One loco is being overlooked here as a challenger: C&O 614.

The TE figures for C&O J3a as built: 66,453 lb solo, with booster: 78,853 lb

The railfan media of 1980-81 made note of the fact that, according to riders and witnesses, 614 took essentially the same (shortened) trains over Sand Patch and Seventeen-Mile Grade in Pa. and Md./W.V. as 2101 had, and although it took slightly longer, the 614 did not slip "even once," at least on the 1980 runs, whereas there were plenty of recordings of 2101 slipping often on the same grades. I personally rode behind 614 on a full train up the almost-as-severe grade from Rockwood to Somerset, Pa. in July 1981, and as my audio tape revealed, the only slip was starting after stopping to pick up the conductor/flagman after throwing a wye switch.

All this does, of course, is add another debatable factor to the equation--on top of rain, track wear, leaves, crew experience and route knowledge, etc.

.

Not to knock the 611, but one thing that might be problematical is her adhesion ratio. The engine is supposed to have 288,000 lbs. on her drivers, but with a rated tractive effort of 80,000 lbs., your looking at a factor of adhesion of only 3.6 (4.0 is normally considered close to ideal). That's pretty low, almost down to a diesel factor rating of about 3.3 (thanks to smoother torque and traction control with the electric drive). Undoubtedly the 611 is among the locomotives where use of sand was a pretty fundamental part of the locomotive's operation.

Against that, a factor of adhesion of 4 with that 288,000 lbs. of weight gives you an effective tractive effort of 72,000--still pretty high, especially for the passenger trains she was designed to pull.

Perhaps someone here, possibly someone who's even run the 611, can comment on whether the engine is as slippery as its paper calculations might suggest.

I can testify to the fact that the 611 tends to slip at slower speeds and is very dependent on a good flow of sand to keep her feet.

On 2 trips that I was running her the 614 needed the assist of the booster to get her train moving and we used the booster extensively on the 17 mile grade and Sandpatch trips to get those tonnage rated trains up those long hard pulls.

I'll be riding Saturday's 2102 trip in o/w coach # 4 and look forward to meeting some of my fellow RyPN posters.

Thanks, Ross

You can have all the power in the world, but if you can't keep that power on the rails then it means nothing. There are a lot of factors that come into play on how an engine will do under certain conditions. There are probably some lowly 2-8-2's or 2-8-0's that would have done a better job of lifting that train up the hill than 2102 under those circumstances. Perhaps the most important factor is the skill of the crew in manipulating their machine to get maximum tractive effort to the rail. The technique used by Shane here of constantly opening and closing the throttle is something I've never seen. This is running by the seat of your pants to get full boiler pressure into the cylinders but then reducing it just in time to prevent a slip. This is skirting a very fine line of not enough vs. too much and he seems to be getting it just right. And look at the fireman. White hot fire, maximum boiler pressure, clear stack and a calm attitude only making minor adjustments. I'm just as impressed with their skills as I am the 2102.

Tractive effort means nothing if you don't have adhesion.

There was a 2 position selector alongside our reverse quadrant. You should put it in the idle position to warm it up. The cylinder cocks on the booster will time out and then you put it in the run position. You can hear the gear engage and cylinder cocks are closed.
The steam supply to the booster engine came from the fireman's side cylinder on 1522. When the engine throttle was open, both the engine and the booster were running.
We also had a cut out valve that was like a press to cut out in case the booster slipped.
I'm sure there's literature out on the net to acquaint you with all the controls and what they did.
As soon as the engine was working well enough to hook it up at a certain point the booster latch disengaged and shut off.

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Invented in Britain nearly two centuries ago (albeit with steam).

See also the Miller traction increaser, on the first true long-distance railroad in the world.

I've seen live steam locomotives with a chain going from the rear most driving axle to the trailing truck axle.

There's a video on youtube somewhere of 2716 with it's booster clearly operating where you can hear the exhaust beats.


If say the 1522 was coal fired, would having the booster impede a large hopper style ash pan?

Hello,

A bit OT here. Where do they turn the 2102 these days at the south end, near Port Clinton? Port Clinton does have a wye and the Port Clinton turntable isn’t large enough. Turns are done at the north on the new Jim Thorpe wye. This has been mentioned before but I don’t recall where. Reading downtown isn’t practical and controlled by NS.

Thanks.

Randy

Not very likely, at least I wouldn't think so.

All the booster applications I've seen were on relatively modern locomotives with cast trailing trucks. Usually the load bearing and centering devices associated with such a truck are at the rear of the truck frame, and there is also a large main frame cross member that rests on that.

The booster engine is at least partially mounted on the trailing truck's cross member, and all of this is aft of that main frame cross member and the supporting and centering devices. All of this is also well aft of the ash pans.

I don't know which locomotive this is--it may not even be in the United States (some more searching suggests its an American or Canadian built French "Liberation" 2-8-2, a 141R)--but in the photo below, we have a cast "Delta" two wheel trailing truck. This one doesn't have a booster, but its supporting rockers are visible, as well as the big main frame cross member that rests on them. You may also notice that the running surface of the cross member has a crown in it; the two inclined planes there provide the centering action for the rockers on the trailer itself.

You can also see the cross member at the rear of the trailing truck below all this, which is where the booster would be mounted. There are a lot of other things there, including what looks like a cold water pump for the feedwater heater, but stuff like that is normally easy to move around to provide space for the booster and its articulated piping joints.

2102 is turned at the Haucks wye, just railroad south of Jim Thorpe.

Hence why you don't see back-to-back dates of 2102 runs out of Outer Station or Port Clinton. After the round-trips for the day are completed, the crews then use a diesel and bring 2102 up to Port Clinton - either for servicing and they do it the next day, or that same night - will then bring 2102 all the way up to Haucks to turn it for whenever the next trip is. It makes for an extremely long night for all involved, hence why they only do one-off trips, instead of both dates on a particular weekend.

Here's a link to a cell phone video of 2102 arriving at Tunkhannock on June 22, 2024:

https://imgur.com/gallery/BkkJLmZ

After we watched the arrival, we went West towards home. We wound up driving through several downpours. I hope none of them hit Tunkhannock, the downpours had sheets of rain so bad I almost pulled over.

Brian Helfrich