March 7th Steam's up!

[xoxoxoBruce]

The reality is our jobs are on the line, in this day and age efficiency is the only was to get the
shareholders off our ass. Our four field agents are using antiquated methods, and the Chinese have
offered to increase productivity 400% over our horseman. We've got to upgrade without losing the
ability to terrify, or we'll all be selling pencils on the corner.

Here's our new shtick...

...................

[xoxoxoBruce]

Here's one just sitting around waiting for a kind soul to bring a hot cup of coal and a blankie.
To take pity and adopt the forlorn engine. It may however, be a little complicated bringing it home from Hungary.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Water shmater, Aussies don't care.

[glatt]

Awesome picture. And impressive capture of the action. So many times, in old pictures, the film technology wasn't there yet to have a fast enough shutter speed to freeze the action. I'd expect this to be all blurry, but it's pretty crisp. Good stuff.

[Lamplighter]

Another squirrel, hunter and tree question ...

Would high water getting into the locomotive's workings
increase or decrease the efficiency of the steam engine ?

[glatt]

I don't see how it could increase efficiency.

[Gravdigr]

Water that high would cool the boiler, no?

I don't know a lot about steam tech, but, I wouldn't think you'd want a cool boiler.

[Sundae]

Aussies don't care because everything in Australia wants to kill you.
Why not take going out on a train journey when a trip to the dunny is fraught with peril?

[Lamplighter]

Think "separate condenser"

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by Gravdigr

Water that high would cool the boiler, no?

I don't know a lot about steam tech, but, I wouldn't think you'd want a cool boiler.

The water is up to the bottom part of the boiler which is where the firebox is located. The steam tubes are above that, and I don't think the water would have much effect on the boiler because by the looks of that bow wave I doubt they plan on spending a whole lot of time in it. I'd be more concerned about the cylinders with their valving and driving rods that turn the wheels. That stuff is what does the work where the rubber meets the road uh... steam power meets the rails, and it's all submerged. Once they save the village, get the medicine to the orphanage, and drive the vandals from fair dinkum shores, the locomotive will need some serious maintenance.

But I could be wrong.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Big MoFo...

[xoxoxoBruce]

We see all these pictures and stories, both historical(or at least old-timey) and contemporary, of the mighty locomotives overcoming adversity.
I t h I n k I c a n... I think I can... IthinkIcan. But sometimes it can't, like Johnstown, PA, in 1889.

[xoxoxoBruce]

This 1927 exhibit near Baltimore, by the B&O railroad, looks more like something from Rube Goldberg or Doctor Seuss.



Really, it has to be a joke who would want to ride very fast, or very far, on that contraption?



Well it is real, and they didn't travel either fast or far. The locomotive is an 1892 replica of the 1832 Atlantic, 0-4-0, nicknamed Grasshopper.

Wiki says...

Built at a cost of $4,500, the Atlantic weighed 6.5 tons and had two vertical cylinders. It was commissioned after Davis' entry had won the competition for a steam locomotive design, but the contract was awarded to the inventor of the Tom Thumb; when the five locomotives commissioned failed the contracted delivery, B&O bought out the patents. A few of these were incorporated in the Atlantic by Davis, whether by specification or because Davis wanted them is unclear. The locomotives he delivered before his death in 1835 were the first commercially feasible, sufficiently efficient coal burning steam locomotives produced domestically in the United States and placed into traction service.

B&O built 20 of these engines after the prototype traveled 40 miles, with 50 psi boiler pressure, on one ton of coal. I didn't see a speed, but with 63 hp (47 kW) it couldn't have been that fast, even in relatively flat MD.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Ran across another picture of the Queen's soot belching monsters.

[Carruthers]

A few days ago I bought a second hand copy of the book 'Terence Cuneo, Railway Painter of the Century'. It includes a large number of his best paintings.

I was especially impressed by this work.

The Mightiest of the Mighty

A Union Pacific ‘Big Boy’ takes on coal and water at Harriman, Wyoming, before tackling the heavy grades of Sherman Hill.

Introduced in 1941, these 4-8-8-4, 594 ton locomotives were the largest ever built and were the equivalent of four conventional engines.

New track had to be laid to cope with their great weight and new turntables for their length.

In all, 201 were built of which six remain today. (1990)

Union Pacific Big Boy

Wiki suggests that 25 of the locos were built and not the 201 quoted in the book.

Terence Cuneo