As you may know the 4449 spent 4 days this past week as a film star on the BNSF Fallbridge Sub in the Columbia River Gorge. I was able to get down there on Wednesday. Not a gorgeous day in the gorge but at least for the most part, it wasn’t raining. Here’s a video of the train crossing Horsethief Lake on it’s way back to Vancouver.
Very very nice. …and none of this ‘black smoke is so dramatic’ nonsense…nothing but water vapour that just vanishes.
Now if we could just make that a permanent condition steam would be back and in a big big way.
Terrific stuff…thanks.
A clear stack was usually company policy, I believe. So much so that some railroads put spotlights at the stack so it could be seen at night.
I suppose some feel that if a steam locomotive is working, there ought to be smoke. But I agree - the goal should be that clean stack. Otherwise, that’s good money going out the stack.
And it is a very good video.
Excellent video!!!
Superbly done! And that’s some nice (and very responsible) drone flying too!
The fireboy on 4449 certainly knows his business, nothing but a trail of condensing steam in the engine’s wake.
Ah yes, steam on the head-end of a beautiful passenger consist, just like God intended.
And no diseasel either!
4449 is a oil burner - as long as the atomization equipment is working properly, keeping a clean fire should be ‘relatively’ easy. I am not trying to take anything away from the fireboy, but contoling the the entry of oil to the firebox should be more reliable that distributing coal into the firebox.
Oh, I’ve seen some films of oil-burners belching enough smoke to make Mount Vesuvius green with envy, but I usually suspect the following…
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It could be a bad load of fuel oil.
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The head-end crew’s hamming it up for the camera.
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The locomotive’s WAY overdue for service.
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The fireman doesn’t know what he’s doing.
I saved that last for last because far be it from me to critisise someone doing a job I’m not familiar with.
Again, the clean white plume of exhaust is very impressive.
This mere mortal prefers IC 4000 on the lead of the original “City of Miami”.
I’ll grant you that was a handsome locomotive.
At least it didn’t look like THIS ugly bugger!
www.american-rails.com/green-diamond.html
Makes me shudder…
A common phenomenon for photo run-bys, I believe.
Not exactly. The CO2 is there, you just can’t see it. And that’s the problem…
The Green Diamond, M10,000, and their like had a certain Buck Rogers look to them - a sign of their times.
Much as I hate to comment on this (and not to be critical) … stack lights were NOT like the floodlights on the Mercury locomotives that spotlighted the ‘rolling power’ motionwork - one of the great things in 1930s ‘streamlining’ that goes largely unremarked’. The hooded lights were to allow the fireman to gauge the correct amount of firing at night.
“Correct” oil firing was actually not to give pure exhaust, it was nominally to give a fine gray haze. This was because a clear stack could represent any lower level of firing turndown right down to the point of differential expansion damage or even unlighting.
There’s as much, or more, thought and adjustment going on in firing a locomotive like 4449 as there is in a comparable coal-fired locomotive at equivalent speed. Remember that the flame plume is dynamic on a modern oil-fired engine, regardless of burner design – and the dynamics of the plume are measured in no more than seconds. So any change in momentary load, or draft, or other conditions, will have to be met with what may be a complex, and anticipative, response. Sure, there will be long periods where the firing valves can be set to match steam demand, but there are long periods between required stokings in many classes of coal-fired power, too (PRR has records of some highly interesting ones).
That’s what I was referring to. Thanks for expanding on it.
Your video, Ottercove, delivered exactly what the post’s title promised! And, you are to be commended for that!
The video was incredible choppy on my computer, though, but since no one else mentioned that, it must have been the limitations of my computer.
Much success to your future video efforts!
Got to visit and touch 4449 today at the Oregon Rail Heritage Center, where they were busy replacing a few leaky stay-bolts. Very cool!