New body steam engine

[Kb4iuj]

Saw this ad in an O gauge magazine. It's the top one....

[bill937ca]

Golden Gate Depot?

[kvp]

As far as a prototype, it's a fantasy model since the original plans were never realised. An interesting, but somewhat flawed design by the way.

 

ps: imho a modern steam locomotive should do away with the drive rods but a hollow shaft connected bogie mounted multi nozzle steam turbine design would be indistinguishable from any modern diesel electric road switcher. Also an universal joint drive with body mounted steam motor (similar to a diesel hydraulic), would make it a modern sentinel and would look like any euro dual cab diesel.

[cteno4]

Very cool! Very fun!

 

Jeff

[marknewton]

Why do you think it was a flawed design?

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

[Socimi]

Why do you think it was a flawed design?

 

 

It's main thecnical flaw might be the driving wheels, compared to powerful steam locos where the driving wheels have a diameter of 1.5 to 2 metrers, the ACE 3000 driving wheels were smaller, wich were made that way for semplificating maintainance.

 

But most important, it was anachronistic: it was built in the 1980s.

Perhaps if the ACE 3000 was built during the 1960s, it might have been able to compete with a SD40 or U30C, but then the SD40-2 and C30-7 came out, and diesels have not stopped improving since.

 

Another reason is that it was created to avoid shortages of fuel lik the Oil crisis of the 1970s, since it was powered by coal, of wich USA has huge reserves, unlike oil wich has to be imported from overseas.

 

But such shortages aren't permanent: in a couple of years you will get as oil as you got before the shortage, so builiding a steam loco (for heavy freigt hauling) today is useless.

 

Other railways (like BC Rail, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GMD_GF6C  ) ,during the same period instead focused on electrfication, and that was a better solution, because electric trains are more energy efficent than Steam Trains, and are easier to handle, operate and cheaper to maintain.

[velotrain]

Other railways (like BC Rail, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GMD_GF6C  ) ,during the same period instead focused on electrfication, and that was a better solution, because electric trains are more energy efficent than Steam Trains, and are easier to handle, operate and cheaper to maintain.

 

Interesting that the Wiki article gives "high maintenance costs" as one of the reasons for closing down the electrification.

[Socimi]

Interesting that the Wiki article gives "high maintenance costs" as one of the reasons for closing down the electrification.

The High maintenance costs were caused by the low traffic (and thus low income) on the line in the early 2000s, that was solely built for serving the local coal mines, wich were expired and closed shortly after the dismantlement of the catenary in 2004.

[velotrain]

Low traffic wouldn't cause high maintenance costs (I suspect the opposite would usually be true ;-), but does make it much more difficult to offset them.

 

I don't know the exact factors or formula that is used, but it seems likely that the decision to electrify is largely based on traffic density (as you suggest), so electrification makes sense for much of Japan and Central Europe, but a lot less so for most of the US (North America?) - with the exception of the NE corridor and perhaps a few other busy areas.  I realize that there are high traffic transcontinental freight lines, and don't know why they haven't been electrified - outside of the huge initial cost.  I would guess that there should be payback after X years / ton miles, or some such measurement.

 

I'm aware that the Milwaukee Road and Pennsylvania electrified some divisions, but don't know how history regards those decisions.

[kvp]

Why do you think it was a flawed design?

As i wrote it's still using drive rods and side mounted steam cylinders. That's too heavy and bad on the tracks compared to modern hollow axle drives. The large steam cylinder technology needs large driving wheels which as it was mentioned weren't large enough, not to mention having only 4 driving wheels an lots of nonpowered is a design meant for fast passenger trains and not heavy freight locos.

 

For the same purpose, i would have used a fixed multicylinder underslung steam motor in the middle, driving hollow axle connected C-C bogies with diesel sized wheels through gearing and center mounted cardan shafts. The motor and gearing would be mounted as a power unit, that could be disconnected and slid out for maintenance and could run in a cooled oil bath. Solo cab design for motor-tender (C-C+3-3) or motor-tender-motor (C-C+3-3+C-C) operation. The only difference is the condensing tender having a cab or a second set of condensers and water/coal connections. The locomotive could operate with fine coal, coal dust, bunker C, diesel and tar sand raw oils. Not the cleanest but cheap to build and run and easy to manufacture and maintain as no special cast components are needed.

 

ps: Electrification for freight is worth it when the maintenance and running costs of the catenary system is less than the maintenance and running costs of a diesel system. This depends on traffic density and the local costs of electricity. If battery storage gets cheaper and have higher power densities than oil, we might see a change to battery storage locomotives on low density lines.

[westfalen]

As i wrote it's still using drive rods and side mounted steam cylinders. That's too heavy and bad on the tracks compared to modern hollow axle drives. The large steam cylinder technology needs large driving wheels which as it was mentioned weren't large enough, not to mention having only 4 driving wheels an lots of nonpowered is a design meant for fast passenger trains and not heavy freight locos.

 

For the same purpose, i would have used a fixed multicylinder underslung steam motor in the middle, driving hollow axle connected C-C bogies with diesel sized wheels through gearing and center mounted cardan shafts. The motor and gearing would be mounted as a power unit, that could be disconnected and slid out for maintenance and could run in a cooled oil bath. Solo cab design for motor-tender (C-C+3-3) or motor-tender-motor (C-C+3-3+C-C) operation. The only difference is the condensing tender having a cab or a second set of condensers and water/coal connections. The locomotive could operate with fine coal, coal dust, bunker C, diesel and tar sand raw oils. Not the cleanest but cheap to build and run and easy to manufacture and maintain as no special cast components are needed.

 

ps: Electrification for freight is worth it when the maintenance and running costs of the catenary system is less than the maintenance and running costs of a diesel system. This depends on traffic density and the local costs of electricity. If battery storage gets cheaper and have higher power densities than oil, we might see a change to battery storage locomotives on low density lines.

Something similar to this, except it has chain drive? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SR_Leader_class About the only word to describe it, and most designs that deviated too far from basic, simple steam locomotive design, is failure.  The idea of the ACE 3000 was to apply modern (for the time) technology to the basic steam locomotive principles that had been successful since Stephenson built the Rocket.

Edited December 2, 2016 by westfalen

[kvp]

Something similar to this, except it has chain drive? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SR_Leader_class

Pretty much not. That one still had conventional cylinders and placed the steam motors into the bogies, with all the unreliability this comes with in a moving bogie design. Think more like the variation of the Climax with the steam motor mounted under the boiler, between the bogies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climax_locomotive

This technology with modern hollow shaft bogies and steam motor, added condensation tender or side mounted condensers would result in a locomotive that has a steam engine in place of a conventional diesel hydraulic drive (found in locomotives like the DB V100/200/300 series). It could be made in a single cab, dual cab and with a smaller boiler in a road switcher configuration. (smaller variants as B-B, larger variants as C-C with or without a tender)

Edited December 2, 2016 by kvp