If I remember my history, the first streamlined (or “fluted,” if you prefer) passenger equipment was the trainset Burlington Zephyrs of the 1930s. And I remember seeing a very vivid magazine advertisement, circa 1952, which was either paid for by Budd or Budd + Pennsy, about its new New York to Washington train – which was streamlined, too, although they may not have used that word.
Lately, however, I notice that NJT has contracted for the current generation of “Comet” bilevels (Comet V, I think but am not sure), and they are clad in a solid metal, stainless steel would be my guess.
And Acela is not “streamlined” according to the above definition.
So this raises a few questions:
Has streamlining ever been scientifically tested (say, in a wind tunnel) to be aerodynamically superior to slab-siding?
Why does modern thinking seem to be moving away from the fluted, if indeed it is?
The Budd cars of the early Fifties (RDC’s too, I guess) were called “lightweight” and compared to the heavyside, slablike earlier passenger equipment, especially the heavily riveted type, I guess they were. But did the substitution (or perhaps addition of) streamlined panels make the train cars lighter (I know, begging the issue)? Or was it a different type of works, improved suspension or lighter materials? It seems to me to be counterproductive if stainless steel panels are pegged on to the understructure, unless the stainless steel underbody itself is saving so much weight. I do realize that train cars get lighter with each generation, so the early fifties type of Budd-at-its-LD-zenith cars are “heavy” compared to today’s Amfleets or commuter equipment.
Anything anyone can say to help un-confuse the issue is welcome by me. - a. s.
I don’t have a definitive answer, but I’ll give it a shot. I don’t believe fluted siding is syononymous with streamlined. Cars of the streamliner era came in both fluted and smooth side varities. I believe streamlining referred to the overall lines of the train, which suggested a smooth airflow from locomotive to observation car.
I don’t know the answer to question 1. For question 2, it may either be a matter of manufacturing cost, or just the latest fashion trend. Streamlining was as much about appearance as efficiency. It was designed to stand out and attract the eye with the intent of attracting customers. But to the modern traveler fluted siding seems a little old fashoined.
As for #3, stainless steel is a lighter material than the conventional steel used in older cars. Also, due to its greater strength they probably required less of it resulting in significant weight reduction. At least that is my understanding.
First, your equating fluting with streamlining is completely off base. There is no such correlation.
Streamlining in general is designing to lower wind resistance, but railroad reference is more to lightweight vs heavyweight in that the lightweight cars had a more modern shape, smooth arched roof, flat ends to form a more connected appearance, uniform car height (almost all lightweight cars were built to the same height regardless of builder), roof vents were generally conformed to the roof contour and there are more points also.
Fluting does improve the rigidity of a panel which is why Budd used it. However the fluting on many railroad cars was purely cosmetic as evidenced by the fact that it was later removed without rebuilding the car. C&O did this.
Actually, I think we’re on the same page regarding the above. Between the first and second World Wars there was a stylistic movement and a (separate but overlapping) technological tendency (I won’t call it a “revolution”).
The stylistic movement was often called “streamlining” but it is better called “fluted metal sides” or even “corrugation.” Along with the hallmarks of the trade jsoderq cites I would also put the grooved roofs on Budd cars – not an absolute must but an indicator of the new style. These days, it does seem that corrugation is at or past its peak, at least judging by the newest model trains such as Acela (OTOH the Japanese have been going without fluting since the New Tokkaido Line HST in, I believe, 1964, and their following HST’s also forego fluting, I think).
The engineering (“technological”) tendency called streamlining does indeed serve to promote a clean flow of air from engine to rear of train (or at least the illusion of same.) Streamlining often used more modern materials so the train (or early trainsets) had to burn less fuel.&
While we are on the subject of heavyweight vs lightweight cars, what is really going on in the roof top of railroad passenger equipment.
An AAR standard streamliner profile, I believe, has a floor height of 51 inches (a tad over 4 feet) and a roof top of 13’6", giving it a floor to top of over 9 feet. Do they have that much headroom or high ceilings in coaches, or is the 9 feet meant to accomodate berths inside bedroom sleeper comparments where you need some vertical space? Or is there “non-revenue” head space for ductwork in those things?
What is in the clerestory of a heavyweight car – is it windows that opened for ventilation in the pre airconditioning days?
Superliner equipment is something over 16 feet tall, some inches taller than the Santa Fe Hilevels, but if the entry is at 15 inches, that means there is something like 7’6" per deck. What ceiling height do they achieve on Superliner or Pacific Surfliner on the lower deck and upper deck when you take away room for the floor planking? Do people consider the headroom OK in those cars, and if so, why does the standard single-level streamliner need to be so tall?
Paul, I’m basing my answer on recollections of my many rides in coach on the Starlight in the 1970s. Yes, the coaches had higher ceilings than Superliners, and significantly taller windows, too. If I remember correctly, the overhead racks were also a fair bit taller. The higher ceilings never felt like wasted space, but they did make the cars feel more spacious than Superliners.
Certailnly the higher ceilings benefited sleepers more than coach passengers. The ceiling clearance of a Superliner upper bunk is IMHO inadequate.
I believe that the fluted sides on the Budd streamliners were part of the structure. The exterior sheet was shot welded to the car’s frame. The fluting gives the sheet quite a bit more strength.
The fluted stainless steel look apparently became synonymous with “modern” and a lot of carbon steel cars were built with decorative stainless panels (the NYC PS fleet of coaches were this way, for example). The North Shore even painted fake SS fluting on their interubans!
The ceiling of coaches I’m familiar with do contain HVAC ductwork.
And, speaking of streamlining…not that it matters to the performance, but how about all those rivets on those Bombardier commuter bilevels! Looks like 1920 to me.
I really doubt that Amfleet and Viewliners are really any lighter than those post war Budd cars. They have the same basic construction - just a different shape.
Re: Bombardier bilevs: If that is the bilevel type I rode from Trenton to Newark, I’ll take the rivets! I have just two words to describe the ride: Sol. Id. [;)]
Streamlining - whether fluted or not - was not the first appliction of a design style to railroad equipment. The first application was Victorian styling as seen in classic heavyweight Pullmans and business cars. Streamlining grew out of the Art Decco movement - which also resulted in streamlined radios and clocks - hardly an aerodynamic application. RR designers quickly adopted streamlining/Art Decco to differenciate new equipment from the - by then - dusty, worn, dark Victorian Pullmans. Streamlining was more for marketing purposes than for any technical advantage. Art Decco was gradually supplanted by the “form follows function” movement of which I think GE and EMD diesels are classic examples. These boxey behemoths are devoid of any attempt at streamlining - but they seem to pull rather well without it.
Of the “pre-war” Streamliners, only the New Haven Railroad’s “Comet” was designed in a wind tunnel. It was built by “Goodear Zepelin Company” at Akron Ohio, and advertised as the “Goodyear Rail Zepelin”. It had slab sides and a “snoop nose” much like todays Bullet Trains.
Bullet Train designs are wind tunnel tested as the speeds are about the same as takeoff speeds of an airliner. (150 - 180 mph)
Corregated sides add strength, so the walls can be made thinner and thus lighter. Less weight as well as streamlining allow both faster travel, and better fuel economy. That is why you saw them introduced about the same time. First generation diesels were not as powerfull as steam, so weight was important.
Perhaps you have seen the concept used in cardboard boxes. It was also used in the exterior walls of the World Trade Center which probably contributed to it’s collapse when interior trusses melted.
Milwaukee Road’s streamlined passenger cars, for example, turned the fluting to the inside; to gain the strength, but in that instance, to show a flat exterior. Milwaukee’s Kenneth Nystrom developed the idea of all-welded passenger cars to reduce weight as well. Although called “streamlined” the light weight of the cars was a much more significant development insofar as efficiency was concerned. Nystrom was producing drawings of streamlined passenger car types in 1932, and in 1933, he rebuilt a standard “heavyweight” sleeper car, the “Great Falls,” into a lightweight coach, renumbered as car 4000. The project was considered a huge success, and the precursor of modern railroad passenger car construction. The “streamlining” was incidental to the manufacturing innovations that Nystrom developed as an overall effort to develop lightweight, but standard, passenger cars.
Streamlining did, however, offer approximately a 12% fuel advantage at 70 mph – more at higher speeds – with 8 or so cars. An engine that might top out at 100 mph could do 110 mph with the same load, with streamlining. The more cars, the smaller the advantage. For a typical passenger train, streamlining had some payoffs. Not huge, but enough to consider, and particularly in combination with the marketing excitement generated by the new designs.
I guess it all depends on what you define streamlining as. I was looking at an older Dodge Caravan today and thinking how outdated its styling was compared to a recent one. In its day it was pretty good but everything gets dated with time (except GG1’s!). So within a confined space vertcially, length and width of a passenger car what more could be done to further “streamline” it. It could be that the term Streamline may come to mean somthing of a style or period like Art Deco style.
I agree with you that streamlining may come to be a period of time-- I could begin it around 1934, 1935, but when would it end? With the Metroliner’s accession to Accela? With the production of the last fluted-body commuting equipment?
Yes, the GG-1 is truly a classic. From what I hear from veteran engineers, though, it wasn’t all that much fun to operate – cramped inside, sometimes too quick off the mark. OTOH I don’t expect any of the newer motors, cabs or not, whether assembled here or abroad, to last 50 years. - a. s.
Amtrak’s AEM7s are closing in on 30 years old. I’d give you pretty good odds they’ll still be around in another 20 - perhaps all converted to AC. I don’t see any new technology on the horizon that would render them obsolete.
You make a good point about the AEM7’s, which I should have calculated into my reasoning but didn’t. There seems to be something of a consensus that the AEM7 was the best (or most suitable) overall electric-motor locomotive purchase Amtrak has made in its 35+ year history. If not too ignorant a question, from when and where did the AEM7 evolve or was created?
The AEM-7 was derived from an off-the-shelf Swedish electric built by GM’s Swedish partly-owned affiliate for the Swedish National system and tested on the NEC. It was built new with AC traction motors, like the Swedish prototype, and may have been the first locomotive to use them in USA service. So it doesn’t need to be converted, but of course newer electronics and controls may be applicable. They were built by GM-EMD after some government arm-twisting. They did for the NEC what the FP-40’s did for the rest of the Amtrak system.
Oh yes, in addition to the GG-1, for me the classic EMD passenger and freight power, all the E’s and F’s, will never look “dated.” Just the best looking diesels ever built! (With the E-5 still the favorite) Ditto the New Haven EF-3 and EP-4 electrics which look as good as the GG-1 and were a lot more comfortable for their crews and performed just as well if not better, except for possibly the maximum top speed. I think the word “streamlined” is applicable to all this equipment, even if not wind-tunnel tested.
I also recognize that some others may favor an Alco PA over the EMD E-series.