Check out this video. Big Boy 4014 going seriously fast! Very good video.
https://www.trackforum.org/forum/community/jamski-s-off-topic-explodables-tenderloins/6814297-union-pacific-big-boy-4014
Still in training.
Man, that thing can move!
Say, I've got a question I'm sure someone can answer. In the first few minutes of the video during the running broadside shot of the left side of the locomotive there's a vertical pipe (behind the first set of drivers) with a fair amount of water coming out of it. Anyone know what that's about? Injector overflow perhaps?
I took it to be continuous blowdown.
Overmod I took it to be continuous blowdown.
Thanks! But wouldn't that be a waste of water? By the way, I'm assuming the UP steam team knows what they're doing, but it does strike me as a bit curious.
It's amazing how stable those tracking shots are! Beats the heck out of my old VHS camcorder I chased with back in the 90's!
Same me, different spelling!
This is not perfect but I counted 80 revolutions of the drivers in 20 seconds, so that is 240 revolutions per minute.
68-inch diameter drivers travel about 213.7 inches in one revolution, so multiply by 240 revolutions per minute is a total of 51,288 inches per minute, or 4,274 feet per minute.
4,274 feet per minute divided by 5,280 feet is .81 miles per minute.
.81 miles per minute times 60 minutes per hour is 48.6 miles per hour.
If track speed for freight on that stretch of track is 50 mph, then 4014 would have basically been doing track speed.
Again, not a perfect measurement but maybe, possibly, in the ballpark.
Not bad for the Big Fella!
That's the only video I've seen where it's going anywhere near that fast. Very cool to see.
Listening to 4014 start up the drivers not being syncronized gave a very distinct 8 beat rhythm. Makes one wonder which type running would cause less wear on loco and track work ? sync or not ?
Due to wheel slippage, I presume synced drivers on an articulated would be a roundhouse foreman's worst nightmare.
blue streak 1 Listening to 4014 start up the drivers not being syncronized gave a very distinct 8 beat rhythm. Makes one wonder which type running would cause less wear on loco and track work ? sync or not ?
It was preferred for the driver sets to be out of sync with each other, it made for smoother running, but it wasn't unusual for drivers on articulateds to go in and out of sync at speed. Usually it wasn't a big deal, the in-sync usually was over with quickly.
Slippage on the front set of drivers could be a problem if the locomotive wasn't handled correctly. Steve Lee once said a slow, steady start with an articulated (In his case Challenger 3985) was the way to go. A fast start would cause the boiler water to surge toward the rear reducing weight on the front drivers and causing a slip. As long as you didn't "floor it" you were fine.
The situation is different for compound articulateds than for simples. There are discussions of the various things that tend to make 'true Mallets' tend to synchronize on the Web, including those that mention that the absence of audible HP exhaust may make discrimination of small angular position difference between two engines near a torque synchronization less evident.
The case of the N&W A, which is the real first high-speed simple articulated, has passed partly into folklore of one kind or another courtesy of Ed King's stories about the 'double licks' that have become as established in railfan 'common knowledge' as the utter intractability of slipping in PRR T1s. Certainly there seem to be few large articulateds with as typically clean and sharp identifiable exhaust beats, so a review even of existing audio clips (from Link on forward) should establish some baseline on how frequently and perhaps protractedly these locomotives got into step or back out again. Here too there is some natural proclivity for slip recovery to stabilize with the engines in or close to sync, but I have no organized data to indicate how operative that was.
There are a couple of answers about where you'd want the engines phased for operation. For lack of augment you'd want the closest possible to a Withuhn conjugated duplex with no conjugating rods (which would involve proper 'antiphased' layout of the two engines); for evenness of torque and lower slip propensity you'd want an analogue to 135-degree antiphase where you got the eight overlapping torque pulses in the distance corresponding to one driver revolution, and 'ate' the corresponding reciprocating-balance augment with the typical methods of lightening the reciprocating components of rod and gear mass.
The December 2021 issue of Car & Driver magazine has a decent article about railfaning the 4014 trip between Denver and Cheyenne using an all electric Audi e-Tron, along with the trials and travails of finding juice for charging. Power of the past vs. Power of the future.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
The time was approx November 5th to 7th in 1992: UP #3985 had made the turn to the East at Walnut Ridge(AR) on its trip to pull The 'Clinchfield's' Christmas Train in East Tennessee. I followed about 30 min. as it pulled away from those of us who were trying to follow on the highway. The above video made that whle day return in fond memories.
WEW caught up with hee again, as she moved onto Railroad Ave and the Memphis Central Station lead track. Watched the youngf guy who was the pilot engineer climb off of #3985....It was going to take about a year to wipe that grin off his face; and the soot off his face! She thenwent to overnight at Sergent Yd(nee;MoPac RR). The next morning she started to move out towards the CSX's Leawood Yd (nee: L&N Yd ). Apparently, The crew had found a problem; They stopped by the old NC&StL station near Cooper and Central. The problem was in the smokebox- a small cast fitting (a part of the forced air drafting in the floor of the smokebox had broken(?). It was going to have to bve replaced, so the front ofthe smokebox had to be opened and allowed to cool down. They were just West of the LAST switch on UPRR territory in Tenn. So we got to witness 3985 switchng out its train and moving up the Steam Generator Car for the re-start of 3985 the next morning, refilled the Water Tenders, and just watched the 'show'. Since the location was at the end of UPRR and start of CSX tracks; the movements were 'controlled' by a CSX employee in radio contact with Jacksonville(?) Dispatch. Whikle that was happening, Jax Dispatch asked the CSX employee if had eyes and 'supervision' for the moves of 3985. His answer was in the 'AFFIRMATIVE'..
I looked around, and the body of spectators seemed to be between 50 and 75 individuals. (I recognized the Div Superintendent from the ICRR, and several other management types from Frisco's Tennessee Yd; Pick-ups from IC,Frisco, CSX, and some other companies in the area. Those 'movements' were definitely covered! It was an interesting day, and when she was 'buttoned back up' 3985 was moved out to overnight at Leewood Yard and moved out towards CSX's destinations, and her date to be renumbered as Clinchfield #676.
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