China using steam locomotives

[53' Stude]

This shows all of us how very labor intensive steam locomotives were/are

https://youtu.be/foneS2GhpUg

 

[eljefino]

Originally Posted by Kamele0N
Originally Posted by c502cid
In my many trips to China while taking the ultra modern bullet trains I have seen many steam locomotives still sitting on sidings. Surprised they haven't been melted down, almost all rail in China is electric now.

Every (clever) country has steam locomotives stored somewhere...as a "cold reserve"....in case of war...when there is no electricity....


And how are they going to add water every X miles when that infrastructure is long gone?

 

[y_p_w]

Originally Posted by 53' Stude
This shows all of us how very labor intensive steam locomotives were/are

https://youtu.be/foneS2GhpUg

Originally Posted by 53' Stude
This shows all of us how very labor intensive steam locomotives were/are

https://youtu.be/foneS2GhpUg

A modern diesel-electric or electric is basically all electronic controls. I guess there's a fly by wire throttle, but also PTC.

 

[bunnspecial]

AFAIK, large-scale manufacture of locomotives like the QJ class ended sometime in the late 1980s or early 1990s, and I had been under the impression that they were gone from the mainlines by ~2000. The few lingering ones-if there are any-are on remote branch lines.

A few QJ class locos have made it over to the US. In the mid-2000s, here in Central KY, a local billionaire who had made his money both on short lines and on derailment service bought one and had it refurbished. He had it refurbished and used it occasionally for revenue service, as well as for high-profile publicity(i.e. it pulled the train that took the governor to the Derby a few years). Unfortunately, he died of cancer and the folks running the company now have indicated that it will likely never be in steam again.

Corman removed the smoke deflectors-they were present when it was still operating in China, but he wanted to give it a more "American" appearance. There were two others brought over at the same time, and AFAIK they retain smoke deflectors...and also the Chinese number plate on the front.

Here's a photo I have handy from the "maiden voyage" in 2008...this is the only one I could locate offhand, although I have a fair few more

In any case, at the time the "case" for buying a Chinese locomotive was that it was ~30 years old and had been out of service for ~10 years, while any available US locomotive would have been 70+ years old and out of service for 50. Any steam loco brought back into service-at least in the US-will need at a minimum a boiler overhaul which usually means new flues and hydrostatic testing of the boiler. There are a lot of other things done to the boiler and pretty much any other steam line done at the time, and once done and "certified" you get either 1472 days in steam or 15 years, whichever comes first, before the FRA says you have to pull it out of service and do it again. Given the availability of skilled steam labor, know-how, and facilities in the US these days, even if a locomotive is serviced right after the expiration of its operating certificate it usually takes a year or two at least to get it back out again.

Originally Posted by y_p_w

I was kind of surprise they were still mostly coal fired. Most steam engines in the US were using fuel oil because it's more fuel dense and considerably easier to manage. Having to refuel coal and stoking it is highly inefficient, but manual labor is still cheap there.


Fuel oil was primarily a western thing, where coal was less available. Also, before the widespread use of plastics, bunker C, which is what almost all oil-fired steam burns, use to be almost free garbage from the oil companies. It's now valuable both as an industrial feedstock and for "cracking" into lighter fuel. In any case, I'd venture to guess that it takes longer to pump a tender full of viscous fuel oil than it does to drop a few tons of coal into the hopper. Here east of the Mississippi, coal is plentiful and few if any steam locomotives ran oil.

Folks I know who have hands-on experience with both say that it's all in what you know. Oil is somewhat easier to fire in the sense that you can increase/decrease the fire size with a lever(you can dump a coal fire quickly, but building one up takes a few minutes warning) although oil comes with its own issues. If you get too much draft through a coal fire, you MIGHT start pulling it off the grate, but you'll probably notice it before anything bad happens and can close the dampers or do whatever you need to drop it. On the other hand, with oil in the same situation it's possible to kill the fire completely and you don't want to have to try and re-light it when you're climbing a grade and need steam NOW.

Modern/larger steam locos(including the QJ class) have stokers, which are basically just an auger that runs in a trough from the coal bunker in the tender to the firebox. A single fireman manually shoveling couldn't keep up with even a QJ, which is actually a bit small by American standards. Although the fireman DOES generally have to manually shovel some coal, it's usually just to control specific areas of the fire. The stoker dumps most of the coal needed-the fireman just needs to know when and how quickly to add it-although of course there's a LOT of skill involved in knowing that in the first place(and also watch/adjust the water level, which is perhaps an even more important job and is the same on oil and coal both).

It's worth mentioning that although the Union Pacific was/is the last railroad to OPERATE steam(since in 2019 they have a fleet of three locomotives in revenue service, two of which were never removed) and primarily use oil on their late stuff, the Norfolk and Western was the last railroad to actively develop steam and the last to phase it out on a large scale. The N&W was primarily a coal road, and even their A, J and Y class locos built in the 1950s were coal fired.

 

[y_p_w]

Originally Posted by bunnspecial
AFAIK, large-scale manufacture of locomotives like the QJ class ended sometime in the late 1980s or early 1990s, and I had been under the impression that they were gone from the mainlines by ~2000. The few lingering ones-if there are any-are on remote branch lines.

A few QJ class locos have made it over to the US. In the mid-2000s, here in Central KY, a local billionaire who had made his money both on short lines and on derailment service bought one and had it refurbished. He had it refurbished and used it occasionally for revenue service, as well as for high-profile publicity(i.e. it pulled the train that took the governor to the Derby a few years). Unfortunately, he died of cancer and the folks running the company now have indicated that it will likely never be in steam again.

Corman removed the smoke deflectors-they were present when it was still operating in China, but he wanted to give it a more "American" appearance. There were two others brought over at the same time, and AFAIK they retain smoke deflectors...and also the Chinese number plate on the front.

Here's a photo I have handy from the "maiden voyage" in 2008...this is the only one I could locate offhand, although I have a fair few more

In any case, at the time the "case" for buying a Chinese locomotive was that it was ~30 years old and had been out of service for ~10 years, while any available US locomotive would have been 70+ years old and out of service for 50. Any steam loco brought back into service-at least in the US-will need at a minimum a boiler overhaul which usually means new flues and hydrostatic testing of the boiler. There are a lot of other things done to the boiler and pretty much any other steam line done at the time, and once done and "certified" you get either 1472 days in steam or 15 years, whichever comes first, before the FRA says you have to pull it out of service and do it again. Given the availability of skilled steam labor, know-how, and facilities in the US these days, even if a locomotive is serviced right after the expiration of its operating certificate it usually takes a year or two at least to get it back out again.

Originally Posted by y_p_w

I was kind of surprise they were still mostly coal fired. Most steam engines in the US were using fuel oil because it's more fuel dense and considerably easier to manage. Having to refuel coal and stoking it is highly inefficient, but manual labor is still cheap there.


Fuel oil was primarily a western thing, where coal was less available. Also, before the widespread use of plastics, bunker C, which is what almost all oil-fired steam burns, use to be almost free garbage from the oil companies. It's now valuable both as an industrial feedstock and for "cracking" into lighter fuel. In any case, I'd venture to guess that it takes longer to pump a tender full of viscous fuel oil than it does to drop a few tons of coal into the hopper. Here east of the Mississippi, coal is plentiful and few if any steam locomotives ran oil.

Folks I know who have hands-on experience with both say that it's all in what you know. Oil is somewhat easier to fire in the sense that you can increase/decrease the fire size with a lever(you can dump a coal fire quickly, but building one up takes a few minutes warning) although oil comes with its own issues. If you get too much draft through a coal fire, you MIGHT start pulling it off the grate, but you'll probably notice it before anything bad happens and can close the dampers or do whatever you need to drop it. On the other hand, with oil in the same situation it's possible to kill the fire completely and you don't want to have to try and re-light it when you're climbing a grade and need steam NOW.

Modern/larger steam locos(including the QJ class) have stokers, which are basically just an auger that runs in a trough from the coal bunker in the tender to the firebox. A single fireman manually shoveling couldn't keep up with even a QJ, which is actually a bit small by American standards. Although the fireman DOES generally have to manually shovel some coal, it's usually just to control specific areas of the fire. The stoker dumps most of the coal needed-the fireman just needs to know when and how quickly to add it-although of course there's a LOT of skill involved in knowing that in the first place(and also watch/adjust the water level, which is perhaps an even more important job and is the same on oil and coal both).

It's worth mentioning that although the Union Pacific was/is the last railroad to OPERATE steam(since in 2019 they have a fleet of three locomotives in revenue service, two of which were never removed) and primarily use oil on their late stuff, the Norfolk and Western was the last railroad to actively develop steam and the last to phase it out on a large scale. The N&W was primarily a coal road, and even their A, J and Y class locos built in the 1950s were coal fired.

I heard in California any steam locomotive needs to be certified every 10 years. The California State Railroad Museum was running a steam locomotive for a 3 mile out and back excursion trip using the Granite Rock #10. But I remember they started running a diesel. I was asking volunteers at the museum what the deal was, and apparently the boiler needed to be rebuilt. They also had a couple of donated steam locomotives that weren't in running shape and were left on a siding where they were collecting graffiti. They finally rebuilt the boiler a few years back and are running steam again. I was always impressive when they did a blow off before reversing.



I live fairly closed to a miniature steam train setup. They run it on #2 fuel oil, which their volunteers (and maybe one paid employee) say is because they don't have to pay road taxes. I've heard that the Disneyland Railroad runs a B98 biodiesel using every bit of waste oil generated by their restaurants and then some. Apparently the petroleum diesel they use is regular diesel #2. Probably not a big expense in fuel taxes anyways.

I haven't seen a coal fired steam locomotive in person. I thought maybe they had one at the California Pacific Railroad (aka the Skunk Train) up in Mendocino County.

We've got a bunch of mini steam powered railroads around here. There's the Redwood Valley Railroad near Berkeley, the 22 inch Little Puffer at the San Francisco Zoo, the Billy Jones Wildcat Railroad in Silicon Valley, and Sonoma Train Town in the city of Sonoma. The last one they operate a diesel hydraulic locomotive in the off season.

I mentioned the California State Railroad Museum, where they've got a bunch of non operating steam locomotives. I suppose the most unique is the last remaining cab forward steam locomotive in existence - the Southern Pacific 4294. Something about putting the cab at the front to avoid all the smoke when going through several tunnels through the Sierra Nevada. There was talk about restoring it to operating conditions, but the cost is too prohibitive.

 

[Vikas]

Quote
1) The steam locomotive is essentially a constant torque, variable horse power machine.

I don't think you really mean what you wrote. Horse power is nothing but torque multiplied by the rpm. Constant torque is holey grail because it means the power just keeps on increasing as you increase speed. Alas, in most cases the the constant torque is available only in limited narrow range of RPM.

 

[doitmyself]

I think you are correct Vikas and it could have been worded better. I think the statement I quoted was a very simple generalization used to compare how steam engines differ from diesel electric, especially when starting from a dead stop (asked by double vanos).

Another quote from a poster in the first link I shared was "A diesel will start with any train it can't run with, and a steamer will run with any train it can't START! "

 

[y_p_w]

Originally Posted by doitmyself
I think you are correct Vikas and it could have been worded better. I think the statement I quoted was a very simple generalization used to compare how steam engines differ from diesel electric, especially when starting from a dead stop (asked by double vanos).

Another quote from a poster in the first link I shared was "A diesel will start with any train it can't run with, and a steamer will run with any train it can't START! "

But an electric motor should generally have a flat torque for the low end of its rev range.

It's important to get it moving first, and and electric motor can do that at low speed. I've mentioned the occasional direct-drive diesel, which apparently was only used for limited duties since they had a tendency to destroy transmissions.

 

[PandaBear]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jining%E2%80%93Tongliao_railway

 

[Shannow]

Couple of incorrect beleifs in here regarding the coal steam trains.

Water was not total loss...when required....water is cheap, condensing equipment isn't. But some places, condensing steam trains were used, like South Africa
https://caterpillar.scene7.com/is/content/Caterpillar/C10467200

Coal doesn' necessarily mean that there's a guy with a special hat, sewn by his mother (I think that was the Golden Book), they've had mechanical stokers for virtually ever.

Mechanical, augers, spinner spreaders, steam driven distributors all sorts of innovations.

The really big steam trains, no human could hope to get the coal to cover the firegrate, and keep the fire even and without holes.