I was wondering what the mechanism is that will cause an alco engine to shut down if it suffers a crank case explosion, i know with emd engines they have the engine protector and the crank case button will pop out which drops the governor oil level causing the governor to have a low oil shut down but i am not sure of the engine protector system on alco engines
According to the Alco mnual for the C430/630's which I used as a guide. There is a Low Lube Oil Light on the control stand. If that comes on the engineer can throw the engien nd fuel pump start switch which would shut down the engine.
In the RS-2, RS-3 era when lube oil pressure dropped below 20 psi and throttle in 5-8th notch unit would drop to idle with alarm light and bell. If operating in 2-4th notch the unit would keep working, but with with alarms. The Alco isolation switch could be set so unit would not go beyond 2nd, 4th, or 6th notch. If lube oil pressure dropped below 7 psi unit would shut down.
Alco had a crankcase exhauster system that kept gases/pressure to acceptable levels. If the crankcase exhauster indicator light went out unit was supposed to be shut down (after one replaced light bulb and checked circuit breaker). I guess the theory was that after the crankcase explosion took place lube oil pressure would be below 7 psi and unit would shut down. In actual practice they would sometimes keep running and working.
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