Atlantic Coast Line R-1 4-8-4's

[nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org]

I have very anxiously awaited this response.  I knew they were coming.  I do 
not have the expertise to give the details about why Mr Sellers was wrong 
but I had read to many independent articles that I knew the corretions had 
to be comming

Bob Riffe
----- Original Message ----- 
From: <nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org>
To: "NW Mailing List" <nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org>
Sent: Wednesday, September 07, 2005 12:04 AM
Subject: Re: Atlantic Coast Line R-1 4-8-4's



> Bill - I appreciate your feelings for your favorite 4-8-4s but let's look 

> at a few items.

>

> First, Js never handled a 12-14 car lightweight train; the ARROW was a 5-6 

> car lightweight train, which, for a J, was nothing.  Two of the three 

> Southern trains were all heavyweights, up to 15 cars, and the grades 

> between Lynchburg and Bristol were up to 1.34% (westbound up Allegheny 

> Mountain). The speed limit on this mountain was 40MPH due to curvature, 

> with a 50MPH curve at the bottom so no high-speed run could be gotten for 

> the climb. Yet, a J could violate the speed limit up above Montgomery 

> Tunnel (several miles up the hill) with a long heavyweight train.

>

> The J could also run 100 MPH where required, on the Norfolk and Scioto 

> Divisions.

>

> Now, your contention that a J couldn't have accelerated a 1500-ton train 

> to 70MPH as quick as an 1800 is not based on anything other than your gut 

> feel. Since the 1800 was not capable of producing the drawbar horsepower 

> (much less the starting tractive effort) of the J (the J was tops among 

> 4-8-4s in this achievement, and the 1800 was not even in the top rank), 

> the J could certainly have accelerated any train the 1800 could handle 

> faster than the 1800 could.

>

> I invite you to ask yourself the following question:  If you put an 1800 

> on the N&W, could it do what the J did?  The answer is - no way.  It would 

> have had trouble lifting a 15-car Pelican out of Marion, Va., eastbound; 

> it would have had trouble getting an eastbound Cavalier out of Northfork, 

> it couldn't have gotten a westbound Pocahontas back up to track speed on 

> Bluefield Mountain after reducing speed for the 25MPH "Jug Neck" reverse 

> curve.  These are things the J was specifically built to do.

>

> If you put a J on the ACL, could it do everything the 1800 did? 

> Absolutely! The 1800 never had to contend with the grades and curvature 

> that the J did, and the J could have made the time.  What's the maximum 

> grade on the ACL between Richmond and Miami?  I'll bet it's less than 1/2 

> of 1% and probably less than that (the SAL had worse grades than ACL did).

>

> And why was ACL so quick to bump the 1800s into freight service?  If 

> they'd been all that great a passenger engine, they'd have lasted longer 

> in the service.  But it's well known that they had deficient 

> counterbalancing, and were hard on the track.  The J's weren't . . .

>

> Now, Bill - the 1800s were good looking engines.  If your admiration ended 

> there, I'd be all for you.  But if you get into performance comparisons, 

> you're treading on thin ice.

>

> The N&W bought the tenders (ten of them, not eight) because they were big, 

> not because the engines that pulled them were great.  And Saunders didn't 

> buy them . . .

>

> But Keep Steaming!  And I wish you'd distribute those great GM 2-10-0 

> audio tapes . . .

>

> Ed King

>

>

> ----- Original Message ----- 

> From: <nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org>

> To: <nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org>

> Sent: Tuesday, September 06, 2005 9:33 PM

> Subject: Atlantic Coast Line R-1 4-8-4's

>

>

>> Having worked in engine service for the ACL beginning in  September 1941,

>> once in awhile I have one of those  "what  if" questions to pop up in my 

>> head.

>> You fellows on the N&W are justifiably proud of your J class 4-8-4's, as 

>> they

>> performed well in the assignments for which they were built, which was to

>> handle passenger trains over the curvey rip-rap of the N&W between 

>> Norfolk

>> and Cincinnati.   Compared to the ACL, the N&W was only incidentally in 

>> the

>> passenger business, half of which was a joint operation with the Southern

>> Railway.   In an acceleration test, ACL  R-1 No. 1800 was coupled to 

>> twenty

>> heavyweight friction bearing passenger cars that weighed 1500 tons ( and 

>> not

>> to a 12 or 14 car lightweight  Powatan Arrow easy rolling train set.) 

>> The

>> 1800

>> went from a dead stop to 70 MPH in eleven and one-half minutes and eleven

>> miles.  They were capable of handling up to 21 heavyweight cars at 90 

>> MPH,

>> and made the schedules of the ACL's fastest trains in a little better 

>> than 13

>> hours between Richmond, Va. and Jacksonville, Fl.  The N&W was not even 

>> in

>> the same ballpark with the ACl when it came to operating passenger 

>> trains.

>> I submit to you that A J class locomotive with it's 70 inch drivers could 

>> not

>> have matched an ACL R-1 in an acceleration test with 1500 tons.   Stuart

>> Saunders, who was not the brightest star to ever shine at the N&W bought

>> eight of the 12 large 24,000 gallon tenders off the 1800's from the ACL 

>> for

>> use on some of the N&W Y class locomotives when the ACL scrapped the

>> 1800's.   Bill Sellers

>>

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