North Yorkshire Moors Railway General Discussion

But, what really matters is how many passengers its use prevent from walking away - unfortunately, a metric that is very hard to measure.....

 

Grosmont coaling tower was largely built in house under the direction of Peter Smeaton. It is a valuable piece of kit; locos can receive several tons of coal in less than a minute, whereas coaling a tender with a bucket loader is a time consuming job. It comes into its own with tank locos that have to come on shed for a top up during the day as it has a minimal effect on the T/T. Although operation of the tower is usually done by the duty fitter, if needs be the crew can do the job.

 

The tender as converted to carry oil.
There isn't much available data for cold pressed oil consumption, however comparable oil data and the bulk cp rapeseed prices suggest a cost per mile considerably more than your quoted figure, as I understand it future resilience and summer use are the justification rather than pure cost per mile. Standard heavy fuel is cheaper.
NYMR conundrum as ever.

 

In general it seems undesirable to use any kind of oil as fuel that could be used as food. Used cooking oil is another matter. Even if you are going to use fresh rapeseed oil, why cold pressed?

 

Basic thermodynamics. Whilst heat transfer in the boiler is reasonably efficient the open steam cycle used in a locomotive is horribly inefficient. A diesel engine has an efficiency in the order of 30% to 40% then there are transmission losses. A steam locomotive is lucky to make 4% on a good day. In simple terms 96% of the heat generated from the fuel goes straight up the chimney. Oil was burned in steam locos where it could be obtained cheaply. The Festiniog burned old motor oil. Environmental regulations no longer allow this. The NYMR is burning oil so steam can be run in hot, dry weather without burning down the National Park. The cost differentials and benefits will have been number-crunched before the job started but the reality will not be apparent until running data is available. Perhaps a paper will be read to the Institute of Locomotive Engineers on the subject. ( Are they still in being?)

 

From the Science Museum website:

 

Using diesel may cost, idk, £500 more per day but if the result is a guaranteed steam journey with 2253, the trip it will pay for itself. Using a class 37 could put off 50 to 100 or more people a day.