obviously working hard as the exhaust is mainly straight up.
Dr D I also do not understand why Lima reduced the firebox size and eliminated the thermic syphons and arch tubes and replaced these with "security circuulators." Giving a reduction to firebox heating area of 38 sq ft, reducing evaporative heating surface by 600 sq ft, and reducing superheating surface area by 300 sq ft. for a combined heating surface reduction of 700 sq ft?
I also do not understand why Lima reduced the firebox size and eliminated the thermic syphons and arch tubes and replaced these with "security circuulators." Giving a reduction to firebox heating area of 38 sq ft, reducing evaporative heating surface by 600 sq ft, and reducing superheating surface area by 300 sq ft. for a combined heating surface reduction of 700 sq ft?
A few thoughts here. Steam locomotive design is a series of tradeoffs. It is very easy to compare direct and indirect heating surface area and draw conclusions strictly based on the numbers. If the J3 has more direct and indirect surface area than the J3a, then the J3 must be a better performing design, right? Not necessarily. Indirect heating surface heat transfer is proportional to the temperature difference between the flue gas and the tube walls. As the flue gas travels from the firebox to the smokebox, the temperature difference decreases rapidly, until it is relatively small by the time it is about 18-20 feet from the firebox. There is a significant diminishing return for additional tube length above 20 feet. So, if you think about it a different way, not all square feet of indirect heating surface are created equal. A square foot of indirect heating surface in the tubes and flues 21 feet from the firebox has much less evaporative capacity than a square foot 2 feet from the firebox. The J3 had tubes and flues 21 feet in length, the later J3a had 20 foot tubes and flues. So, 236 sq ft of the J3's indirect heating surface advantage is in the last foot of tube/flue length that contributes very little to evaporative capacity.
The J3a design traded that extra foot of tube/flue length for a 1 foot longer combustion chamber. This was a tradeoff that was well worth it, as the larger combustion chamber provided several important benefits: a) more furnace volume, b) increased direct heating surface area (changes to circulators/siphons/arch tubes notwithstanding), and more efficient drafting through the shorter tubes/flues. ALCo steam locomotive design expert Alfred Bruce, wrote that a locomotive boiler's power potential was a direct function of furnace volume. The larger combustion chamber allows more time for complete combustion of coal before it entered the tubes and flues. And since direct heating surface area (furnace wall) is exposed to the radiant heat of the fire, it has around 6 times as much evaporative capacity as indirect surface area (tubes/flues). Therefore, what the J3a lost in indirect heating surface was more than made up by the increase in furnace volume and direct heating surface in the combustion chamber.
The flue diameter on the J3a was also increased to 4" from 3 1/2" on the J3 (the J3a had 177 flues, the J3 had 220). The effect here was an increase in the gas flow area from 10.2 sq ft on the J3 to 12.7 sq ft on the J3a. This, in addition to shortening the tube length, improved the draft efficiency of the J3a, creating higher velocity gas flows through the tubes and flues for a given smokebox vacuum. Higher flue gas velocity translates to higher heat transfer (and therefore higher evaporative) rates for a given square foot of tube and flue area.
Finally, as you point out thermic siphons and arch tubes were replaced with circulators for a net reduction in direct heating surface area on the J3a. The primary purpose of these firebox elements is to promote water circulation throughout the boiler, and especially over the firebox side- and crown sheets. I have not seen the circulator arrangement inside the 614's firebox, but I assume they are similar to those installed on Union Pacific's Big Boys and late Challengers. Those circulators (inverted "T"s), are designed to draw water from the firebox sides and expell it at the crown sheet. I assume this change was driven by maintenance needs (I have seen it written that UP avoided thermic siphons on its big power because siphons were found to be hard to maintain in service). I have never seen any data that suggests siphons and arch tubes had an efficiency advantage over circulators, so I'm skeptical that there is a significant difference in evaporative performance.
A very interesting discussion for those who want a thoughtful perspective of boiler feed water systems and their resultant effect upon locomotive horsepower and efficiency!
I really never paid much attention to boiler feed systems until the Gettysburg RR boiler explosion and then became a student of the Federal Government required two boiler water delivery systems. For safety reasons most steam locomotives had (1) a Live Steam Injector controlled by the engineer and the second (2) a the Feed Water Heater system controlled by the fireman. This (2) feed water system had the advantage of supplying hot water into the boiler increasing the overall efficiency of the locomotive.
The breakdown of either of these water feed systems which were a "back up" for eachother prevented the dreaded "low water" over firebox, and resultant deadly "low water boiler explosion." Failure of both systems at the same time was preparation for disaster as in the June 16th, 1995 Gettysburg incident. The deaths of the engineer and fireman were thankfully overted because of the unique Canadian firebox design.
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As to C&O 614, I never paid much attention that there was a third type of hot water supply system to the standard "closed" and "open" feed systems - the Exhaust Steam Injector such as the Hancock TA-1 used by LIMA on the C&O 614 build. Also the way it played into the engine design - a lighter weight locomotive.
Previous posts show that the locomotive designers at LIMA and the 1948 C&O steam engineering situation of the Robert Young dieselization era were up against different political parameter governing the effective use of the steam locomotive - not power performance per se but low cost compared to diesel-electric usage.
Seems odd that C&O or LIMA for all this steam technology would leave the exhaust nozzle development completely out of the picture when N&W, NYC, PENNSYLVANIA and AT&SF were so completely absorbed in it?
Further, the poor condition that C&O 614 had been allowed reach prior to the Wardale testing - to the point of substancial firebox leakage, and the removal of the efficient Exhaust Steam Injector replaced apparently with another "cold" Nathan Live Steam Injector just to meet legal requirements. Was not locomotive efficiency and performance a concern here for the Wardale's tests?
Further, is the eventural waste of fantastic passenger locomotive designs. Why build a poppet valve series of gigantic "Hudsons" like C&O 300's in 1948 and use them for only 6 years? Why build the fantastic "Northern" class of 1946 C&O 600's and use them only for 8 years? Why go to all the trouble to rebuild the "President Class Pacifics" into modern streamline "poppet valve," "roller bearing" equipped "Yellow belly" Hudson 4-6-4's and never use the on the trains they were designed for?
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Oh yes I almost forgot! Enter Wall Street Industrailist Robert R Young who suddenly took over the running of the Chesapeake & Ohio RR after WWII!
Born in 1897 in Texas during the Spanish American War, Young attended Culver Military Acadamy in Culver, Indiana graduating as head of the class in 1914. He attended the University of Virginia but did not graduate. In 1916 he took a job in New Jersey at the Dupont Gunpowder plant as a "powder-cutter." He married the sister of famous Western American painter Georgia O'Keeffe, and by 1920 he was working in the Treasurers Office of Dupont. After a couple of years speculating in securities he went to General Motors and by 1928 was the Assistant Treasurer of GM.
Young predicted the 1929 stockmarket crash and made a fortune selling short. In 1931 he formed a brokerage firm and bought a seat on the New York Stock Exchange. He owned a controling interest in Alleghany Corporation a railroad holding company formerly owned by the Van Sweringen family which controled the Cheasapeake & Ohio and Pere Marquette Railroads.
R.R. Young, known also as "Railroad Young" the "Populist of Wall Street" aka "The Darring Young Man of Wall Street." Became a crusader against the missmanagment of railroads by banking interests and challenged the old methods of financing and operating railroads. So he became Chairman Of The Board at C&O intent on launching a much publicized campaign of modernization with forward thinking advances in technology such as diesel powered light weight passenger trains, and the diversification of freight railroad operations, and large scale computorization.
In 1947 he merged C&O with Pere Marquette and created a research and development department to impliment these futuristic ideas of railroad freight and passenger service. Fortune Magazine said it, "Robert Young has an almost endless inventory of ideas, some pneumatic and some substancial, about passenger service. He believes railroads could double any previous passenger revenues if they put out a good product and merchandized it well..."
In June 1954 Young completed a hostile takeover of New York Central Railroad spending $1,300,700 in the newly developing take over art of "proxy fighting" with the Vanderbilt heirs giving up control of the railroad. (TV news broadcaster on CNN - Anderson Cooper is the last of the Vanderbilts) Young became Chairman Of The Board and selected Alfred E. Perlman as President. The Central carried a substancial tax burden from communities that saw rail infrastructure as a source of property tax revenue. Also, President Eisenhower with the help of Congress passed the Federal-Aid to Highway Act of 1956 - the Interstate Freeway System - giving free non-taxed road service to the trucking industry which put New York Central in worse shape than Young imagined. Central was also saddled with a 15% tax on passenger fares.
Young's efforts to accomplish on the Central what he had done on the C&O failed an eventually the Central stock prices fell in January 1958 in which Young lost and in the midst of depression blew his brains out with a shotgun.
Young was finally caught up in the change he helped instigate. The Penn Central debacle was to follow with the pending financial collapse of the nation.
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What was going on with C&O steam locmotive operations had much to do with, and was only a "drop in the bucket" of what change was going to happen in 1940/50's politically charged America.
Doc
DreyfusshudsonI read somewhere, possibly on this forum, that what clinched the ESI deal for the C&O J3as was that the ESI salesman furnished the C&O men with some very nice ham joints. No idea if this is true, but I like it.
BigJim Oh contraire. Again this is a myth that needs to have been stopped a long time ago. For all intents and purposes 100% of the heat from live steam used to make an injector work was transmitted to the feedwater. Cold water most definately does not enter the boiler from the injector!
A proper feedwater heating system is both an energy-saving and a water-saving appliance. Extracting energy from the exhaust steam reduces the amount of energy that needs to be supplied by burning coal. Maybe not a whole lot, but figures of 8-10percent savings are bandied about.
Extracting energy from the exhaust steam also condenses it. You are not condensing nearly all cylinder exhaust as with a condensing locomotive but you are condensing also 8-10 percent, supplying water savings that go along with the fuel savings.
A live steam injector uses steam that you had to burn coal to raise. You are also tapping steam from the boiler before it has run through the cylinders. The exhaust steam injector saves some water and some coal over a live steam injector -- otherwise why bother? A proper pump and feedwater heating system, especially a "closed" or "shell" type system will have even more.
If GM "killed the electric car", what am I doing standing next to an EV-1, a half a block from the WSOR tracks?
Paul MilenkovicFeeling was, that these last 5 of the J3-a "Greenbrier" 4-8-4 ran better without the standard Worthington SA feedwater appliance. Seems odd to me considering the reliability almost all other railroads found in the water admission and heating efficiency achieved with the Worthington SA closed system.
Paul MilenkovicMany perfectly fine locomotives had only live steam injectors and hence no heat recovery (as did 614 in the 1980's tests), but I am just making sure.
Think about it folks. Steam at 300psi has a temperature of 421 degrees F. And you are trying to tell me that combining that with the feedwater is going to equal cold water going in the boiler!
And, there will probably not be a lot difference in water temperature between the feedwater heated by injector or the feedwater heater system due to the open system and water boiling at 212 degrees F at normal atmospheric pressure and the fact that the hot water pump needs to pump water not steam. However, there could be some slight pressure involved inside the FWH that could elevate the water temp somewhat. Yet, it is still a system that is open to the atmoshere.
Keep in mind that the saving between the two systems is in the fact that when a steam injector is used, it uses boiler pressure to do so. A feedwater heater uses substanually less steam in operating its appliances.
Paul Milenkovic I know some may regard this as "rivet counting", but just to clarify, you mean supplied new with an exhaust steam injector as one of the two required boiler feed systems?
Yes, of course, but then again no one is likely to mistake the Turbo-Inspirator setup for an 'exhaust steam injector' either. The point of the system was, in theory, to reduce the weight of a feedwater heater essentially by using one 'motor' to drive the various pumps, and coordinate the sources of feedwater heat (notably including exhaust steam, but not imho to the degree a formal ESI would). Dave Klepper has noted this system was applied to the New Haven I-5 Hudsons, where it made possible the use of a larger firebox and boiler than would likely have been possible with a conventional FWH of comparable capacity. The use of the Turbo system on the PRR T1s is similarly for weight-saving rather than 'lower cost' - and it is a substantial savings both in absolute weight and in weight distribution.
The 'other' injector will almost always be a standard Nathan 4000 or something similar, mounted and operated in the usual way. Where this setup begins to give 'problems' is when the locomotive is operated at high output for a continued time. The lower peak temperature that an injector can achieve before it starts to 'break' in cavitation is far below the equilibrium temperature of the water in the boiler at operating pressure, and when a high volume of injection is required due to high steam demand, you start to risk thermal stresses in the boiler around the point the (relatively) cool feedwater is going in.
Dr D I remember seeing C&O 614/611 and C&O 1604 on the scrap line in Russel, KY in 1970 all the engines were pretty rusty and stripped of most collectable parts. Chessie changed the engine number 614 to 611 late in its life and it sat in Russel numbered C&O 611. I also remember when Ross Rowland got the "Greenbrier" and started the restoration of it. Ross and I discussed the odd lack of a Worthington S feed water heater system - but the engine had been ordered new from Lima Locomotive Works with the Hancock type TA-1 live steam injectors as a "poor man's feed water system." Feeling was, that these last 5 of the J3-a "Greenbrier" 4-8-4 ran better without the standard Worthington SA feedwater appliance. Seems odd to me considering the reliability almost all other railroads found in the water admission and heating efficiency achieved with the Worthington SA closed system.
I remember seeing C&O 614/611 and C&O 1604 on the scrap line in Russel, KY in 1970 all the engines were pretty rusty and stripped of most collectable parts. Chessie changed the engine number 614 to 611 late in its life and it sat in Russel numbered C&O 611. I also remember when Ross Rowland got the "Greenbrier" and started the restoration of it. Ross and I discussed the odd lack of a Worthington S feed water heater system - but the engine had been ordered new from Lima Locomotive Works with the Hancock type TA-1 live steam injectors as a "poor man's feed water system."
Feeling was, that these last 5 of the J3-a "Greenbrier" 4-8-4 ran better without the standard Worthington SA feedwater appliance. Seems odd to me considering the reliability almost all other railroads found in the water admission and heating efficiency achieved with the Worthington SA closed system.
I know some may regard this as "rivet counting", but just to clarify, you mean supplied new with an exhaust steam injector as one of the two required boiler feed systems? The exhaust steam injector is regarded as the "poor man's feedwater heater" on account of providing some heat recovery from the exhaust steam. Many perfectly fine locomotives had only live steam injectors and hence no heat recovery (as did 614 in the 1980's tests), but I am just making sure.
Paul,
In enjoyed your insights into the career of C&O 614.
Feeling was, that these last 5 of the J3-a "Greenbrier" 4-8-4 ran better without the standard Worthington SA feedwater appliance. Seems odd to me considering the reliability almost all other railroads found in the water admission and heating efficiency achieved with the Worthington SA open system.
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C&O 614 and its 5 sisters were built in 1948 and retired in 1956. I am sure that engineering development work on them halted much earlier - a mere 8 year lifespan wasn't very much time to sort out various engineering details for one of the most advanced passenger engines that Chessie ever owned.
Admitedly, the other C&O 600's - 5 of them, were designed in 1935 and an additional 2 more were built in 1942 - these 7 engines gave operational experience to Chessie so that the design studies really encompassed over 20 years of development. These engines did vary somewhat from eachother - the first C&O 600-604 engines had plain bearings throughout and also firebox thermic syphons and arch tubes, along with the aforementioned Worthington SA feed water heater systems.
The second set of 2 additional engines were C&O 605-606 built at the beginning of World War II in 1942. These were 47 ton heavier locomotives by weight owing to military needs of all the alloy steels which resulted in heavier steel construction. These two heavyweight "Greenbrier" had different boiler tube designs consisting of an additional three boiler flues with included more superheater tube units. The 1942 engines also featured "roller bearing" equipped leading and trailing trucks.
The third series of 5 engines were C&O 607-614 and were all built in 1948 - late in the steam game, and were completely equipped with "roller bearing" side rods and main bearings, as well as roller sets on almost every other operational bearing point possible. Firebox design was changed eliminating the thermic syphons and arch tubes and using instead four "security circulators." Grate area remained at 100 sq ft, but the firebox heating area was reduced by 38 sq ft. Evaporative heating surface was also reduced about 600 sq ft., and superheating surface was also reduced by 300 sq ft. The combined heating surface was then reduced by 700 sq ft. The result was a reduction of heating surface to cylinder volume from 254.36 to 233.76. These engines also differed from their predecessors in the use of ¨nickel steel alloy" for most all engine components. These last 5 locomotives also differed from the previous 7 engines - as mentioned - in the use of the Hancock live steam injectors for boiler feed water control and heating in place of the Worthington SA systems.
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Advanced Steam Locomotive Exhaust Development - At the time C&O was finishing up its steam locomotive design and operation, they did see fit to build 1 switch engine with the "Giesl" advanced locomotive exhaust nozzle/stack. If I remember the Trains Magazine article, the smokestack was an oval funnel shape. Significant efficiency in the reduction of "exhaust back pressure" was reported by C&O, but the time for new steam designs had passed, and the steam game was over by then.
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Also of note regarding future locomotive design, was the wonderful high efficiency poppet valve C&O 310-314 series of "Hudson" 4-6-4 passenger locomotives built in 1948 by Baldwin. Larger and more powerful than the famous New York Central J3 "Hudson," these Chessie "Hudson" engines were equipped with the elephant ear smoke deflectors similar to the New York Central's fast Niagara 4-8-4s. These "Hudson's" were Chessie's LAST steam passenger power built, and were reported as wonderful engines - short lived and much more deserving of preservation than the lowly "home made" C&O 490 "Hudson/Pacific" yellow belly streamliner that was somehow unfortunately preserved at the B&O Railroad Museum today.
C&O - The folks that gave us the modern mighty C&O 1600's "Allegheny" 2-6-6-6 and also gave us the modern C&O 607-614 "Greenbrier" 4-8-4's, and also the fast running modern C&O 310-314 "Hudson" 4-6-4's. Seems odd to me that C&O steamers are hardly as appreciated as those of the Norfolk And Western, Pennsylvaina and New York Central.
We have only these two might C&O 1602 and 1604 and the sole remaining C&O 614 to remember such a famous and advanced high technology steam fleet.
Anyway, I am curious as to what the computer model will turn up for the 614's test with a coal drag on the Russell-Hinton line of the C&O.
In light of what Wardale wrote, I am curious as to where on the "performance envelope" of speed vs tractive effort vs evaporation vs coal consumption they were operating, it seems that Wardale or Porta didn't dig too deeply into this apart from blaming the exhaust system. If they were lugging that locomotive this badly, would a lower-restriction exhaust made much a difference? Chapelon certainly took a broader-picture approach with his 160-A1.
Dreyfusshudson I haven’t really studied the test results on C&O 614 in Wardale’s book, because the data is a bit sketchy, and the locomotive was, as you observe, in rundown condition. However, looking at it again, it raises some interesting points, most particularly his strictures about how restricted the exhaust of 614 was. Elsewhere he states Porta’s view that US exhausts ‘could not have been worse’; I researched this point fully, and concluded that whilst under extreme tests conditions, such as the 6600IHP tests of the Niagara and T1, back pressures were truly abysmal, if you looked at the steam rates used in practice they were acceptable, this a view gleaned from analyses of NYC, MILW, UP and ATSF running. I believe it to be generally true. It may have been possible to gain a fractional increase in efficiency on some designs from even lower back pressure, but nothing of a game changing nature. However, 614 is a possible exception, and this is maybe what coloured Porta’s view. Wardale quotes back pressures in the range 14 to 28 psi, and with a free nozzle area of the size and discharge coefficient he quotes, this would correspond to blastpipe flows of 52000 lbs/hr and 74000lbs/hr at 70 mph, approximately 3400 and 4100IHP respectively, not a lot from so large a grate. As tested, 614 was fitted with live steam injectors, so this will have been the cylinder rate. Since the loco was in run down condition, the evaporation needed may have been significantly higher than this. He makes a stab at the maximum IHP as being 3600, but this will have been at lower speed, and at 30 mph I make the power at 28 psi back pressure about 3800, in line with this. Thinking about it, I suspect that even with 11 heavyweight coaches on the George Washington climbing eastwards towards Hinton, a J3 would not have needed much more than 3000ihp given the limited speed possible, and with 10% recycle thanks to a feedwater heater, this would have meant that under its normal hard working conditions, the back pressure was ok, in other words, there was nothing wrong with the design for its intended purpose. It may well be however that what was good enough in terms of steam rate for the George Washington was not good enough for 5000 tons of coal, so the back pressure weakness was exposed. I will need to ‘build’ a J3a and the line from Huntington to Hinton to test these ideas out fully. I will report back in due time on what emerges.
Wardale reports everything in metric units, but here goes. I don't have The Red Devil in front of me, so these are approximate figures.
I am going with Wardale's "best figures" for the 614, which are from a composite of runs where they had the booster still working and the boiler had not yet sprung so many leaks into the fire space, which burns a lot of coal evaporating that water to no effect on tractive effort.
We are talking about 4500 trailing (metric) tons, average speed of 45 km/hr, and a fuel consumption (of a high quality coal) of about .035 kg/hr/ton-km. As there are 2.2 lbs in a kilogram (kg), this amounts to 4500X45X.035X2.2 = 15,600 lbs coal/hour (about 7.8 short tons/hour).
As to the horsepower, you give a value of about 3000 hp that such a locomotive can develop at 45 km/hr (28 MPH). The figure of 3000 hp sounds reasonable to me. Contemporaneous with the test of 614 in coal service on the Russell-Hinton line, the C&O was dragging something like 14,000 trailing tons with a pair of SD-50 Diesels (what are they, 3600 hp each at the alternator shaft?) at a somewhat lower average speed (30 km/hr average or about 19 MPH). Porta rode those Diesels and reported to Wardale that they were operated in Run 8 (full rated HP) for more than 60 percent of the time.
So we are talking 15,600/3000 or 5.2 lbs coal/hp-hr. That is about 11 times the energy consumption (in BTU's -- coal 14,000 btu/lb, Diesel 20,000 btu/lb) of those 3rd generation Diesels (.33 lb/hp-hr?). 5.2 lbs coal/hp-hr seems high compare to the 3 lbs/hp-hr I had read for the H-8 Alleghenies in similar service.
The general figure bandied about is that steam required 6 times the BTUs of (first generation) Diesels, "Chapelonized" steam maybe 3 times the BTUs. That the 614 (in its best condition) required at least 11 times the BTUs of the Diesels according to Wardale was met by disbelief by Rowland and others and suggested a high hurdle to be met for an improved steam locomotive (the ACE 3000), even if coal was cheap and Diesel oil was very expensive. Wardale seems very discouraged about the prospects for an improved steam locomotive at this point given that the 614 test was reinforcing notions regarding why Diesels superceded steam in the first place.
So OK, the 614 had its feedwater heater removed (what I read, in contradiction of Wardale, is that this batch of the C&O J3's had exhaust steam injectors, and 614's was replaced with a live steam injector because the exhaust steam injector never worked properly rather than it being removed as a maintenance shortcut), and it had what Porta called a criminally poor exhaust system.
But stop and think about all of that. 3000 hp at 28 mph works out to 3000X375/28 or about 40,000 lbs tractive effort in relation to 60,000 lbs starting tractive effort (reverser "in the corner" but without the booster).
What does 40,000 lbs tractive effort come out to in cutoff? Wardale talks about 614 being at about 35% cutoff for much of a "big climb" apart from a ruling grade. Max economy with Walschaerts gear is maybe at 25%, but 35% is usually "high power with OK economy"? Do you get 40,000 lbs with 35% cutoff?
I am thinking that apart from the boiler leaks and the loss of the booster and the high-restriction exhaust system, the ACE crew was working 614 pretty darned hard for most of the eastward-against-grades-with-loads segment, probably well outside its "economy band." The thing with Diesels is that you can underpower a train and lug in Run 8 at barely the minimum continuous speed (MCS -- Porta told Wardale that this appeared to be the operating policy of the C&O and they didn't care if crews damaged the odd traction motor provided they didn't stall out) and be running a peak economy.
If we are talking about drag service, operating near maximum tractive effort for hours on end is not the way to achieve economy with a steam locomotive. It may look "cool" to steam enthusiasts to see that locomotive heroically "working hard" and sending a tall plume of vapor, smoke, and carbon carryover into the air, but the Wall Street Journal picked up on this right away as a reason that steam is obsolete. That "test" of the 614 may have as much as anything else finally closed the chapter on steam as a viable propulsion source for mainline railroading, and Wardale sensed as much.
Sure, you could have squeezed a bit more lugging economy out of 614 by a boiler in better repair, a working feedwater heater, and a less choking exhaust nozzle. But would that have made enough a difference to consider steam for drag service in the early 1980's when oil because expensive and people did not see any relief in sight?
Wardale says as much that the 614 test was more about publicity rather than serious work on the ACE 3000, but what kind of publicity? The 614 test appeared to be a "photo freight" run to appeal to railfan sensibilities, but "what was (Ross Rowland) thinking" in terms of making a statement about the practicallity of bringing steam back to counter expensive oil?
Did anyone think at all about what speeds and cutoffs a single-expansion steam locomotive would use with what trailing tonnage and where the "sweet spot" was? Wardale suggests that didn't matter because the 614 had better economy when the booster was working than with the reduced tonnage when the booster was out (that was only used on a short ruling-grade segment), but the locomotive condition had deteriorated at the time the booster went out.
The real answer to drag service was Chapelon's compound expansion 160-A1 with 6 (!) cylinders to get enough capacity to not be operating "in the quadrant" all the time, and with low pressure steam circuit reheat and cylinder steam jackets so all those big cylinders won't sap power from condensation losses.
But did anyone on the ACE team, including Porta and Wardale, really look into what is needed for an effective drag-service locomotive (a N&W Y-6b compound Mallet!)?
DreyfusshudsonI don’t agree with you calculations as to what would happen on a 2% grade. If the train hit a 2% upgrade travelling at 40.4mph...
There's no question about that-- the only question is, does your table take that effect into account. Looks like it doesn't; if it doesn't, it should.
To T
MZ
Jeffries book is available at our National Railway Museum, but I need to go there to access it. I intend to go there again next month, but I’ve been saying that for the last two years!
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