I’ve seen several photographs of what appears to be hose reels on tenders. Is that what they are? I’m assuming that they are there to pump water out onto a trackside fire if the train comes accross one, or are they there to drop into a trackside stream to pump water into the tender in the even that the engineer didn’t have the foresight to fill er’ up at his last stop. I’m probably way off base with that assumption. Can anyone shed some light on these? Thanks. Jason
The most usual reason for a hose reel on a tender was fire suppression. They were very common on logging locomotives, and less common (but hardly unknown) on common carrier lines that ran in fire-prone areas (dry grasslands are even more flammable than dry forests.) Such hoses roll up flat, and usually have a fire nozzle installed on the end.
On some lines that paralleled clear-water mountain streams, locomotives carried suction hoses to take water direct from nature, thereby saving the price of water tanks and pumps to fill them. Suction hoses are always circular in cross-section, frequently end in cage filters (to keep larger debris out of the pump) and are usually too stiff to roll up on a reel. They might be slung along the side sill of the tender, or left laying on the water tank top. I believe the Mann’s Creek Railroad used this equipment, and I’m sure there were others.
The funny-looking piece of rigging on the top of the boiler of the J. W. Bowker was a fire pump.
Chuck
Were they logging lokeys, or mainline power? Were they hose reels, or trainphone antennas? Cheers, Mark.
Southern Pacific maintained several S1 & S2 class 0-6-0 switchers with hose reels and pumps into the mid-30’s at least, they were the designated shop/depot switchers and the ability to operate in confined spaces provide a quick response mode. Southern Pacific also maintained fire fighting trains on Donner Pass, their mission in life was to protect the many miles of wooden snow sheds, the assigned T1 class 4-6-0’s carried mutliple pumps and aimable nozels atop the boiler and tender deck. The reminder of the train consisted of obsolete tanks cars converted to haul water and to have it pumped…Similar trains protected the Shasta Route, configuration varied slightly due to the necessity to fight forest fires…No fire trains were available when most of the remaining wooden sheds were engulfed by fire in 1960… Union Pacific 0-6-0 switchers dispensed with the pump, hose fittings were designed to be attached to the cold water injector line and pressure regulated by the cold water pump, further, UP protected hoses with a sheet metal enclosure, many switchers went to the scrappers with the fire supression systems operable, how often they were called upon to perform would make a interesting study for one so inclined… Some resorted to low tech for fire supression, one simply opened the boiler blow down and blew the fire out with saturated steam!!! This was only effective if the fire was within a certain distance of the tracks and the danger of igniting brush or structures wasn’t present… Dave