Gordon Hamilton

[nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org]

 Gordon Hamilton,Great story.  Some people just like the seat of the pants method.  I was rereading your great article on N&W Steam vs southern diesels.  Wonderful article.  Sometime i would like to figure out how much it would cost in todays dollars.  Average Man hours and materials used during an engine servicing and Class 1-5 repairs.  Average number of miles for each class of repair.  The differences for each of the modern engines.  Use rate of inflation on the material costs and the modern wage rates for the man hour numbers. I suspect alot of this info might be lost for the ages. I hope not,John Rhodes--- On Sun 01/15, < nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org > wrote:From: [mailto: nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org]To: nw-mailing-list at nwhs.orgDate: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 19:02:08 -0500Subject: Re: speed and cutoff



This does not add any information that John Rhodes was seeking, but it is a little bit of lore from a half century ago. My first summer job with the railroad was in the N & W's steam locomotive shop in Durham, NC, where the foreman at that time was W. D. (Bill) Emmons (whose father was an N & W roadmaster, at Ft. Gay, WV).  Bill was a great raconteur, and he enjoyed recounting railroad stories (a closet railfan?). One story pertaining to cutoff was about the reaction of some of the "old head" engineers when the N & W first installed back-pressure gauges on most of the road steam locomotives to guide the engineers in adjusting the cutoff for the most efficient operation (least back pressure in the cylinders).  He said that old engineers snorted that they did not need the gauge to tell them what to do.  They said that all they had to do was to listen to the sound at the exhaust stack to tell them when the old girl was running "right." Gordon Hamilton
----- Original Message ----- From: nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org To: NW Mailing List Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2006 2:35 PMSubject: Re: speed and cutoffJohn, Finally, I got some of the information I think you are asking for. This I have from Test Engineer Robert M. Pilcher, who did most of the testing on the late steam era locomotives. There is nothing I have about the S1/S1a and I have seen nothing about a dynamometer car being used on a switch engine. Mr. Pilcher's notes to me are as follows: 1.    The early/older Y's usually were worked at about 70% cutoff and the throttle then worked to increase or decrease power as needed once the 70% was reached. At maximum drawbar HP the speed would have been at about 15 MPH for the Y3/Y4 and 20 MPH for the as built Y5/Y6/Y6a. 2.    The Y6b's [later included the improved Y5 and Y6's] were worked at about 55% cutoff before the engineer regulated power needs by the throttle. The maximum DBHP of 5600 was at 25 MPH. 3.    For the single 
expansion A's and J's, they were operated at about 25-30% cutoff while running. I have nothing about the cutoff at 70 MPH that you asked for. The A developed a maximum 5350 DBHP at 40 MPH and the J 5150 DBHP at 41 MPH. 4.    I am adding this from his notes and that is about efficiency of each class. The improved Y5/Y6's, under optimum conditions with a fully loaded trains near its maximum DBHP rating, were about 6.75-7.25 percent efficient. The A was about 6.5-7.0 percent efficient. The J in passenger service was about 5.25-5.75 percent. This is about all I can find on your subject. Hope this helps. Bud Jeffries
----- Original Message ----- From: nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org To: NW Mailing List Sent: Tuesday, December 20, 2005 3:31 PMSubject: Re: speed and cutoffJohn, I have some information about some of these classes. But I will need a few days to get to that and dig it out. This time of year is a little hectic, so bear with me. Best wishes, Bud
----- Original Message ----- From: nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org To: nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org Sent: Monday, December 19, 2005 1:07 PMSubject: speed and cutoff


Group,Another question may be someone will know or maybe not?The class A developed max HP at 40mph, right? With a full tonage train at that speed what would be the average % of cutoff on the reverser?The Y6b is at 25mph? % of cutoff?S1a at 15mph? %?The class J running a heavy train at say 70mph. what would the % of cutoff used?I am working on determining the pounds per second of steam being exhausted by these engines. I was looking at the use of other types of front end arrangements (Lempor Exhaust) on these engines. These are the last variables I need to know.Thanks,John RhodesVirginiaPS. Louis Newton, Bud Jeffries, Ed King, or others, do you know?


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