Imaginary Locomotives

[Owd Bob]

A few of my imaginary loco' builds on my 32mm N.G. garden railway

[Corbs]

 

DLM in Switzerland have built brand new steam for one of the mountain railways and this was on the basis of a commercial business case - the steam loco was more economic that either a diesel or electric alternative, even without allowance for increased passenger numbers attracted by steam haulage.

 

 

DLM also rebuilt this Kriegslok

 

into this modern steam loco for hauling the orient express

[Satan's Goldfish]

A few of my imaginary loco' builds on my 32mm N.G. garden railway

DSC02383.JPG

d3.jpg

loco grn 007.jpg

tank loco 004.jpg

Very nice. Gives me some ideas on how to 'fix' some OO9 I've got gathering dust, really like the pointy roof in the first picture.

[Owd Bob]

Very nice. Gives me some ideas on how to 'fix' some OO9 I've got gathering dust, really like the pointy roof in the first picture.

Thanks! I think i had a JCB digger type cab in mind when i did that one.

[melmerby]

DLM also rebuilt this Kriegslok

 

into this modern steam loco for hauling the orient express

However nice it looks there is nothing revolutionary about the rebuild.

It just best practice from the later days of steam locomotive operation applied to an earlier very basic design.

It has grease roller bearings, fully balanced, oil-fired, insulated boiler and steam circuit to minimise losses etc.

The mods have increased power output to 2200hp (from 1600hp) and raised the top speed from 80kph to a more respectable 100kph (62mph)

I notice the boiler pressure and cylinder size has not been altered.

 

BTW it now looks faintly Australian to me!

 

keith

[Tic-toc]

However nice it looks there is nothing revolutionary about the rebuild.

It just best practice from the later days of steam locomotive operation applied to an earlier very basic design.

It has grease roller bearings, fully balanced, oil-fired, insulated boiler and steam circuit to minimise losses etc.

The mods have increased power output to 2200hp (from 1600hp) and raised the top speed from 80kph to a more respectable 100kph (62mph)

I notice the boiler pressure and cylinder size has not been altered.

 

BTW it now looks faintly Australian to me!

 

keith

 

Absolutely, there doesn't need to be anything radical to improve the 1st generation steam loco.

Excellent draughting, steam circuit, valve events/timings, are all eha5s needed to create a good loco.

 

But I do feel that all new builds should include some improvement upon their original design.

Tornado did, the new P2 2007 will, but not as much as hoped.

[The Johnster]

A stephensonian steam loco can be improved, not by any radical engineering or it ceases to be a stephensonian locomotive, but by computerised feedback controls, which can assess the load on the locomotive and set the regulator and valve gear optimally for it, and even manage the fire with the greatest possible efficiency for the required steam production and fuel/water economy.  In conjunction with gps, such automated steam production management can even build the fire in anticipation of a bank or other expected situation requiring an increased output from the boiler.  The single manned driver does not have to concern himself with the locomotive's requirements, and can concentrate on his job, which is stopping the train at the locations and times specified in the timetable.  The scale of the improvement and the savings in running costs, which is what the railway operator is most interested in, is not known because it's never been done, but there is a huge potential here.  

 

Modern electronic wheelspin detection and correction has never been applied to a steam loco AFAIK either.

 

There is a major advantage to using steam which is largely forgotten these days; because of it's expansive nature, the loco can be overworked and the boiler mortgaged for short periods in a way that other forms of traction cannot be abused; hence, a loco with nominally less power and size can be produced to do the same job, without deleterious effects on performance or maintenance.  The objection that the infrastructure required to keep the loco supplied with water no longer exists is lessened by the more efficient use of the water carried on the loco; only the bare minimum goes up the chimney so the loco's effective range is extended, though larger and heavier tenders than were common in UK use traditionally will be required for any long distance work.

 

None of which is going to lead to a re-introduction of steam traction for commercial use any time soon.  There is still the problem of hammer blow to solve.

[Compound2632]

Indeed - the ability to achieve such fine control would get the best out of a three-cylinder compound - only a handful of Leeds Holbeck and Carlisle Durranhill drivers ever got to discover what such a locomotive was really capable of, for just a few years at the beginning of the last century.

[melmerby]

 There is still the problem of hammer blow to solve.

There are ways to eliminate that

Multicylinder engine with geared drive (rather like a Shay but not side mounted). Therefore no coupling rods/connecting rods & valve gear directly connected to the driving wheels

Steam Turbine e.g. (4) 6202, although the driving wheels were coupled conventionally on that loco which used many standard parts.

 

How about a Garratt style loco with a large modern boiler, oil fired, feeding the two engines each with a (V?)4 cylinder power unit, as well as the water & oil, driving via gears & propshaft to (say) 6 driving wheels?

 

Keith

Edited April 29, 2018 by melmerby

[Northmoor]

In conjunction with gps, such automated steam production management can even build the fire in anticipation of a bank or other expected situation requiring an increased output from the boiler.  The single manned driver does not have to concern himself with the locomotive's requirements, and can concentrate on his job, which is stopping the train at the locations and times specified in the timetable.  The scale of the improvement and the savings in running costs, which is what the railway operator is most interested in, is not known because it's never been done, but there is a huge potential here.  

Automatic fire control probably relies on oil firing.  That's what DLM did with their Swiss rack locos (with large, removable electric cartridge heaters used to reduce warm-up times in the morning).  Coal is far too inconsistent a fuel to be relied on in the way Heating Oil can be.

Edited April 29, 2018 by Northmoor

[Corbs]

Didn't Bulleid valve gear and boxpock wheels eliminate hammer blow?

[talisman56]

That's kinda why I asked the question, I've no idea! But mk1 coaching stock had a mixture of non-powered and powered bogie types all the way up to the powered ones breaking 100mph on the 309s. How fast and powerful were 4rep etc on the southern?

 

Obviously a bit more compact making it match the height of a KFA flat, but I did beef up the bogies a bit.

 

Each 4Rep power car was equivalent to a Class 73/1 (they used the same traction motors). They were rated for 90mph, but regularly reached the ton (but not officially), especially if the consist included only one 4TC...

Edited April 29, 2018 by talisman56

[brack]

Didn't Bulleid valve gear and boxpock wheels eliminate hammer blow?

It significantly reduced it, mainly by restricting hammerblow to the small section of track beneath a slipping pacific...

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

Didn't Bulleid valve gear and boxpock wheels eliminate hammer blow?

 No. Minimal hammerblow in their Bulleid form would be a better expression. As with most engineering choices this is a compromise, almost certainly a contributor to their wheel slipping both starting unloaded and at all speeds when in motion up the maximum rate they could achieve. The slipping tendency reduced significantly when rebuilt, that handy old hammerblow nailing the driving wheel to the track to get enough traction to start moving, and 'galloping' the loco wheels at speed.

[The Johnster]

As rotary mass can be balanced on a locomotive but reciprocating mass cannot, even gearing will not eliminate hammer blow.  I suppose it is possible to arrange for counterbalancing movements to cancel hammer blow out, but this will drastically increase the all up weight of the loco, and finding somewhere to put might well prove impossible!  Presumably shorter piston movements will reduce the problem and this seems to have been one of Bullied's aims with the Spam Cans, along with the chain driven valve gear.  

 

I am not really qualified to design a loco that eliminates hammer blow, as my understanding of the problem is by no means exhaustive.  My suggested computerised feedback control loco will not, in itself, make any difference in this respect.

[Satan's Goldfish]

Would horizontally opposed cylinders (similar to the way a Subaru boxer engine balances itself) help at all? Not sure how you'd implement that on a steam engine, but it's a thought!

[melmerby]

As rotary mass can be balanced on a locomotive but reciprocating mass cannot, even gearing will not eliminate hammer blow. 

?

So even diesel locos have hammer blow?

 

Keith

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

As rotary mass can be balanced on a locomotive but reciprocating mass cannot, even gearing will not eliminate hammer blow...

 

 If there is an intermediate gear coupling the reciprocating drive to the axle, then there is no hammerblow.

 

...  I suppose it is possible to arrange for counterbalancing movements to cancel hammer blow out, but this will drastically increase the all up weight of the loco, and finding somewhere to put might well prove impossible!  ...

Would horizontally opposed cylinders (similar to the way a Subaru boxer engine balances itself) help at all? Not sure how you'd implement that on a steam engine, but it's a thought!

 And I direct you both to the Paget locomotive, and Bulleid's 'Leader' as UK examples of attempting such things. Many a happy day may be whiled away contemplating deviation from Stephensonian orthodoxy here. http://www.douglas-self.com/MUSEUM/LOCOLOCO/locoloco.htm

 

In a nutshell: the firetube boiler and piston drive directly connected to the wheels won out overall for rail traction using steam locomotives. Cheap to build, relatively simple to maintain, ghastly thermally inefficient. After a good century powering the traffic that enabled the technological development of the world, alternative power systems were advanced to the point where they could take over and do the work more reliably and with much superior thermal efficiency (for a higher first cost).

[Joseph_Pestell]

DLM also rebuilt this Kriegslok

 

into this modern steam loco for hauling the orient express

 

I can't see what is "modern" about this rebuild. But I do find it ugly by comparison with the original.

[PhilJ W]

Would horizontally opposed cylinders (similar to the way a Subaru boxer engine balances itself) help at all? Not sure how you'd implement that on a steam engine, but it's a thought!

The later Sentinel railcars had just such an engine with six cylinders.

[Corbs]

I'm the opposite, I think the newer version is much better looking.

 

Modern as in uses a lot of the later developments of steam locomotive technology (it was modernised by the rebuild), was done in the modern era (1999 wasn't that long ago), the driver's experience is more akin to a modern loco (oil firing and lots of insulation in the cab).

 

https://www.advanced-steam.org/5at/modern-steam/modern-steam-miscellany/dlm-52-8055/

 

Edited April 30, 2018 by Corbs

[Coryton]

Here's why i asked the wheel diameter/traction motor question:

 

The modular, ISO container based, powered intermodal wagon concept!

 

The idea is a pair of 60ft container flats are equipped with traction motors on each axle (8 in total), a control cab, and the number of Gensets in 10ft containers added decides how powerful the unit is. There's a lot more to it than that, it's all in the drawings below.

 

 

Just how powerful a generator can fit in a 10ft box these days? At least it doesn't need to go faster than 75mph.

 

Sorry all the containers look the same, i really should have hacked apart more than 1x Hornby KFA for this so Units stood out a bit more.

 

I like it. (In terms of an imaginative idea...I hope nothing like this ever actually happens).

 

The idea of picking the cab up from one end and plonking it down on the other with the container crane is rather clever

 

As for communications wiring through the train, in the US I believe radio control is common for distributed power...then again they don't have many tunnels...

[TheQ]

A few of my imaginary loco' builds on my 32mm N.G. garden railway

DSC02383.JPG

d3.jpg

loco grn 007.jpg

tank loco 004.jpg

I love the series one landrover with the rear body having shades of Tickord and carawagon...

[Owd Bob]

I love the series one landrover with the rear body having shades of Tickord and carawagon...

Thanks! In my imagination this is where and what happened to the missing pre-pro' R02.

[JimC]

in the US I believe radio control is common for distributed power...then again they don't have many tunnels...

Would tunnels be a problem for wireless communication within a train - all line of sight?

 

The container flat multiple unit is an interesting idea!