Chains on Tender Trucks ?

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
1

One of my C&O locos has chains on the tender attached to the trucks

Does any one know why they did this ?

Thanks

Terry

2

The chains are on tender trucks to keep them with the tender body in case of a derailment. All steam engines should have them, but very few models come with them (P2K and some brass is about it). They’re pretty easy to add ot a model: add hooks to both the trucks and to the tender frame, and hang some chains. ACC one end only, so the trucks will remain removeable.

3

Orsonroy,

I agree with your assessment of why the chains were on tender trucks, but having been raised in southern Illinois along the Illinois Central and Missouri Pacific railroads I don’t agree that every tender had them. In fact, I don’t remember ever seeing chains on any tenders of these two roads, and I spent a lot of time at their roundhouses.

4

Chains were primarily used on high speed steam engines notably passenger engines. The idea was to keep things going in a straight line in the event of a derailment. Killing or maiming passengers was never a money making proposition.

5

The same reasoning puts chains on most passenger trucks. In a derailment, keeping the wheels more or less in line with the centerline of the car causes the cars to remain more or less in line with the rails. Compare that to a freight wreck, which typically accordions. Rolling stock is designed to take a lot of longitudinal stress, but not nearly as much lateral or vertical stress. This is especially true of locomotives (all types) and steam locomotive tenders.

Chuck

6

Hmm…I sort of assumed that the chains were in virtually every tender.

I just flipped through Richard Bessette’s new IC steam book (2000+ IC steam photos), looking for tender chains. While they do show up in every builder’s photo after about 1890, they’re not common after an engine was rebuilt a couple of times. Steam switchers seem to mostly lack them completely, while they’re on most road engines that don’t have Commonwealth two axle trucks.

I guess I’m thinking more along the lines of NYC and AMC influenced roads, like the NKP, P&E, and others, all of which had chains on every tender, including the yard engines.

So I guess the moral of this story is check your prototype!