Saddest Sight in Steam Railroading Today?

As you may or may not know, last year Grand Canyon Railroad ceased its steam operations due to "Environmental" reasons. This came after they did huge amounts of work to improve the emitions and fuel rfficieny of their steam locomotives. Here is the result, their two new F40's pulling the train with steamer 29 on display. http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPi ... id=1635598 The sad part is 29 is fully capable of operation and still has somewhere between 3 and 5 years left before its flue time expires. Just sad...

How was 29 fired? Was it burning coal? wood? oil? gas? If it were burning oil or could be retrofitted to burn oil, how would it be any less environmentally friendly than an F40?

I think when they took it out of service it was actually burning biodiesel

masscoastalfan wrote:I think when they took it out of service it was actually burning biodiesel

Biodiesel pollutes more than regular diesel. I wonder by "environmental reasons" they mean local NIMBYs complaining about the engine based on the assumption that it burns coal. I fail to see how one diesel powered steam engine is less environmentally friendly than two F40s.

Sorry i wasn't clear. The company that owns the GCR claimed environmental concerns. No one was complaining about the steam engines. The 20 people layed off from the steam department said it was actually because the company didn't want to spend the money to keep the engines running. Thus two fully capable of operation steam engines are rusting away while F40's pull the trains. These engines are pretty top of the line too. Each (29 and 4960) were rebuilt completely for about 1.5 million a piece. the several more million was invested in making them environmentally friendlier and installing things like feed water pumps, lampor exhast stsems, diesel MU capability and other advancements. The railroad also fields a fleet of, i believe its 6 Alco FPA4's, whose days are apparently numbered too. If this happens and all steam and alco roster will be replaced by the new roster; 2 ex ATSF GP7u's and 3 F40's.

Since they run them with F40s on the rear end of the train anyway, they could've opened the cylinder cocks, greased the pistons, put halloween fog machines in the fireboxes, and pushed them, the public wouldn't know the difference. They could even charge to let the kids "drive" the train (with a "fireman" manning a radio, bell, and whistle piped to the brake line).

This really sucks I had planned to go out there this year and ride the train behind steam Now forget it, ride behind F-40s? I did that under Amtrak I will just go spend my money on the C&TSRR The GCRR has lost my business

Comparing burning fuel with the same heat value, the steam locomotive's fuel consumption could be as much as four to five times the fuel consumption of a diesel to do the same work. That is simply the result of the ratio of the efficiencies of the two machines, usually around 6 to 7% for the steam locomotive and 30 to 35% for the diesel. If the steam locomotive is burning a fuel with a higher heat value, like heavy oil, the difference is less. The ICS textbooks are good references for this information. Considering the fuel prices last summer, their decision is consequently not too surprising. A "green" component of the decision - the color of money.

MX

What's described in this thread is not new to me. About 10 years ago, my then fiancee and I were in Georgia and visted Stone Mountain State Park where there was a little excursion railraod. Among other activities, we boarded what we'd been led to believe was a steam train for a tour of part of the park. It turned out to be a diesel train in disguise - the steam locomotive was hitched to the front a diesel locomotive that was pulling the coaches and pushing the cold steam engine that admittedly handn't been fired in about 10 years then.

mxdata wrote:Comparing burning fuel with the same heat value, the steam locomotive's fuel consumption could be as much as four to five times the fuel consumption of a diesel to do the same work. That is simply the result of the ratio of the efficiencies of the two machines, usually around 6 to 7% for the steam locomotive and 30 to 35% for the diesel. If the steam locomotive is burning a fuel with a higher heat value, like heavy oil, the difference is less. The ICS textbooks are good references for this information. Considering the fuel prices last summer, their decision is consequently not too surprising. A "green" component of the decision - the color of money.

MX

Sorry, but that's only true for the old ones.
Only old boilers have that inferior thermal effectivity. Modern, high insulated and well designed boilers, attached to modern steam engines do a very good job, even in 'pollution'.


As you see, compared to the Diesel, to pollution isn't that problem. Usually it's more the shop service, what might bring a railroad convert to diesel.
Because the boiler inspections, boiler repairs, the rod and wheel bearings, the higher personell expenses.. All this moves many railroads convert to diesel, because less shop service, less personal expense.

In modern diesel service, the engineer comes in the morning, switches off the external power supply and starts the engine. Ready to roll out of the shed!
Now think what to do with a steam engine: You have to get the fireman early out of bed, just to heat the boiler up in serve, and even if you have shop firemann or a shed fireman, you have the engine at night with one man more in service. And it takes hours longer to get in Service, because after fireman the engineer comes and together now the grease and lubricating service has to be done, checking rods and bearings...
And now you are ready to go out of the shed.
So an old steam engine need plenty of hands and plenty of time to be and kept into service.. that's what makes the diesel important. The pollution, well, that's only something the railroad officials tell the public, to explain why the steamers had to be retiered...
Often old steam locomotives, burning oil, do not consume that much more fuel, than diesels...
But, if you run the oil burners, like to see very often, in position to get some 'show', what means big amounts of black smoke coming out of the chimney, no wonder that fuel consumtion is much higher.. because black smoke means: Much unburned fuel will be blown out of the chimeny.
And most firemans asked to theat point, find it okay to smoke the hell out of the engine...
But with a well adjusted oil burner, the engine generates well steam and one will not see any black smoke, only a slight grey fog out of the chimney, as the burner is adjusted to higher volumes.... So smoking a a sign of a not very well experienced or instructed fireman (that' not an attack to any fireman here, it's onlywhat my teachers told me).
So today electronics keep the lambda factor above zero in exhaust, because that's what prevents smoking in modern boiler constructions and controls.
In old boilers the fireman has to be the lambda detector, by watching the chimney. So a well instructed fireman was able to see at the exhaust from the chimney, how the fire and boiler was operating.
I know fireman, wo see on the coal fire how the boiler is and how much power you can get with that... also at the color of the exhaust from the chimney the fireman sees, how the fuel is used or burned...
Well, so in many videos on you tube: Watch the color out from the chimney and see where all the more fuel consumption has gone through... unburned with the exhaust out in the air. And what reason?
Simply for the public, to "do the show"... and now everybody cries why another steamer is retiered... Because we as fireman did also out part to ruin the steamer in service, because we blew out the fuel through the chimney, regardless of pollution and over consumption. We like the show, we do the show and find this necessarily for our "job"... but hard calculated, we increase costs, so what we do is: Sawing off the limp at the tree we sitting on.
We eliminate our beloved loco and eliminate our job as fireman with this operation, as we "do the show"

So a modern steam engine, comes like a diesel. You have two plugs, one at the boiler bottom and one at the feedwater inlet. There the external preheating unit is attachet.
Now go to bed, next morning, unplug the preheating unit, start your fuel burner and move out of the job. After service, watch the weekly lubrication plan, replenish the daily schedule on the given lubrication places, left the others unattended. Refill oil and water. Plug the external heating unit on, lock it and start the external control. Leave the shed and go to bed.
And: You're alone on the machine, like the driver on modern diesels....

But you have a steamer running.

Klick for a video on the footplate of a modern steamer -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3RNs_kPM0ME

And on the Brienzer Rothorn Rack railroad the modern steamers do their job daily, and no diesels on the track.
Because they outbeat the diesels.. but you have to do it with modern steamers...

Klick for a video of the modern steamer running outhill -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DE8sAbpp7W4

So, keep the old steamers alive, don't do more show then realy necessarily and if you can, and have a railroad only in tourism service, vote for a modern steamer...

Sorry, but that's not the case at Grand Canyon. They have old steam locomotives.

MX

Sure, they have. And now?
Do the steam locos do the job? Or are the Diesels the rule?

I think it is pretty well agreed that railroads in the transition era converted from steam to Diesel to save money on manpower and facilities. Unit availablity was another big factor.

In most cases, they were comparing new Diesels to steam locomotives that had been worn out by the demands of WWII.
I think it is telling that the railroads who actually took the best care of their steam locomotives (like N&W, and UP) kept them in service the longest.

The same factors that made Diesels attractive to railroads in the 1950's apply to operations like GCR.

What GCR is overlooking here, is the fact that nowadays tourists are attracted to steam locomotives, and will go out of their way to ride behind them. Money saved by Dieselizing has to be balanced against money lost by not having steam.
A smaller segment of tourists will go out of their way to ride behind FPA-4's, but maybe not behind F-40's.

Diesel power on passenger trains used to be a positive for ticket sales.

Les