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Heritage Line Loco Power Requirements

Discussion in 'Steam Traction' started by johnofwessex, Jul 21, 2017.

  1. Pete Thornhill

    Pete Thornhill Resident of Nat Pres Staff Member Administrator Moderator Friend

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    She's done 151,806 miles in preservation actually and is the SVR's highest mileage engine.
     
  2. Steve

    Steve Resident of Nat Pres Friend

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    Some trains will load up to 400 passengers so, assuming a British Standard person of 12 stone, that's about 30 tons or virtually another coach.
    You can reckon on 2,500 gallons for a round trip Grosmont-Pickering burt this super fireless won't need a tender so perhaps a bit less. Extending to Whitby will add another 500 gallons. Eight coupled wheels is OK between Grosmont & Pickering but will find it hard going to Whitby. Most locos require steam on to get them round the curves going downhill.
    A 7 coach train needs an IHP of about 900-950 to get it up to Goathland at 17 mph, depending on the loco.
     
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  3. Hermod

    Hermod Member

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    Bang went my plan to run steam battery trains all the way.
    Somehow a shame because Whitby looks like a town that could go green and object to diesel and coalburning.
    Nobody knows what range a fireles 60 tons with coalfired superheat can do so I will dream on .Locomotive change in Grosmont and some form of electric battery locomotive
    from here to Whitby and back.
     
    Last edited: Aug 8, 2017
  4. LMS2968

    LMS2968 Part of the furniture

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    Ta!

    I'm only the Society's Archivist. I suppose I should know this sort of thing!
     
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  5. Matt37401

    Matt37401 Nat Pres stalwart

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    No wonder it needs new tyres then!
     
  6. flying scotsman123

    flying scotsman123 Resident of Nat Pres

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    Oi shush, I'm holidaying up there in a couple of weeks, don't go spoiling things!

    Sent from my Moto G (4) using Tapatalk
     
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  7. Jamessquared

    Jamessquared Nat Pres stalwart

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    Never mind that, we might be dropping by next week - if you can keep the fleet running until then it would be appreciated!

    Tom
     
  8. Jamessquared

    Jamessquared Nat Pres stalwart

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    Nah, that's the sort of thing the chief engineer should know. You passed your Archivist test when you were able to state that she had been re-tyred at a heavy general in 1966 ...

    Tom
     
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  9. Hermod

    Hermod Member

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    Grosmont Pickering single trip is 1250 imp gall or 5.5 tons.So my estimated 5 tons was not a mile of.
    On the other hand I had forgotten UK rail braking being vacuum.Train heating can de done by exhaust steam as there is no need for great suction.
    A Beyer garrat looking thing with short 6 coupled ends?

    Two of these made not very many years ago in Meiningen?
    http://www.bahnbilder.de/1200/die-flc-077-dampflokfreunde-macht-1013335.jpg
    http://www.lokhersteller.de/lokbau/typen/typen_meiningen.htm

    Camoflaged as a Bulleid Leader?
     
    Last edited: Aug 8, 2017
  10. Steve

    Steve Resident of Nat Pres Friend

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    Will you be visiting?
    It's not yet 100% certain that the Schools will be running. You might be a bit premature! 'Twas pulling a dieselly thing around today, though.
     
  11. flying scotsman123

    flying scotsman123 Resident of Nat Pres

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    I wouldn't be worried if I wasn't - hopefully I will be visiting! :)

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  12. Jamessquared

    Jamessquared Nat Pres stalwart

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    We went behind Repton on a visit about 8 or 9 years ago, so if I miss it its not the end of the world. Whereas actually I'd quite like to see one of those fabled North Eastern locos I hear such wonderful things about - any chance of that? ;) (Just checked the website - looks like not).

    Tom
     
  13. pmh_74

    pmh_74 Well-Known Member

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    Hermod,
    Your idea is interesting; I don't pretend to completely understand the concept (in part because I can't really be bothered to figure it out) but fundamentally I wonder what problem you are trying to solve? The NYMR and other steam railways exist because people want to preserve old steam trains, not so much build new ones, and when they do want to build new ones it's to old designs out of a sense of nostalgia for something which used to exist but has gone. If you're going to go down the road of designing a new build machine then it's utterly pointless to do so on the basis of replacing an old machine on a heritage railway, because nobody wants to do that. It's not the same as say a Swiss rack railway where the punters primarily want to get to the top of the hill (and indeed on the one similar British railway, Snowdon, a good many folks are happy to do so with a fairly modern purpose built diesel on the front, because the loco is not their primary concern). On the vast majority of heritage lines, people want heritage, which means the full-on vintage experience, and "authenticity" is key (even when it's as viewed through rose-tinted spectacles). It's also why steam-outline diesels very rarely if ever find much use outside zoos and theme parks.
    Now, if you could design a modern steam engine which had a genuine hope of finding commercial use on the main line, and I mean day-in-day-out use rather than special trips, then maybe after 20 years or more people would be interested in preserving it, but even then if it looks anything like a modern machine should look I would expect its place to be in a static museum or doing what it always did on the main line, not working on one of our heritage lines. It probably could be done, in engineering terms, but whether any commercial manufacturer would be willing to put the money into developing a working prototype is highly doubtful, even more so when you consider that the lineside infrastructure (water columns, specifically) for steam just doesn't exist any more.
    For what it's worth, I have my own hare-brained scheme for a steam-electric which boils the water when running under the wires and then has a limited range beyond the end of the electrified system. It would use modern bogies with traction motors and the steam vessel once fully charged would work on fireless principles to drive a turbine to generate electricity. This is as far as the idea has gone or is ever likely to go because life is too short and whilst it would be an interesting technical challenge to design it, even I know that it's pointless!
    And finally, why are you worrying about long rigid wheelbases anyway and not designing something on a garratt/mallet/meyer chassis?
     
  14. Dag Bonnedal

    Dag Bonnedal New Member

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    Just let me add an extremely simplified play with numbers regarding the idea of fireless locos.
    I do this from a Swedish/German perspective, but I guess that the properties of steam can't be that much different on your isles.
    Basis for time table calculations in Europe is normally a firing rate of about 100 lb of coal per hour and sq.ft. of grate area.
    The heat released by burning coal is sufficient to evaporate 10 times its weight of water at normal boiler pressure,
    but the efficiency of the boiler is in the order of 70%. Thus 1 lb of coal produces 7 lb of steam.
    A small boiler of 20 sq ft grate area thus burns about 2000 lb of coal per hour and produces 14 000 lb of steam per hour.
    When you start up a fireless loco, you start out with the pressure vessel filled to about 70% with cold water and add steam to full pressure and 100% water level.
    When the pressure is too low to do any useful work, the water level is down only to 90%, thus the pressure vessel needs to hold 10 times as much water as the steam you need.
    So, to replace the 20 sq ft grate boiler with a fireless and be able to run it on the line for one hour, you need a tank holding 14 000 lb water to be evaporated and another 126 000 lb of hot water to evaporate it.
    63 tons of water! If you are satisfied with half an hour running, then "only" 32 ton is sufficient. Still a lot of weight and hot water.
     
    Last edited: Aug 9, 2017
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  15. Hermod

    Hermod Member

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    Thank You for asking.I think that many grown ups like to play train full size but that boiles are a problem.I imagine that many not operatioable steam locomotives are stationary because a new stephenson boiler is very expensive.The tornado thing was done and repaired in Meiningen.A fireless locomotive has a big isolated pressure vessel like a gas bottle and can hold steam enoug for a 5-15 mile trip.
    Mr Giesel-Gieslingen constructed a fireless locomotive 1939 for Wiena gaswork and I have some numbers.
    A 0-D-0 of 65 tons that can make 1300 hp during 1/2 hour.
    A lot of heritage traffic can be well served thus.
    Point is that the pressure wessel is simple and much cheaper and long lived tha boilers.
    I will try to link to photo and it looks strange but with a little phantasy it will be easy to se a rotten 9f running on a steam battery where boiler was.Better than just rusting away.
    That lovely LSWR T3 can easily ply a heritage railway 10-15km long two or three times a day without skilled fireman and look very nice.

    http://i.imgur.com/a0kE4cx.jpg
     
    Last edited: Aug 9, 2017
  16. Hermod

    Hermod Member

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    You are miles of.
    I am Danish by the way.
    Mr Steve has given water consumption in post 662 that uses 5500kg from Pickering to Grosmount with 7 or eigth cars.
    My idea is decoupling steam in Grosmount and put a diesel on, that takes train to Whitby.
    Steam Locomotive is put aside for recharging in Grosmount and another steam battery locomotive takes next train over hill to Pickering where this will be changed for anorther freshly charged in Pickering.
    Three boiler expired former real steam locomotives,a diesel or two, two recharging boilers, lots of tourists with interesting things to watch, and quite some volunters that does not need to have firing licence.
    Sounds like a nice preview of heaven to me.

     
    Last edited: Aug 9, 2017
  17. oldmrheath

    oldmrheath Well-Known Member

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    I'm not sure you'd have lots of tourists and not many volunteers either to be honest....

    Jon
     
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  18. gwalkeriow

    gwalkeriow Well-Known Member

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    You could end up in the situation that there are no volunteers because your proposal is so far removed from the passion that drives the Heritage Railway movement. It is a solution for a problem that does not exist.
     
  19. Jamessquared

    Jamessquared Nat Pres stalwart

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    Have you thought about the impact on volunteers who may actually be involved precisely because there is a challenge to be mastered?

    You may just find that you swap one problem (expensive boilers) and replace it with another (large numbers of expensive paid staff, because the volunteers have all left).

    Edit: I'm a slow typist. Everyone else got there first :)

    Tom
     
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  20. Dag Bonnedal

    Dag Bonnedal New Member

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    Maybe, because normal fireless locos have very big cylinders and can operate at very low pressures.
    If you start out by rebuilding a standard loco you need a VERY big one to have big enough cylinders and carrying capacity for the huge pressure vessel.
    Thus you can probably not let the pressure drop as much, and you need far more than ten times the water just for heat accumulation.
    Steve is saying 2500 gallons of water, i.e. about 11 m3! Needing well over 100 ton for the heat accumulator. If the figure quoted is for a superheater, then it is even worse, they use less water for the work produced.
     
    Last edited: Aug 9, 2017

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