Hi All,
Other than a general preference of the railroad, what was the reasoning of placing the headlight at the the top of a smokebox vs mid smokebox vs at the base of a smoke box (as was the case on many, but not all articulateds). I imagine better visibility for certain locomotive lengths and operating conditions, but I have never seen an actual reason why.
Thanks!
Casey
With articulateds, the headlights were mounted on the front engine set, which would pivot, and the headlights would more closely follow the track alignment, than if they were smokebox mounted
Doug
Casey that is a good question Penny put there light on to of the smoke box and Reading moved thereâs to the center of the smoke box but never said why.
Chuck
In the days of âfueledâ headlights, the reflectors were of comparatively large size, and the stacks were comparatively tall, so it made sense to put the platform high to get maximal visibility. (This was of the approaching engine; you will note in a great many contemporary âcutsâ of locomotives that the actual focused beam pointed fairly steeply down to a point only a couple hundred feet ahead of the engineâŚ
Another big reason was that, even in the early years of screened front ends, crews routinely had to shovel âsparksâ out of the smoke box, and a heavy, bulky headlight case would make it difficult to dog and undog the hot smokebox door and keep it open while working in there.
When smaller, brighter oil and acetylene lights came to be adopted, it made some sense to keep them high.
PRR is an interesting case. They kept a rectangular case very late, well into the 1920s. The WWI USRA made them standardize on smokebox-door headlight position sometime between 1918 and 1920, but they went back to high mount ahead of the smokebox as quickly as they could, with the generator on top of the smokebox behind it. Then in the '40s they went to smaller, brighter lights up on top where the generator had been, bringing the generator down to the previous headlight position for easier maintenance access, and often using a cast pilot â many PRR fans referred to this sardonically as the âbeauty treatmentâ.
Soo Line engines (including Wisconsin Central) were noted for headlights mounted above center, but still on the smokebox door.,
Thanks all for that insight! It is something I have wondered for a bit. The D&RGW seems to have kept high mounted headlights fairly late (I have seen photoes of Mikados and Pacifics with high mounted headlights into the 30s) and the C-48s Consolidations had high headlights until the end in 1956. The smokebox door headlight with the rise of the USRA standards makes sense as well, though I had never made that connection.
All the historical B&O engines I have seen in various books have the headlights mounted at the top of the boiler. The smokebox contained a emblem with the engine number until the end of WW II when they started to affix the Capitol Dome emblem. Articulated engines had their headlights mounted on the top of the machinery of the front engine - as with other steam engines the center of the smokebox held a emblem with the engine number and after the War the Capitol Dome emblem.
The WWII built T3 engines all had their headlights mounted on the center of the smokebox front, with the Capitol Dome emblem on the pilot-mounted air pump shield. After the war, a number of P7 Pacifics and several S1 âBig Sixesâ were rebuilt the same way.
Greg
Which makes sense as a headlight mounted would follow the track ahead better than being mounted on the smokebox.
Astoundingly there were some â the Fetters Challengers and the D&H engines as examples â that had them on, or in the case of the D&H, in, the smokebox. I have no idea how well they saw on curves at night, but if the headlight were more for people to recognize an oncoming locomotive, perhaps less dumb.
The subject of a headlight or lights on a locomotive is an interesting one. As many of us know, in the UK theyâve never had them as we have in America. Supposedly itâs because their ROWâs are all fenced. In this country we have had huge headlights, but why? Itâs not as if the engineer can see danger far enough up the track to able to bring his train to a safe halt. The whole thing makes me wonder how needed a headlight really is.
That being said, I remember as a kid when the NKP installed Mars headlights on some Berkshires. Now those headlights got attention! They were almost scary, as if the locomotive was searching as it sped forward, like a living creature.
LOL. That had to be quite a sight!
Rich
The Denver and Salt Lake mounted headlights on top of the boilers of 2-6-6-0s for a time. The photo below is from 1938. Image is from the Denver Public Library Special Collections - Otto Perry Collection.
Look at the size of that locomotive when compared to the guy sitting on it !
Rich
Right? Different safety culture back then.
In early times the headlight was large more as a warning to other traffic than illumination for ensuring the track was clear and in good condition. Even into the Argand and then acetylene era, the light was not that helpful as focused distant beam.
That had certainly changed by the early Thirties, with the circling spotlights on UP and C&NW (for example). By the late â30s PRR had a streamlined locomotive with about 360,000 candlepower in a fairly competent parabolic reflector; the resulting beam was photographed in rain (in a post here a few years ago) and had good illumination at distance.â
I donât know how many railroads used Marslights/Gyralites as anti collision warnings. As I noted a while back, many railroads used all-red lights as emergency-brake warnings for trains on opposing tracks.
I have a Union Pacific model that came with a red Mars light. I thought it looked weird. Same for the prototype.
Rich
No âweirdâ is that light as it was originally installed on a Milwaukee S-3 4-8-4. And you have people who complain the postwar PRR beauty treatmentâ was funny-looking! Gives a Selkirk âFrankenstein monsterâ smokebox front⌠and even a K5b, which takes a heap oâdoing⌠a run for its money.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder! 
Rich
Oh, wait, I meant the K6bs from Brooks!
