Today’s world of Class 1 railroading has crews shutting down locomotives when they are left at outlying points at the end of their tour of duty.
Most locomotive have batteries that supply electricity to the generator/alternator, which for starting gets electrically configured to be a starter motor. All is well and good as long as the batteries are charged.
However, for a variety of reasons the batteries can be unusable - no charge. When this happens the locomotive cannot be started, unless electricity can be provided from another source. At outlying points there is rarely, if ever, another source. So the engine is dead until mechanical forces are brought into the equation and through their means get it started.
I have always wondered why locomotives are not equipped with a secondary Air Powered Starter. Generally a source of air can be made available much easier than can a source of electricity (even when they arrive in the same carbody). A operating locomotive normally carries a Main Resevoir air pressure approaching 140 PSI (it is used to charge the braking system trainline for a train) - I would expect a air starter plumbed to use Main Resevoir pressure would have little trouble in starting a locomotive. Coupling air hoses between locomotives is a normal function of Train & Engine crews; locomotives are not equipped with battery jumper cables and crews are not trained in their use.
Not being a locomotive guy, I can’t see where equipping locomotives with air starters would be THAT expensive; especially in the view that a dead locomotive is not performing the duties it was purchased for.
I am sure the air will leak off. What also occurs is that another train is operating past the engine that won’t start and ‘surprise’ it has air in it’s main resevoir (and entire brake system) - take a few minutes, couple to the engine that need air for it’s starter and away we go. Many jobs these days use multiple units because of the tonnage they handle, one starts, the other won’t - with air the one that starts would provide air for the one that has dead batteries.
Some Alcos had air starters. (If the pressure leaked down, all you had to do was couple up the air hoses and build up reservoir pressure) The advantages are more or less as you stated.
The problem was that when you used one, you could hear it more or less distinctly six miles away… and it was an added expense (as opposed to motoring the main generator to crank the engine over).
In a similar vein: early GE V-8 railcars had a novel method of starting: a shotgun shell in a special chamber. Flip the lid, close the latch, pull the trigger: enough gas to move the engine through a couple of cylinders’ worth of cycle. Nice hot gas for preheat, too.
There have been a couple of interesting threads on RyPN regarding ‘extension cords’ and ‘jumper cables’ for starting a dead locomotive effectively without having to replace the batteries. If I recall correctly (it’s been a long time, and I was never exactly sure of the hard details) in the bad days of Penn Central, many locomotives including no few FL9s had so many defective battery cells that the engines could not be shut down, and some method had to be used to start a dead engine off live external power. As W.C. Fields once said, ‘those were the good old days – I hope they never come again’…
(BTW, one reason older generations of locomotives were not shut down when idle was that the engines did not use antifreeze. It would NOT take long for the water coolant to freeze, and cause the usual sorts of problems that confined water does when it freezes. Leaving the engine running was a relatively cheap way to prevent freeze damage. There were exceptions; I remember a Trains story about a FM road-switcher that was plugged in on weekends (largely to avoid the haze of blue smoke that characterized slightlhy-worn OP engines that were left to idle for long periods of time…)
“Shotgun” starters used to be used on some aircraft as well. For a good demonstration check out the Jimmy Stewart film “Flight of the Phoenix.” Stewart uses a “shotgun” starter to get the “Phoenix’s” engine running.
I remember that article in their Train Master issue years ago. One of the more memorable issues they ever put out. According to the story though, it was because neighbors complained about the noise from her idling overnight and on Sunday’s back in the 50’s. So the block heater was installed and she was kept plugged into a power pole next to the depot when she wasn’t in use.
I wonder what happened when she was retired. The article speculated on a pair of GP9’s taking her place. I wonder if they were equipped similarly when it happened or if the line was just abandoned (The White Oak branch at Oak Hill WV that she served on didn’t sound like it had much more of a future than the Train Master did in 1973).
With the prices of fuel these days its in the company’s best interest to keep the batteries in good shape so the locomotives can be shut down. I know we try to keep them in good condition.
I don’t really like or dislike air starters, If the locomotive has not been shut down for a long time and will likely restart easily the air starters work fine, keep in mind you only get about 6 seconds of cranking time until the air tank is empty and needs to be recharged. My latest experience is with SD90MAC-H .
The upside and downside of electric starters is you get a longer cranking time but you also do so at risk to the small EMD starter motors. I have changed hundreds of them.
The older DC generator engines that used the generator as starter were probably the most reliable, they would crank forever without damaging anything and on relatively low battery charge.
Older GEs use the AUX gen and the exciter as starter motors, these are more robust than the small EMD starters but are still damaged by excessive cranking especially at low voltage.
The GE alternator start is very good but the battery voltage must be at least 58-60 volts, Even if the battery has decent cells capable of making starting current if the voltage is too low the machine cannot ring up the starting capacitors. The easy fix in that situation is a small battery charger or booster that will bring up the battery voltage and allow the machine to ring up the alternator. The charger I use is a 5 amp-75 volt… all I need to do is bump the voltage for a bit. Sometimes I can use a running locomotive and its MU to bump the voltage a bit, I only need the voltage to charge the capacitors not crank the engine so a 14 gauge wire jumper to the control side usually does it.
One trick we use sometimes on locomotives with low batteries is to open a bunch of test cocks to reduce compression in a bunch of cylinders to make the engine turn over easier, of course after the diesel sta
That was a Virginian Railway (VGN) Trainmaster. When Norfolk and Western bought the VGN in December 1959, N & W picked up all the VGN Trainmasters and used them mainly in the western part of Virginia and Southeastern WV.
I have MU’d up several engine, not that it was in my job description at the time. Plugging in the 27 pin cable and making 5 glad hand couplings is not all that demanding - configuring the controls inside the cab is little more challenging, but not difficult for a certified locomotive engineer. Not having been around any locomotives that had air starters, I don’t know what else would be required beyond getting the Main Resevoir fully charged so that the starting sequence can be initiated.
Simple maybe - but expensive for fuel uselessly burnt and and for engine wear - using antifreeze will be cheaper at any rate .
The Flight of the Phoenix - great film , I liked it when I first saw it at 13 - the characters were well displayed and gave a variety of how people might react in such an extreme situation ; I hated the ‘vain idiot’ of model plane designer - only later came to understand his reaction - man of design and man of practice at loggerheads , both feel disregarded by each the other , a lock up that could easily become fatal in a situation of peril . It took mediation by a third person understanding the situation . I have seen the like to happen in much less dangerous situations and nobody saved it . What I found quite optimistic later when I saw the film again was how they pulled that one wing over the hulk - very optimistic ! Also that scene when the pilot used one capsule for ‘cleaning’ the cylinders - who could really claim to dare to do that in such a situation ? Well , the film plot ‘proved’ him right - however , it was just a film after all - I wouldn’t want to bet for this to work as well in reality …
Yet , they got out of the sands before sands were running out for them - and if it called for using some unlikely , uncanny or even unreal methods , it was just as well : it got them out anyways - gee
“The rispownsabiletey of being James Stewart” , as he was quoted to have said about himself , had shown again - as in the film on Lindbergh and the first TransAtlantic flight …
Oh yeah, Jimmy Stewart as Charles Lindbergh in “The Spirit of Saint Lous!” Great film! You know, General Stewart (US Air Force Reserve) really WAS too old for the role, but he begged and pleaded for it, and you know, he pulled it off quite well. He must have. Anne Morrow Lindbergh went to the film with one of their children and part-way through the film the child asked “Mommy, does Daddy make it?”
Lady Firestorm and I saw the film at a special showing at the Virginia Aviation Museum several years ago, and when the “Spirit” flies over Saint Johns, Newfoundland Lady F blurted out “IT STILL LOOKS LIKE THAT!”, meaning Saint Johns. Turned every head in the theater!
I loved Hardy Kruger as the model airplane designer in “Flight of the Phoenix.” “Toy planez, real planez. ze theories iss de same!”
Oh, back to starting diesels. Anyone think of using a BIG crank, kind of like on a Model T? Or maybe just rolling it downhill and popping the clutch?
Traditionally it was NOT. That’s a pot-load of antifreeze per locomotive! I expect Don and some of the other diesel mavens to chime in with better explanations.
A better solution to ‘freezing up’, imho, was something like the Kim Hotstart: a small diesel-fired heater arrangement that circulated the coolant and kept it as warm as desired, with none of the wear to engine machinery, or general problems with compression-ignition oil leakage/exhaust blowby, etc. that idling would produce – and also none of the expense of fancy antifreeze chemicals…
ISTR, probably incorrectly but someone will let me know, that the EMD 265H was the first engine of theirs that used antifreeze.
No argument whatsoever that idling was a poor – even if cost-effective at the time – method of keeping a diesel engine from freezing. Do, or will, present laws against motor-truck idling apply to locomotives?
Let’s say a dead cold GE unit is the lead unit in a consist that has been shut down and no air is on the train, how long will it take to get the air built up enough to start the EMD? More than “a few” minutes I can assure you. There is also a choke in the MR line that only lets so much air in or more importantly out at a time. Then keep in mind that if you don’t let the air build up a good bit above the minimum, that air starter will suck a bunch of air down and the air starter will stop before the unit fires up.
Then there is the fact that if you are out on the road all by your lonesome, how long will it take to get another loco to you to help. And if you are single track it better come from the right direction. More time lost.
My point is, more often than not, you are not going anywhere in just “a few” minutes.
IIRC, antifreeze decreases cooling efficiency, which is needed to maintain various emission standards (so, the switch to flared radiators). It also can corrode engine blocks quicker than regular water.
As long as diesels were hosted in steam round houses switching off motors was no problem at all :
roundhouse was kept warm by the iron horses and so …
diesels were to shut up , sorry , were shut down ( if temporarily - none of you will be surprised I would have preferred once and for all )
there was electricity to feed a ‘flattened’ electric circle of a diesel for starter engagement
if there still was a problem , it was a warm place to dismantle sheet metal and dig into a motor to unroot what was wrong .
All in all , it would appear the advantages were so substantial I’m tempted to say a system of keeping steam locomotives hanging around in shed ( which didn’t mean they had to run trains , actually ) was preferable enough to make total dieselization look like a total misunderstanding of the two traction modes . In an ideal form it seems , steam locomotives being less fuel efficient than diesels should have been kept more or less for roundhouse duties only - fully in steam all the time and with occasional outings for fuel , water , boiler and fire cleaning - while diesels then could without fear have been shut down in between taking care of train handling . A Pacific would then only stretch her legs in case of a diesel having become disabled , that would have been an agreeable burden , especially as after the trip she could be treated to a full service , oiling all around , thorough cleaning , making up small spots in lacquer coating to finish with a complete shine up . However , I’m afraid to keep Mallet locomotives for this duty , imho should have been considered an overmoded articulation of the idea , at least with roundhouses of less than eighty-eight stalls , in fact this type of arguably easier duty should not generally have asked for a double axle Delta truck neither …
Although haphazardly realized back in days of transition , this turned into a great chance lost for the
Why go so far, when the history of 1218 at Union Carbide is so close and well-known?
A quick memory of this sort of use includes E-4 Hudsons, at least one RF&P 4-8-4 that survived to 1966, and DMIR Yellowstones in ore-thawing service.
I would have to believe that the ICC/FRA boiler restrictions in that era would have required the same five-year full boiler overhaul mandated for working locomotives for any railroad-owned ex-locomotive ‘power boiler’ that was used for roundhouse service. Therefore keeping one of those things as your roundhouse heat would become – shall we say, uneconomical? – by the time the boiler certificate expired. (Not that I wouldn’t love to have seen it happen!) What might be interesting would be if you derated the boiler to ‘heating’ pressure (not more than 15-30 psi?) and attempted to have it licensed accordingly… but you would still in all probability need to use light or waste-oil, or natural-gas, firing in it. [Note that Carbide got their 'A’s listed as scrap so they could relicense them as stationary boilers, their South Charleston boiler engineers only having a stationary rating…]
I do not recall the full details, but Jersey Central ‘hid’ one of their Baldwin double-enders from the eyes of the bean counters, using it for some shop purpose (mighta been shop air, and perhaps shop heating) and I think actually building some sort of wall to conceal what it was. If someone knows the full story, mention it here…
