At the Rochester & Genesee Valley Railroad Museum in Rush, NY, we have a Heisler "fireless" 0-4-0 undergoing an inpection for possible return to service at our museum. This past summer we had the lagging professionally removed leaving the pressure vessel open to inspection. Upon visual inspection, we were pleased to find it appears to be in excellent condition.

Since I do a lot of painting around our museum, I offered to help with the repainting of the pressure vessel (if Mother Nature allows this Fall) since the locomotive has to spend a little time outside of our shop building so other projects can get some time inside. Since I haven't painted much requiring high temp paints except for the museum's trusty BBQ grill, I have a few questions for the experts here.

1) Can you sandblast the pressure vessel (in total or in part) to remove any rust or is this not a good idea for several reasons including grit in the running gear? We have been using wire brushes on angle grinders, but some areas are hard to get to with that method that would be easy to blast.

2) Can anyone recommend a good high temperature primer/paint combo for the pressure vessel? And a combo which might be sprayable?

3) Does anyone know of any other fireless engines running any where in the US?

4) How do the FRA regs relate to a fireless engine? If I search the PDF of Part 230, fireless is mentioned once under day so service if I remember correctly, but that is the only reference.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. I know I have seen posts over time with some of the info in them, but I was unable to find anything in several different searches.

Thanks!

Until later,
Chris



Rochester & Genesee Valley RR Museum
crhauf@frontiernet.net

Requirements for an "in service day" are pressure in the boiler and a fire in the firebox. Since you don't have a firebox you can legally run it every day without using up in service days. No tube jobs either. Cool.

From a safety standpoint you might want to survey the pressure vessel to assure it is still as sound as it appears and keep the running gear in safe operating condition.

I don't know of any common carrier running fireless engines in service. They were most commonly used only in industrial plants where there was a nearby source of superheated water and steam. I think the last in use were in Tennessee but somebody out there might have better information.

Your temperatures won't be that high. Industrial coatings should suffice. Tell your paint dealer you need 350 degrees and you will have plenty of margin. If you do blast take care to keep the grit away from bearing surfaces and moving parts.

Best of luck.

Dave

irondave@bellsouth.net

Dave,

In the copy from the Federal Register I have of Part 230 and if I search for fireless, the only mention I find is actually under service day. Here is the definition:

"Service day. Any calendar day that
the boiler has steam pressure above
atmospheric pressure with fire in the
firebox. In the case of a fireless steam
locomotive, any calendar day that the
boiler has steam pressure above
atmospheric pressure."

Therefore, it would appear from this definition that we do have to count service days, however, I am not sure what they count toward since we do not have a "fire in the firebox". Any further thoughts?

And thanks for the paint info. I know catalyzed acrylic enamels will get into the 400 degree range and we also have many gallons of Amerlon Amerlock 400 epoxy coating which appears with the proper additive can also work up into the 400 degree range. My only concern is that these paints max values are very close to our possible max temps leaving very little margin before the paint may fail. Since the loco will have to spend some time outside even when completed, I want to make sure the paint on the vessel is well-applied and does not fail prematurely since it is the final barrier of protection of the vessel from Mother Nature.

Thanks again and any further thoughts are appreciated.

Until later,
Chris



Rochester Chapter NRHS
crhauf@frontiernet.net

Chris,
Try POR-15, it is anti rust, is almost bullet proof and is good slightly past 400 degrees.

Find someone in your area that has high pressure water blast, 10,000psi, This will peel the rust from the shell without leaving behind any spent media.

That's what I get for responding at 3:30 AM - didn't read far enough! Should have known they would catch me........

Still, no tube jobs could save you some considerable.

One possibility I heard from one fireless owner was to fill the pressure vessel partly with water and then pressurize it with compressed air from a diesel compressor and operate the only diesel powered fireless steam locomotive in the country.

Just how far are you thinking of running it?

Dave



irondave@bellsouth.net

Dave,

Not a problem on the 230 stuff. I am just trying to feel out how it relates from our point of view. Others in our group are also doing similar research. It is new territory for us, but it appears that everyone is following the rules which makes a lot of sense to me. Is anyone running and not adhering to Part 230 since there appears to be some instances where it says it does not apply?

As for trackage, the Rochester & Genesee Valley RR Museum has its own two mile demonstration railroad which connects us to our partner museum, the New York Museum of Transportation. The railroad was jointly built and is jointly maintained. The most challenging part are some sharp curves at either end and an occasional nasty grade at either end like the ~3% which we have as we depart the R&GV RR Museum yard. However, we have ways we can work around those if needed as we also own 7 diesels and our partner is in the midst of electrifying part of our railroad for trolley operations. It is a busy little place!

The hope would be able to use the steamer as part of our Sunday operations (probably special and not every weekend) so we would hope that it would be able to run as designed for several hours, but we still have a lot of TBD's. We were able to acquire a small boiler from the mechanical engineering department of a local college which should get us to around 160PSI. The engine is rated for 300 PSI.

Again, we are very early in the infrastructure process. We are still in evaluation mode and have the entire loco including the running gear disassembled for inspection by our guys and hopefully by some well respected industry experts. But, things look good right now from my novice point of view! I am just the humble painter in all of this as we have much more experience steam people on our steam team.

We also have a 0-4-0T Vulcan (BNY #12) which we are also evaluating for eventual rebuild. It too had its lagging removed this past summer. (Scary what you have to pay just to have a licensed someone throw some stuff out!) All of the boiler tubes have been removed and the engine is continuing to be evaluated. However, we feel the fireless may be an easier engine to tackle at the start and more unique as well. For example, Eastman Kodak Company used fireless engines extensively in its Kodak Park facility in Rochester. While not a Kodak engine, we would hope to draw that parallel to the engine static or running!

If I remember correctly, the fireless was actually run under steam within the last fifteen years which is also interesting.

Thanks again for the help! I will have to get some pics on our website tonight so you can see this creature.

Until later,
Chris



Rochester Chapter NRHS
crhauf@frontiernet.net

Even though it is afternoon, I am not going to commit other than to suggest you check out the conditions which create insularity according to FRA. You may qualify.

Dave

irondave@bellsouth.net

Use Rust-Oleum High temperature Aluminium paint. It will take the heat.

Jason

jasonsobczynski@yahoo.com