Keeping warm on a train

Steve_175

Was in Florida for the holidays and went to Sarasota to check out the P.T.Barnum estate. The house was named Ca d Zan and has some amazing details and whimsical flourishes. The estate also has a first rate fine art museum and a building that houses the artifacts, memorabilia, and an amazing model of the circus as it would have looked in the 1930's.

One of these artifacts was P.T.Barnum's custom made Pullman car he used as a home on wheels when the circus was traveling across country. You will notice in the pics there were pipes running along the wall at the floor. These were heating pipes drawing steam from the engine to keep them warm. The whole car was trimmed in mahogany, with stained glass and a kitchen in the back. Unfortunately the kitchen is a mock up because the original was destroyed in a fire.

I have also included a pic of a radiator in the house with an interesting valve on it.

Steamhead

Wow

that Pullman was the Cadillac of its day.



The Vapor system serving that radiator is a Webster. I don't remember anyone else making a valve whose handle stuck up like that. And the trap looks like a Webster 5-series Sylphon trap. Again, the Cadillac of heating in its day and still one of the best out there.

Jamie Hall

I might add...

that if any of us should think that we have problems with our steam systems, consider the poor car men for a passenger train in the days of steam heat.  The steam was moderately high pressure (I don't have the exact figure), and the connections between cars were "glad hand" connections -- which leaked.  And had to be made up in horrible temperatures.  The wonder is, particularly on the longer trains (say Twentieth Century or Broadway Limited, or Empire Builder -- or the Canadian and the Dominion -- operating in well subzero temperatures), that the system worked at all.



Originally the steam came from the engine -- which had plenty of it.  But after diesels came in (say 1946 or so) passenger diesels were distinguished by having independent steam generator boilers in them, which were all pot-burner types and a fireman's nightmare.  Canadian National, at least, then went to special steam generator cars which lasted well into the 90s, until all the cars were converted to electric heat (480V three phase, either off the engine's main alternator or off a separate generator set in the main engine).

World Plumber

WOW

I remember going through some of the cars before the digital cameras. They had cars with the pipes around the floors. Then they had one with radiators in it and a backup boiler so they could keep it heated if it wasn't connected to the engine. If I ever get back up there I'll take pictures and post them.

Jean-David Beyer

Steam heating reailroad trains.

I know the steam went through a pressure reducing valve. There was not plenty of steam, and the locomotive engineers resented all the steam that was used to heat the train, since they felt it should be used to move the engine. On most locomotives, the fireman had to shovel in extra coal to keep up with the heating. Later larger locomotives had stokers, but coal did not burn uniformly, so the fireman had to shovel in coal to cover the thin spots in the fire, and move the high spots to even things out. You get a heck of a large draft when it goes "choo", and nearly none in between. On big locomotives, they superheated the steam. I think they picked up the steam for the air compressors, generator, injectors, or heating from the steam dome, not from after the superheater.



But think about the problems. We know the steam to the train was less than 225 psi, or whatever the boiler produced. But the steam going through the pipes condensed, and you had to get rid of the condensate. If you didn't the condensate could freeze in low spots, and after that, no heat farther back. On each car was a clever valve that noticed the steam temperature, and if it got too low, the valve opened and dumped the water out. I do not know if it was pure temperature, or also weight. Those valves were a lot of trouble, and would freeze up at times. But ideally, they dumped the condensate and retained the steam.