Williamson to Portsmouth A s

[NW Mailing List]

Yes, I agree that if steam ever does make a comeback, I seriously doubt it will be in the form of a recripocating steam locomotive.  
  Personally, I don't ever expect to see 611, 1218, or any other steam locomotive ever run on NS rails again.  I would be shocked if they did.
   
  Ben Blevins
  

NW Mailing List <nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org> wrote:
  Road mileage is less than 90 miles so where did they take a brake on the 
four hour trip (not including watering somewhere along the way?

Just musing about this and realizing that 20 plus mph for a coal drag of 250 
cars (mid fifties w/lots of non rolling bearing cars was a damn good result 
even if it was a prevailing downhill drag. I can honestly say that at Coal 
Grove I've watch thousands of these drags work their way west, and loved 
every second of the passing; day or night - Grandparents lived on US 52 
adjacent to R of W overlooking the Ice Creek bridge.The night was the best 
just to listen to the coming burst of overwhelming sound and the rail 
colicky - clack of 250 cars, great sleep sound.

Now 65 years later this discussion does really add to the memory, to 
understand tech facts underlying what it took to create this great piece of 
world history (the foundation of this part of world civilization's 
transition to the industrial/eco system of what we thought was the 
outstanding level we were living at in those decades. Surprising that 
today's resurrection of Rail will possibly have another great impact on this 
century.
Steam being used does not surprise me when you see what "chips" have done 
for all other forms of power generation/ecology. But I would suspect that 
the final package this new steam would arrive in will not resemble anything 
you are visualizing in these discussions of A,Y&Js.

Fun thinking.

Oakie G Ford
IRONTON, OH



----- Original Message ----- 
From: "NW Mailing List" 
To: "NW Mailing List" 
Sent: Thursday, May 29, 2008 3:03 PM
Subject: Re: [steam_tech] Re: TRAINS.com latest- can steam make a comeback?



> Let's try this again. I posted most of this before, but I believe it will 

> answer at least one or two of the questions posed here.

>

> The best I can do on an estimate of a Class A's capacity on level tangent 

> track, at the total evaporation and firing rate N&W expected, is about 

> 4,200 trailing tons at 60 mph. This reflects a maximum of about 5,550 DBHP 

> at 40 mph, the usual high point on an A's DBHP curve.

>

> It is highly unlikely that an A every pulled 7500 tons at 60 mph on level 

> track. I believe that would take over 10-11,000 drawbar HP. AnA is good, 

> but not that good!

>

> Now if you give 1218 about a 0.2% downgrade and enough distance.....

>

> N&W rated its locomotives very conservatively, and the often quoted 5,300 

> DBHP is usually considered at the rear of the aux. water tank. Toward the 

> end of steam, the A's were developing slightly more than this in order to 

> get 16,000-18,000 ton trains from Williamson to Portsmouth in something 

> less than 4 hours. That's where the 5,550 figure comes from.

>

> There are many examples of A's running a steady 60 mph on time freights 

> nos. 84 and 85 (some of O Winston Link's recordings), but I've not been 

> able to directly relate a trailing tonnage figure to this speed. As a 

> result, the above estimate is derived from Davis equations commonly used 

> by the RR industry during the 1950's.

>

> Using the same estimating method as above, I changed the tonnage to 4500 

> and the grade to -0.022%, the average downgrade grade from Williamson to 

> Portsmouth. The estimated maximum speed was 60 mph. An A didn't average 

> this speed from point to point. This is the best guess I can make as to 

> why the A was rated at 4500 tons Wmsn-Ptsmth.

>

> I also agree with John, please sign your posts. We would like to know who 

> we're talking to. Based on the Steam_Tech site I have a pretty good idea, 

> but other on this board likely won't.

>

> Dave Stephenson

>>

>>> > Let's see if 1218 can do 60 mph or more with a

>> 7500 ton train, as the Class A has been reported to do since an early 

>> test, and numerous times since> then.

>> >

> ,

>

>

>

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