Tanks?

The pros:
-more weight on drivers
-shorter

The cons:
-more weight on drivers
-limited capacity for fuel

NG roads were frequently pushing the limit for how much locomotive their track could handle. While the narrow gauge movement flourished, dozens of roads tried running 1/2 sized locomotives on undersized rail with shorter ties and no ballast...not to mention rickety bridges. Frequent accidents were the norm. Within a decade, roads were conforming to standard gauge practices with 2-8-0s and 30' freight cars...but still using underweight rail and little ballast. Engine weights and terrible grades were the two main problems.

Engine weights could be increased by strengthening trestles, increasing the rail size from 35lb on up to 75lb, and better support for the ties. All of these changes costs $$$. A few examples: The Colorado Midland's Class 175 2-8-0s were too large for most of the mainline, and served most of their careers at Basalt...IIRC, the D&RG's mudhens were too large for the Cumbras line when new, they had to be dead headed over the pass in order to serve west of Cumbras...a major reason why the C&S didn't get larger power was that it would require replacing too much rail on Boreas Pass.

Grades could be handled by more powerful locomotives. The C&S's new power search was to eliminate double heading and dead heading.

The Uintah increased weight of their 2-6-6-2ts by having them built as tank engines. I don't know if the water level was lower on the portions of the line without the steep grades or not. On the Sumptur Valley, they had the opposite problem...the tanks made them too heavy...and so they were removed.

The weight on drivers does not determine how powerful a locomotive it, but it does help determine how slippery it will be. The WoD should be 4x the tractive effort. Much above a FoA of 4.0, it won't slip very often...but the extra dead weight will reduce its ability to pull more cars and causing more wear to the track. If the FoA is much less than 4.0, it'll be slippery and struggle to pull much.

If a locomotive needs to carry more fuel, then a tender will be needed. If that locomotive has an adequate FoA, it is more maintenance friendly to remove the tank than to keep it. This is much like the fate of most streamlined locomotives...the shroudings were simplified and then removed for maintenance purposes.

Michael

 

I forgot to mention, and Boxcab brings it to mind...water weighs far more than coal. The NKP's berks carried 22 tons of coal 22,000 gallons of water...the water weighs 92 tons.

 

Hey Folks,

Another of the Kemtron On3 0-6-0T's is for sale on ebay.

http://cgi.ebay.com/Kemtron-Denver-...goryZ485QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

 

That looks very nice! I'd love to someday have three of them...EBT, RGS, and D&RG. Of course, there are so many locomotives I'd like to have that I'll be lucky to have one of them.

Michael

 

You're gonna love me for this...

I have found something very exciting for all you 30" fans who are modeling in 30" gauge and not quite feeling right because there was only 20 miles or so of official 30" guage track in all of America and that was in Hawaii on a sugar plantation...

Now as we know, there are very few railroads of 30" guage in America, right? But WAIT A SECOND!!! How many railroads went UNDOCUMENTED?

This excerpt is from "Encyclopedia of Western Railroad History: the Desert States" by Donald Robertson, Page 72:

"One of Arizona Eastern's major shippers must have been Inspiration Copper Co. at Miami. The copper firm purchased these standard guage locomotives new from the factory:

18x24 0-4-0 Porter 5454 9/13
18x24 2-4-2 Porter 5502 3/14
21x26 2-6-4 Porter 5733 10/15
21x26 2-6-4 Porter 6658 6/21
22x26 0-4-0 Porter 7026 7/26

During this same time frame, it purchased 18 [EIGHTEEN!!!] Porter 0-4-0s for the 30 inch mine track. [THIRTY INCH MINE TRACK!!!] In no instance were road numbers listed in Porter construction records that are known."

So there you have it, -n30 Fans, the place where you'll find your narrower narrow guage!! INSIDE larger places like open pit mines!!! Mine equipment in 30' guage is indeed quite common, and for good reason - space is at a premium in a mine even if it is open pit becase the mateiral is all being removed!

Why not use 36" gauge or standard guage? Do you really want a mainline freight getting lost and ending up INSIDED the mine? Sounds like a disaster!!

And since these railroads were on private property, you're not going to find a whole lot of official paper on these things! You might not even find photographs, seeing as how some private organizaitons are very sensitive to these sorts of things!

But the fact of the matter is that if there is lot of standard Mine apparatus like ore carts in 30" guage, there's been a whole lot more 30" guage trackage out there then we'll ever know!!

How much evidence would remain? Well, mines are pretty good about being cleaned up around the mid 70s and 80s by the EPA. And anything of metal was typically sold for scrap once the oepraiton came to clsoing time, so the whole place wauld have been sold off as quickly as possible and torn down!


Now imagine jsut how much railroad you can model...one mine, this Inspiration place, had EIGHTEEN of these little dandys inside their place...and all they did was drag cuts of ore cars from the lode to the tipple, or to the mill and then to the standard guage cars to be hauled to the smelters!!! [OR narrow guage, I found a lot more narrow guage [36"] in the encyclopedia then I thought existed before and that's just in Arizona.]

The only part the encclopedia will not tell us is if those locomotives were tank locomotives or tender locomotives...

 

Benny, you've brought up a good topic that has only been touched on before.

There was only 40 or so miles of common carrier 30" gauge. The most famous industrial (non-common carrier) railroad I can think of was the Quincy & Torch Lake (36" gauge). Most modelers model common carrier railroads (railroads which offer their services to the public rather than just being a part of their production line). Today, there are more than thirty 30" gauge locomotives left in the US.

I don't think the gauge mattered for these because they did not interchange. Since what they were hauling went from the mines/pits/forrest to the processing facility, they didn't need to be compatible with the local railroad. Sometimes they were and did connect up (such as at the end of the SPng where an industrial line had a physical connection with the SPng). If you were a common carrier, all sorts of additional rules applied to you about modifying your services, safety equipment, crew policies, etc. The local railroads didn't want you to tie into their trackage if you weren't paying them to ship your cars...as switches both cost money and cause accidents. Since no interchanging was typically necessary, the cheapest feasible gauge was usually chosen (36", 30", 24", or 18").

An exception to this is when the industrial line had a special arrangement with a common carrier. I believe that the RGS, DL&G, D&RG, ET&WNC, EBT and probably many others had such arrangements. Frequently, the industrial road paid the common carrier to work their line...othertimes, their mill (processing facility) was not right on the common carrier where their line met it so they had to haul either have the common carrier haul the raw material over part of the main or the finished product had to be hauled to the common carrier for shipment. Several well known companies such as the Montezuma Lumber Co and Halleck Bros used equipment purchased or leased from the common carrier.

I believe that the distinction between common carrier and private carrier wasn't as significant in the 1870s...but became very pronounced after 1905. A railroad being a common carrier was simply accepting additional business at the expense of allowing government regulating it. The EBT was a common carrier because it hauled some passengers, hauled gravel, hauled lumber, hauled the mail, and hauled small quantities of frieght...even though most of the traffic was company coal. The price the EBT paid was its court battles over adding power brakes and knuckle couplers. (The Pacific Coast Ry and Tweetsie also had such battles iirc). It also gives the government the power to block the cutting of services and abandonment of lines (principle causes of the failures of so many railroads in the 1960s).

If you model an private carrier, you cannot have any business that is not directly a part of the parent company. The only passenger trains are hauling the company's workers. No other businesses could be served. If the EBT had been a private carrier, it would have only hauled coal and miners...no lumber, not ganister service, no mail, no station agents.

Since very few porters were used by common carriers after the failure of the narrow gauge trunk line, it is most appropriate for them to be on industrial railroads as Benny has suggested.

 

You know, I am smiling about that news Thanks for hunting that down Benny!!

 

And now I'm gonna make that smile bigger...hehehe

This post by way of Atlas N Forum:

So, are you still quitting On30, the "Fake" scale/gauge combination, now? hehe

I feel badder than an kid pouring a sugar cellar down an ant hill...

 

I still may convert my moguls to On3 down the road, but as for my tanks...they will stay as they are for sure

 

I think that you are making a wise call on the porters. I bought my with the intention of converting it to On3...but the coupler height is just way too low. I would have a small On30 line for it, but I prefer the contrast of On3 and On2 over On3 and On30...and I have a couple On2 cars. B-mans porters are nice little engines...especially when you can sometimes get them for around $30!

You know that you have the option of converting some of your equipment to On3 if you so desire, and so you have the freedom to continue working with On30 without fear of the trains not being compatible if at some point you switch to On3.

Michael