Hello,

With the recent YRE announcement an the possible conversion of the 614 to liquid fuel, I need educated on how steam locomotive oil burners work. I have good grasp on coal firing.

First, is the oil atomized and sprayed though nozzles into the firebox, similar to a residential furnace? If so, is the oil pressurized with a pump or air? If it is a pump, is the pump driven by a turbine or small piston engine? I assume some degree of fuel preheating is necessary for cold weather running? This may be very critical for biodiesel because I believe it gells a very low temperatures. I would assume a steam heating module could readily be applied to the oil tank in the tender.

Next comes regulation. While a coal burner is somewhat self-regulating since the stack draws on the fire and increases the combustion rate, does an oil burner require the fireman to increase the fuel rate manually in order to maintain heat demand? I quess it is really no different in concept from a stoker control on a coal burner. Is my logic right here?

How about ignition? While a residential burner has spark gap generator, does a locomotive rely on existing combustion to keep going? I am fairly certain they do not have a spark gap! If they are relying on existing combustion, is there a risk of sudden combustion loss and reignition? If so can this create flash explosions? If you think of all the residual heat in the firebox and you keep dumping raw fuel into it, the fuel could volatize and flash if ignition is delayed. This is why you have a flame safety relay on a residential oil or gas furnace. If some poor sap can't get is furnace lit and keeps resetting the relay without purging the firebox, he is asking for serious trouble. If seen fuel volatize and it appears as thick white smoke but it is vapor and if you ignite it, it flashes like natural gas, very nasty.

I would like feedback on the basic theory. Thank you!

Regards,

Randy Musselman

Some info and photos on what the Grand Canyon railroad has installed in it's locomotives for oil burners.

http://www.martynbane.co.uk/modernsteam/nday/gc/oil.htm

I have fired oil and might give some insight on doing so. First of all, RUN AWAY!!!.. Just kidding. I have fired wood and coal as well. Oil is physically easy, but mentally frustrating.

The basic theory of operation is that the burner is on constantly and the fire brick opposing the burner is the "ignition system" in that it glows red after a short time and reignites any "flame-outs" (I had one - the fire goes quiet and the stack goes white on #2 oil, then comes an earth shattering KABOOM when she relights). The way the oil is atomized is basically two different ways - internal or external mixing. Internal mixing (the one on the engine I work on)is where the oil is mixed with the steam and exits the burner as an aerosol. The external mixing type flows oil over a slit with the atomizing steam issuing from it. You are adjust a "spot fire" in the terminal for an "idle" fire position on the valve handle quadrant with a firing or drifting pin.

The location and orientation of the burner in the firebox or pan is usually under the tubes with the burner aimed at the brick in the firebox below the door opening. Baldwin had some of theirs in the pan pointing up at the same target. the small Baldwin I run occasionally had it level targeted under the door.

The fire is regulated along with demand and water supply to boiler, with a faster heat response than coal. Here's something to remember you can build a really hot fire in a big hurry and damage the firebox if not careful.

When plumbing a burner, provide a pet cock for slow bleed for keeping any condensate out of the burner - you don't want water in your fire or firebox

Here's how I do it starting on air atomizer (a wood fire could be built as well, but makes a mess):

1. With the normal pre-firing boiler checks done - leaks, water level, etc., make sure the firing manifold steam valve is closed down stream of the turret as well as any valves downstream on the manifold. For a light off torch, find a coal fire rake and wind up the end with a cotton rag (sythetic rags met and stink) and soak it in light oil and have it ready with a steel bucket of water to extinguish after use.

2. Open the oil valve on the fuel tank and make sure the firing valve seals closed.

3. Connect air line to the manifold, (if there is none yet, install a Chicago fitting like the ones used on jack hammers) install safety pin in fitting, and energize.

4. Bleed any and all water from the blower line and burner.

5. Crack open the damper and blower line just enough to have a slight draft at the firedoor.

6. Crack open the atomizer to have a reasonable flow of air issuing from it.

7. Light the torch and place near the burner, then slowly open the firing valve. This is where you have to be patient and slowly adjust the oil and atomizer until a stable and clean flame is dancing off the end of the burner and inch or two - drown the torch when you are happy with the fire. Set your firing or drifting pin on the closed side of the valve. Don;t make it so tight that you can't break it free by hand if you have to.

As the boiler warms up and makes steam, I cut over to steam atomizer at no less then 20-25 psi. When going over to steam, follow the same basic instructions for lighting off. Make sure you depressurize the air line completly and disconnect the air line.

On the road, the more oil you feed it, the more atomizer you need to break up the oil to burn, too much will blow out the fire. Hence the frustrating part - its all about balance and knowing what you want to accomplish.

One final thought - the atomizer is consuming steam, and thereby using water. Mind the water glass and don't leave her unattended!!!

PM me if you have any further questions.

Hope this helps you a little.

Ray

A superb explanation, Ray.

MX

Thanks MX!

Some other thoughts came to me... afterwards.

If you plan to run heavy oil, you will need heaters to make the oil flow smoothly to the burner. We use #2 heating oil which is easy. This engine I work on has a couple of heaters for the #6 it used to metabolize in its first life, one in the tank (or it used to) and one under the cab. The one under the cab is a probably not much more that a pipe in a pipe heat exchanger the a condensate drain.

I did read where another engine used heavy oil and a temporary burner running on Kerosene from a drum on the tender. The burner is placed in the door to bring up the steam to get the main oil warmed and moving. That one was a real balancing act - have enough water in the boiler at cold start to make sure you have enough water to cover the hot parts so you could force more water in, but not so much that you took all day to bring up the pressure and use up all the Kerosene on board.

A concept I came up with, but yet to do anything about is to install a oil fired water heater with a circulation pump to heat up the water overnight so that the fire up moves along faster in the morning. I figure in through the whistle feed, out through the blow down valve. I found that the water legs behind the brick are much cooler that above until the pressure starts building - little circulation in the boiler on a low fire setting.

As far a flame outs go, the one I spoke of was the worst that first weekend we had running it until got the burner targeted on the brick instead of the door... the next morning. After that few degree adjustment, life was much better. I was firing and running with a longtime friend who has been running steam as long as I have been alive and we trust each other form working on another enginer, so when things go shaky the first time out, we got through with a few laughs and look back on it the same way.

This burner enters the firebox water leg below the throat sheet through a 4" boiler tube section welded into place.

Whatever you do, DON'T USE A FIRE SHEET AS A TARGET!!! You could overheat rivets or stays and then you know what happens!!! If I had my druthers, the burner would be located in the pan, but there is little room to so so in this engine, maybe the 614's firepan can accommodate this.

You will want to be able to see the color of your fire as you are firing and making adjustments. Most oil burners have peep holes in the door, but our door is solid. I could see through a gap between the door ring and backhead (I got shin splints for standing so long in that position one day it took a few days for it to clear up). You want a meduim to bright yellow color. If the color is too white, the fire may not be hot enough and if dim with a clan stack, your fire is almost to the point of blowing out - too much atomizer. You may think you are saving fuel, but if you aren't making steam, its not economical. The stack (firing on #2) shouldn't excceede a hazy appearance. If the stack is totally clear, you may have a hot enough fire. If you have get to a stack you can't see through and you still can't make steam, you either have a dirty boiler or you fire controls are way out of adjustment.

You'll want to carry a bucket of aproximately 80 grit sand and an ice scoop on board to sand the flues when working hard to keep the heating surfaces clean (the cinders do this on a coal burner). We don't run far enough or hard enough yet to warrant doing this. when you sand, do so when the demand is strong and constant so you can tell when you have the majority of the soot off of the tubes. Don't sand where there are a lot of people or houses around...

I like to also listen to the sound of the fire to tell how it is doing. You should have a nice strong rumble, not an anemic hiss. I add fuel for heat then atomizer to adjust the flame. I only open the damper enough to let the fire breathe. In the station, I shut it because there are some openings in the pan and that enough until she starts wanting more oil. Also, once I light off and the fire stabilizes a bit, I back off the blower to just cracked open to keep the heat moving through the tubes (and smoke from exiting the firedoor openings), but not so much to pull in much col air through the firepan openings or damper - yet another balancing act. The fire pan in the engine I work on has a 12" x 12" opening in the floor of the firepan just ahead of the firedoor that allows air into the firebox from the damper area where the fire reaches the brick under the door. To me, that is like a hole in a coal fire that should be covered or your box will cool down. But here, it is a necessary evil in that is where the fresh air comes from, but only give her what see needs - a harder exhaust on an oil burner doesn't naturally doesn't equal a hotter fire like on a coal burner where you are pulling air through the fire in the same exact manner, that's only accomplished with adding more oil and atomizer. It would be nice if the damper would automatically match the draft, but I have never heard of such a device on an engine.

One thing to do during a conversion is to add pressure gauges to a gauge cluster for the fireman - similar to what may already be installed - that is, atomizer and blower pressures. After a few turns of running, you'll know at this given place or demand you need approximately "X" PSI to atomize the amount of BTU's of fuel flowing into the firebox.

I had many of the same questions you do before working on one. The key's to being successful with burning oil is understanding what you are working with and using good judgment and common sense to get the job done. There are others on this board who are happy to help steer you in the right direction and avoid some pitfalls that are part of any learning curve. If you know somebody with a locomotive cyclopedia (I don't have one) they can provided drawings to help illustrate what you are looking into. I had some nice diagrams from the web (which I think is no longer available) showing Baldwin diagrams of the cross section of a oil burning firebox and the arrangement of burner, brickwork, and dampers, but can't put my fingers on it at the moment.

Let me take a shot at some of these questions.

The burners that you will find on most oil burning engines are the drooling type. The regulated oil flow flows out of a slot at the upper front edge of the burner and drools down onto a shelf where steam blows out of another slot at the lower edge and then atomizes the oil into the firebox. Another type that I have seen is a cup or looks like a tin can where the regulated oil fills the can and as it flows over the edge a steam jet atomizes it into the firebox. There are many variations of these burners. The location of the burner was generally at the front of the firebox blowing back onto a flashwall and curling towards the flue sheet. CP and some other roads used a burner at the back of the firebox directing the flame into a brick arch. Still others had burners in both front and back.

Someone posted a link to the grand canyon engine retrofit. This is an excellent system that atomizes the oil internal to the burner. This system also has burners for low fire (spot firing) and then road firing burners.

The oil is heated in the tender oil tank usually in a bowl so that the thick oil can flow down into the delivery pipe. Some locomotives had a drum type heater after the tender tank and some had a simple steam pipe within a delivery pipe to heat the oil. The heated oil was to help the thick oil flow, help in atomizing and also to help in combustion. This of course was when most engines burned the bunker or residual fuels. Now we see most engines burning waste oils, diesel oil number two and some different blends like ps400 or 600. These oils are light enough in viscosity that tank heat isn't used much. Perhaps in snow country though.

The valve that controls the oil flow is shaped so that better control is had at low demand and more flow is had at higher demand. The valve is not just a ball valve. The fireman then regulates the oil flow to meet the steam demand for the engineer.

Locomotives did not have a burner safety system, no pilot light or automatic spark type starter. To light a locomotive burning waste is tossed into the firebox in front of the burner. The atomizer is brought up and then the oil flow gently opened. The blower is cracked open as well.
The combustion is the product and this keeps the flame lit. The brickwork is there to protect metal sheets that are not cooled by boiler water on the back side. The flashsheet at the back serves to help turn the flame and it protects the rear sheet from direct contact by the flame. If this portion of brick wall was not there then the flame would damage the sheet. This wall nor any other brick work is heated to red hot in order to keep the flame lit. If the flame does go out the flame should not be relit on hot brick work. The hot gas igniting can damage the brickwork or even blow the firedoor back into someones face. Proper procedure is to close the oil and then throw cotton waste that has been drenched in kerosene and lit into the firebox then the oil and atomizer are brought up.

When a cold boiler is brought on line the cold water must be heated slowly. If not damage can occur in the way of leaky flues or staybolts. Sheets can also be damaged by uneven heat. Hot water introduced from an external source is a good method. Using a steam generator also works very well. Torpedo heaters can be put into the firebox the night before. The next day the water should be around 100F. Circulating the boiler water by an external pump works as well. The external pump is hooked to a blow down and the water drawn from this point. Then the water is pumped through a delivery line through a boiler check and this circulates the water from top to bottom. This will give even heat all around the mud legs, backhead and through the boiler. All three methods are good and the trick is slow heat to heat the water evenly. This is true for coal, oil, wood or any boiler.

Ray, Adam and Mike,

Thank you for the excellant feedback. It was very informative. With steam atomization, I wonder what happens to the resulting emissions? I wonder if the steam injection has the effect of lowering NOx? There is likely so little used that it has minimal effect.

Some years ago, I understand that CAT experimented with water injection into diesel engines and had some success. I have not read about it but wonder if it had a benefical effect with emissions. The downside with internal combustion is that the water can accumulate in the lube oil. In the case of a steam locomotive, you have one pass for the water and combustion gases.

The South African's worked with condensing steam locomotives but I believe they had to deal with skimming for oil removal prior to reinjecting the water into the boiler.

Thank you!

Regards,

Randy

Welsh Highland Railway has developed a centrally mounted burner which vaporizes rather than atomizes. Sulzer uses a cluster of burners. There's a lot going on if you follow this stuff........I think based on what really smart people are doing, a vaporizing system with really good drafting and air flow control combined with a boiler providing good circulation will result in the best attainable efficiency and cleanliness we can get now - until more developments occur.

And then, there is the unworkable system developed by Indian Railways for the first generation of oil fired teakettles on the Darjeeling Himalaya. Perhaps the least said about it the better.

Unfortunately, the systems that work the best require the best reliable quality of fuel - the variability in inexpensive waste oil isn't compatable.

If we can use the project to develop a clean efficient combustion system that can handle whatever fuels are inexpensively locally available it would certainly be of note from both environmental and development points of view.

dave

Some years ago, I was involved with FEC 148, and agree with the term "drooling burner". I will give that system credit credit, though, for being able to burn just about any liquid except water.

At the same time, the late Earle Gil had two locomotives on the Morris County Central that used burners of his own design. I got to "guest fire" each of them; I don't remember too many of the details, but he used a pressurized system.

I remember there was a pump with two motors, 32 VDC and 115VAC. The fire was started with shop air and with the AC motor. Once the steam pressure was high enough, the blower and atomization were cut over to steam, and the DC motor ran the pump off the headlight generator. (In later years, after Earle was no longer involved day to day, I remember seeing a Briggs genset on the tender deck, I imagine there were problems wih the 32V motors.

The million dollar question, and I don't have an answer, was where the atomization took place. I also remember some discussion about burner placement, two burners aimed at each other and blowing each other out, hotspots on the crown sheet, etc.

It seems like a lot of development went on there. Anyone know any more? This was all 35 or 40 years ago. I was interested in what was going on, but was with a "competing" tourist operation at the time, and didn't get up to MCC too often.

Going back to the Briggs, my oldest son was interested in the General, and I found an old issue of Trains that L&N set up the engine in the 1960s to burn diesel, with an oil tank and a pair of Briggs under the fake woodpile.
One Briggs for the air compressor, and one to run a fuel pump. Curious as to what kind of burner (much smaller than 614 will need, of course) was used there.

I also worked for a company in the mid 1970s that had a sister company in the burner business. I don't know if they are still around, but the name was Blue Flame. I remember seeing a brochure that showed some of the flame directed into a U-turn and being used to preheat, atomize and ignite the fresh oil.

I suspect that the power plant guys have this all down to a science, just how many drops per KWH. at today's oil prices, they have to-

The burners used by the gcr do have promise but, despite an article published in trains, were actually using several hundred gallons more fuel per day than the SP style. The problem was identified but I do not believe the alterations have been made at this point, there was an issue with the internal passages and resulting flow pattern of the steam. Also, all three are used while road firing, the small burner is turned up all the way and then left alone...the larger burners are then adjusted. These burners would not be suitable for use on the YRE if it is in fact to use bio fuel. Bio fuel tends to form a glaze over critical internal parts, the knife edges, and this reults in a poorly performing burner.
These burners are still experimental and for what this project is going to do, for what the railroads are going to expect, my vote would be for an SP style burner. Tried, true and with proper sepuerheat and a properly vented firepan they can be surprisingly effecient.

GENERAL was equipped with a Vapor - Clarkson steam genny burner system. two burners each facing towards the door sheet if memory serves, but it has been a while since was in there.

Crown used Leahy burners on their 36" gage engines.

The FEC burners were concentrically cored castings, with the inside tube carrying atomizing steam, the middle one the fuel, and the outer a heating jacket. Like the Van Boden Ingles burners, they do well with a pretty broad range of fuels.

I think the 203 has some sort of a dual burner system, but don't know the particulars. Perhaps somebody from there can contribute?

dave

Does anybody know what the cab controls look like on the Grand Canyon engines? Do they have a traditional quadrant shaped firing valve or some other form of controls? Many of the oil fired engines I have seen have simple manifold valves for the blowers that basically run the blower wide open or it is off. I have been told that was to maintain a clean stack on a standing oil fire you needed to run the blower wide open anyway. Is this the case on the GC engines or any oil fired locomotive for that matter?

John Bohon

I have never heard of running the blower wide open except for a moment to clear the firebox of gas when the fire unexpectedly goes out.

The blower is only run when the locomotive is standing and then only enough to maintain draft. When the locomotive goes into a long drift the blower can be run to maintain draft because the throttle is shut off or nearly off. But then only enough to maintain a fire and steam. Sometimes depending on the territory the fireman may need a little help on draft and will use a little blower.

A wide open blower is going to suck cold air into the firebox causing cold spots on the tube sheet. This in turn causes the flues to leak where they are rolled into the sheet. Reason being is that you will have some tubes now wanting to shrink back a little and others wanting to stay expanded from the heat. Different lenghts is tweaking the sheet. This isn't good.

Some engines can be fired on the spot without any blower. Once the boiler is hot which includes smokebox and firebox then the system will draft like a chimney even though horizontal. This is good as the engine isn't sucking any cold air.

John,

This is the fireman's side of 29. The valves are labeled accordingly. All very traditional until you see the gauges that are in his face. They monitor superheat temp, boiler pressure and a few other things.

Thanks for the photo. It answers several questions.

I have only been around a handfull of oil burners, principally the two shays at Cass years ago. When standing on a spot fire or drifting the blowers were always roaring. The crews all told me running the blower hard was the only way to maintain steam pressure and a clean stack. I can not recall a single instance when I was at Cass and the oil burners were not being run this way.

The Western Maryland pacific number 202 in Hagerstown, Maryland City Park is an oil burner with a blower valve that is basically either full on or off. Knowing many WM employees I soon found out these locomotives were apparently operated with the blowers either wide open or off.

The only other engine I have been around that burned oil was T&P 610. I do not remember how the blower was operated on this engine on the Southern.

Adam Mizer's description of how to use the blower is exactly the way I use it on coal. I must admit oil is still an unknown to me and I appreciate you taking the time to help me learn.

John Bohon