I was watching a railfan video and frequently saw flames shooting out of one SP diesel. I never saw that before anywhere.
Is this normal for a slugger locomotive?
Locale was nominally somewhere in Wyoming’s Powder River Basin and the train was a unit coal consist.
Nothing new or strange, happens all the time.
Generally to GE’s…
So what is it? The equivalent of a backfire? Not all cylinders firing? Isn’t that wasteful of fuel? Shouldn’t such an engine be serviced PDQ?
Seems to be an affliction of GE locomotives, due to the fact they have 4-stroke engines (EMD most always uses 2-stroke engines except for about 75 SD90MAC-Hs). Turbo lag can cause this, where the engine receives more fuel than necessary during acceleration until the turbo catches up and feeds the engine the proper amount of air. The excess fuel leaves as thick, black smoke and can sometimes ignite in the stack, resulting in what you see there. EMDs do not experience turbo lag due to the coupled engine drive of the turbo compressor blade (through an overrun clutch).
The same thing can happen if a turbocharger fails, on both GE and EMD engines.
GE of late is touting its Green-initiative locomotives. If that exhaust fire problem is still prevalent with the newer engines, these newer locomotives are not very Green in my estimation.
Most times, locomotives are used in a minimum two engine lash up. Is the way the train is operated have any effect on these exhaust fires? Would GE claim the fires exist only because of poor handling?
Getting fire out the stack isnt as common as it use to be, at least on the Union Pacific. There taking alot better care of the locomotives then they use to.
Wouldnt that create excessive egt and cause the turbos to overheat? How do they keep it from damaging the turbos or introducing superheated air into the intake tract?
Tell me, was this the Big Power compilation or Colorado’s Joint Line?
Both are excellent videos!
Highly reccomended.
I received unsolicited from Kalmbach a DVD with a one hour program entitled “Big Power.” Near the end of the segment discussing slugger locomotives, a montage of varoius trains was shown. Therein was, ahem, the smoking gun. The train in question could have been on Colorado’s Joint Line.
I felt the DVD was dated. For example, a large segment was on the rebuilt locomotives of the Wisconsin Central, which was absorbed into CN in 2000. To the video’s credit, there was an acknowledgement of that fact.
I did appreciate the various engineering specs and costs for the GE vs EMD comparisons, but I felt it didn’t go far enough.
If I like the DVD, Kalmbach wishes me to purchase it for $10, an offer I am likely to decline. If the program was at least two hours long for that cost, I would have been receptive to a purchase. I feel it is an old program that is being recycled. Towards the end, mention was made of a book that Kalmbach once offered – Field Guide to Locomotives, IIRC – but which is no longer available.
What is happening is that an overly rich mixture is EXITING the exhaust, then mixing with air OUTSIDE of the exhaust stack, creating a mixture lean enough to burn. Again, all of this is happening on the outside and is much cooler than a proper exhaust…
I got it in perhaps 2002, and at the time I thought it was the most amazing video I had ever seen.
Of course, I hadn’t seen too many videos at that time [;)]