I have a question about removing a cab from a steam locomotive. At Wilmington and Western the cab of #98 was cut and welded all the way around during her time on the Mississippi Central in the 1930's. I'm thinking maybe it was done as a quick and dirty way to remove the cab to replace staybolts at the top of the boiler. I can't come up with any better theory. Does anyone have any thoughts on this matter?

Thanks,

I guess you should look around the cab for bolted places to hold the cab as a full unit, perhaps added by the mod to make it a one shot removal.

A light overhead crane prolly would lift it right out or a few hand wrenches.
You may need to check if any cab parts don't interfere or require removal.

Tom,
Not being able to look at the whole cab, its hard to say but I'd suggest a simpler explanation. Replacement of corroded sheet metal along the bottom of cab walls is a fairly common thing, and from the photo it looks like that may have been the case here. I'd think the cab was off the engine when the work was done, and I'd also think it would be easier to cut or remove the bolts and/or tie rods holding the cab to the floor and boiler rather than cutting the bottom of the cab off if the purpose was to remove it for access to the top of the boiler. Just guessing...

I'm not 100% sure I understand your question. Some could read it that the cab was welded to the floor, etc.
I'm sure there are bolts around the sides and ends of the cab where it's bolted to the cab floor. There should be some attachments to the boiler somewhere to unbolt plus piping that goes through the walls and such.
With all of that unbolted, you could either use a chain and hook to each corner of the roof and lift. We put a beam through the cab windows and lifted the cab with straps around each end of the beam and had guys at each corner keeping it level and watching the lift.

To be more clear. Would there be a advantage to torching the cab in order to lift it off over unbolting it?

I have given thought to the fact that maybe they replaced the bottom due to rot but the cut/weld line goes all the way around. It's not just the side panels. I guess repairing rot could still be a reason.

Tom, are the cuts/welds visible on the cab interior as well, or are they covered over with sheathing?

If frame members were also cut it would seem like they did a wholesale replacement of the cab bottom. If the metal all seems to be the same as far as thickness and surface texture, and if the interior framing all matches up dimensionally, I certainly understand your puzzlement. If the cab was cut to expedite removal, the advantage would have been lost in having to reconstruct it when done. Either way, as Frisco1522 mentioned, all the plumbing would still need to be removed/disconnected for the cab to come off.

Another consideration is that if torch-cut, some height would be lost, upwards of at least 1/4-inch, and that height loss would have to be compensated for by adding braces/spacers while the cut was welded up or possibly adjusting holes in the front cab wall where pipes pass through. I know that doesn't answer your question, but you asked for thoughts... :>)

that is definately heat welding warp on that cab and its erratic. We would need to see more pics inside, but it does look like just doing a weld cut around to lift the cab out to make an easy cheat to lift the cab top away then just re-weld it back on, (than bother disconnecting a lot of piping..things etc making a bigger puzzle to put back together)

Another possible reason for cab-cutting would be to lower the height of the load if the locomotive was being moved by truck.

For example, a Shay (Robert Dollar 2978) was moved from WRM to Roots of Motive Power in Willits, Ca by truck. The cab was cut and lowered to make the load height acceptable.

Some photos of the loading process

The Shay's cab had also been cut for the same reason when it was moved from San Francisco to WRM several years before it was sold to Roots of Motive Power.

Have removed a few cabs and most of the work is removing the pipes and linkage rods that run through the front wall. After that the side walls are usually bolted in some fashion to the floor. So cutting it where it is cut wouldn't of saved a lot of time at least on the small locos I worked on. The lowering of the cab could be a reason, though from the picture one would still have to remove most of the piping going through the front wall. To me, just off the cuff here, if I were going to lower the height of the cab for clearance reasons I would of cut the cab higher up with less cutting, cut into the window openings. Less cutting, less distortion when you weld it back together. Skip welding can lessen the effects of weld distortion too. Interesting question regardless. Sometimes a mechanic gets into a project and just goes, later on a small child offers a better way to go about the task. Sometimes circumstances require us to do things the hard way too. Who knows? Kind of a fun question to think about. Regards, John.

PS after reviewing the picture are you sure it was cut? That was one awful cutting job if it was. Without seeing more of it is kind of hard to comprehend why. But that "cut" looks worse than a drunk could of done. Looks more damaged than repaired? Not trying to be snarky about it, but if you can light a torch you should be able to cut more square then that?

now that I look harder at the pic, the cut looks bigger then later metal filled, very quarky work there. You know, 765 just got new cab sides, period, if I had druthers looking at this and you think you needed to do a cab removal, when you had the time etc to do this, just make a new cab and design it for easy removal. If you had to take that cab off again, it will never be the same again, just put a new one on.