Steam power

this is cool

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uypuAHTTg_g

Go go boiler go

What great stuff you've all found here, particularly the Jay Leno Doble, I've had a fascinating read and a throwback to my childhood and the toy steam engine. The ones by Wilesco... Lots of good smart entertainment until the day the steam engine's feet put burn marks on the coffee table in the living room.

Here's a picture of pure steam power in action.

The Chicago museum of Science and Industry has a wonderful collection of miniature steam engines of all types imaginable. The museum also has a display of a fin tube steam radiator, how much more educational can you go? (the whole place is steam heated)

Looking back

Reverse? It was as simple as shoveling the coal in backwards motion - ta daaa.

OK, I read way too many car repair books where they never fail to say: -simply reverse procedure... this in order to reassemble the whole thing.

A great customer of ours (a large factory) did operate its marshalling yard and side spurs with small oil fired steam engines, this until shortly into the eighties. Nothing crazy, Greenfield Village in Ford's Detroit still does.

The French still kowtow to steam power. Their most successful high speed train, the all electric TGV is an anagram that immediately recalls the era of steam. Customarily, people would specify the amount of steam to be used on their parcel service, PV, petite vapeur, thus small steam for slow speed, GV, grande vapeur, not unlike Starbucks for large, made it full steam and fast. Of course, nowadays, the meaningless, global priority express says nothing much about how fast things actually get there, likewise, the Germans named their high speed train the ICE - which says nothing about melting off the wheels because it goes so fast or... so slow.

They solved the reverse problem by putting pointy cockpits on both ends of the train. Can't stop progress.

And...

> mode of steam transportation. Nothing like a

> boiler under your butt!

>

> One Hot

> Ride!

>

> http://www.spilling.de/uk/index-steamengi

> nes.htm



This is cool on several levels.

Check out the southern pacific 4449 towards the end:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27rFwrkw5vk&mode=related&search=

Speed? oh yeah, that means fast -

Queen Victoria of the British Empire was their first monarch in 1842 to travel by steam (there not being any rails before her time). In most classy fashion, there was of course the royal train, with the royal dining car and the royal saloon and the royal waiting rooms at the royal train stations, all draped in heavy velvet. Among the gadgetry -which was being invented on the fly- came much of the safety systems for secluding trains within one block of rails; semaphores were also put together in order to first transmit communications from the very important passenger to the engine crew.

What do you think was the most common royal order coming doing the pipe? Well, 35 MPH was fast, faster than anything else, and the Queen liked it... only... much... much... slower. Slow down was her constant reminder to the shovel happy royal engineers.

At least this way Queen Victoria got to enjoy a very long reign, but it didn't last forever, eventually there had to be the royal funerary train to transport her coffin. But now, new King Edward VII was in charge and he was a stickler for timekeeping: the ceremonies tending to last long, the day had already gotten stretched... steam would come to the rescue of the precious time chart and orders came down the royal semaphore to get things to speed up a bit. Eagerly, the engineers got to beat a national speed record! Imagine that, the late Queen had never ever traveled that fast! And wouldn't you know? Nothing happened to her and she didn't even complain. She traveled at more than 80 MPH.

But it was all smooth and gentle steam power... by then also, rail cars were steam heated. Hint hint.

It is amazing how much of this royal patronage did to both inspire innovation and promote rail travel, with the illustrious passengers not always aware of how much testing was being done on them. I imagine railroad company officials biting their nails off while waiting on the red carpeted platforms. Advertising works: the German Kaiser, a mourner on board the funerary cortege did take notice of the remarkable speed performance of the steam engine.

Aaaall Aboaaaard

I volunteer on this beauty:

http://www.6060.org

I rode that train when I was a kid, and now I get to drive her!

Harry is still kicking and still driving that train. He's teaching me lots! He wants to retire from her but we won't let him *LOL* Yep, 6060 used to pull the rail-fans tours in Ontario, that's how I first found her, I was nine years old when my Dad took me on a Niagara Falls steam trip. When I found her again out west, they dragged me up onto the engine when I showed them my high-pressure certification, and immediately started teaching me how to fire her! She used to be an express train, top speed of 70 mph. When she does a run-by, you can feel it through your boots! But you don't want to ask about her fuel efficiency.... XD

I am green with envy!!

Now that is a steam machine.

Maine Doug, is that #98 a Baldwin? She looks like a twin of our #41 Baldwin "Consolidation":

http://rides.webshots.com/photo/1346440485041140363WsVxdy

http://www.absteamtrain.com/

#6060 begins her running season on July 19th this year, and will have runs into September. Here is her schedule:

http://www.6060.org/schdhome.htm