Ash from locomotive fireboxes

[Arthur]

Sorry wrong. Charcoal is burnt wood.

 

OzzyO.

Not quite, and charcoal and coke are, in most ways, similar.

 

The residue of burnt wood is wood ash. Charcoal is the product of the incomplete combustion of wood, coke is the product of the incomplete combustion of coal. Both are produced by heating the raw material, wood or coal, in the absence of air (oxygen) which drives off the volatiles leaving behind charcoal or coke respectively. Both are largely carbon with small mineral residues and both can be burned (smokeless fuels are coke) leaving behind small amounts of ash. Coke is much denser and harder than charcoal, metallurgical coke being almost impossible to burn in a domestic grate.

[ozzyo]

As Coachman has said, ash was dropped from the ashpan into the ashpit not onto the track.  When cool it was then shovelled onto the side of the track ready to be loaded into wagons.  What this rather good photograph shows is the cool ash that has been shovelled out of the pit awaiting further shovelling into the mineral wagons.

 

Chris Turnbull

Not too sure about that Chris, as it looks more like the fire has been paddled out of the firebox onto the side. Why would they shovel the ash onto the side when the crane with a grab bucket on it should be-able to fit into the ash pit? It also looks like that most of the old fire is by the side of the coaling stage this would work well as when the loco is coming on shed, drop the fire and coal at the same time, if the loco had to drop its fire. If all it required was a clean out of its ash pan it could do it here as well. Then it would be cleaned out of the pit later.

 

OzzyO.

 

PS. a lot of fire droppers that I knew did not like removing hot fire-bars using the long tongs and putting them to one side in the box and then having to replace them with the tongs. As if they made a mess of it it was get the fire bar out of the ash pan and pit and then lug it back on to the footplate and back into the fire box. All of this would have to be done when all of these bits were very hot. 

[coachmann]

I've seen preservationists throw out the fire through the cab opening but I never saw this happen on BR. This isn't to say it never happened......I just never saw it and never expected to when we had been trained to remove firebars day or night. No big deal when it was just one of many everyday tasks and it certainly would not put off lads who really wanted to work around steam.

[Ruston]

I can't be cutting holes in the baseboard for an ash pit now so, being as it's a small industrial concern, I'll have a large rusty steel tray between the rails to drop the ash into. As well as piles of ash I'm also adding bits of clutter around the shed - empty and rusty oil cans, old springs, broken firebars etc.

 

One thing I'd never thought about is how the ash would be got rid of from a small industrial loco shed.

[coachmann]

Watch the rusty steel tray between the rails isnt too high at it could foul the pretend inside cranks of your small-wheeled industrial locos. Also it is not clear how a man would rake out the ashpan in such a situation.

[The Stationmaster]

I've seen preservationists throw out the fire through the cab opening but I never saw this happen on BR. This isn't to say it never happened......I just never saw it and never expected to when we had been trained to remove firebars day or night. No big deal when it was just one of many everyday tasks and it certainly would not put off lads who really wanted to work around steam.

It seems to have happened at some Western sheds Coach as the telltale evidence was there to be seen on the sides of tenders and tank engine bunkers where ash had blown back onto them and stuck although obviously the ashpan couldn't be emptied in that way so some (probably most?) went into the ashpit.  Mind you I'm talking later years of steam and don't forget that on the Western fire dropping etc was done by Shed Labourers and recruiting that sort of labour got very difficult as time went on so what was seen as 'the easiest way' of doing the job went on.

[Bulleidnutter]

Coach from experience on the SVR, It depends on loco type. Fixed grate, drop grate, rocking grate. At the moment with the bloody awful coal with have at the moment, the thickness of the ash, size of the klinker can also require the big paddle to have a good dig out.

 

I, like coach agree. The real thing will always come up trumps. Also remember coal wasnt always nice fist sized lumps.

[BRealistic]

Pardon Chris,

 

it maybe on to concrete at the side of the track, there is an ashpit but any thing that was shovelled out of the firebox went onto the side of the track, as seen here.

photo crane 2.JPG

 

OzzyO.

Thanks so much for posting the photo, OzzyO. Colour pix showing piles of waste ash are few and very far between (google can't find that many anyway), and its so useful to see what colour the stuff really is. I had imagined it was a good deal darker... with quite a lot of blackish grey mixed in.

[avonside1563]

Smaller industrial concerns often only had the pit in the shed and ash would usually be raked out outside the shed straight on to the track, that's assuming that the loco had an ashpan, many places didn't bother - notably the Waterside system in Scotland as mentioned in David Smith's excellent book, 'Dalmellington Ironworks, its engines and men. Often the ashpan would be raked out from the side rather than going underneath the loco, many industrial locos having convenient cutouts in the frames to facilitate this. Many industrial sheds had plenty of ash piled up alongside the track such as seen here http://www.scotlandsplaces.gov.uk/search_item/index.php?service=RCAHMS&id=187210&image_id=SC659080

 

Ash from the ashpan tends to be a mixture of dark grey and light grey to almost white depending on the coal and type of ash/clinker it produces. Similarly an fire thrown out has dark to light grey to almost white again in the clinker. Smokebox ash tends to be the much finer particals that can be lifted from the fire and usually much darker grey to almost black as it is generally unburnt or partially burnt coal. The ash from the ashpan is much coarser in texture.

[PhilH]

Colour pix showing piles of waste ash are few and very far between

 

 

 

7th photo down

[Blandford1969]

Coach from experience on the SVR, It depends on loco type. Fixed grate, drop grate, rocking grate. At the moment with the bloody awful coal with have at the moment, the thickness of the ash, size of the klinker can also require the big paddle to have a good dig out.

 

I, like coach agree. The real thing will always come up trumps. Also remember coal wasnt always nice fist sized lumps.

Its lovley coal if you believe some, at worst only 2 hours of digging out the ash that would not go through the bars. The one thing not done is use the tongs, the last time I saw them in use was on big Linda in about 1987. They were very frowned on.

[ozzyo]

7th photo down

 

One thing that them photos show is the difference between smokebox char (a grey type of colour and uniform in size), and dropped fire and clinker, more of a white colour and more random in size.

 

OzzyO.

[11B]

Just to add to the photos, I have found some of Millom Iron Works at the bottom of the page http://www.banklands.com/millom.htm

 

Hope they help

 

Ian

[Ruston]

I got a doggy bag full of ash from Chasewater today. Proper industrial loco ash