Merits of operating steam vs. other motive power at railways

Alan Walker · **Posted:** Tue Dec 16, 2014 12:42 pm

softwerkslex wrote:

Here in Denmark we run a Christmas train Sat/Sun x 3 weekends that starts close in to Copenhagen and goes north about 1.5 hours to a tree farm, does a 1.5 hour layover, and returns. The whole route is served by 3+ per hour regular commute trains. There is no entertainment or food service on board. Most of the coaches are wooden with wood seats, and toilets are dry hopper.

The train is about 9 coaches or maybe 400 passengers, and all trips were sold out November 24. The ticket price is like four times the regular transit fare.

Certainly steam plays a role in the demand, but also the old coaches and the open platforms (which you can ride on without limit).

Are the passengers allowed to bring trees on the train? If so, how do you manage it?

softwerkslex · **Posted:** Tue Dec 16, 2014 2:41 pm

Yes, we have a boxcar. The farm tags the trees at purchase, runs them to the train, and they are unloaded at destination.

(I thought about making a joke about tying them to the top of the train)

Les Beckman · **Joined:** Tue Aug 02, 2005 1:25 pm **Posts:** 6482

softwerkslex wrote:

Here in Denmark we run a Christmas train Sat/Sun x 3 weekends that starts close in to Copenhagen and goes north about 1.5 hours to a tree farm, does a 1.5 hour layover, and returns. The whole route is served by 3+ per hour regular commute trains. There is no entertainment or food service on board. Most of the coaches are wooden with wood seats, and toilets are dry hopper.

The train is about 9 coaches or maybe 400 passengers, and all trips were sold out November 24. The ticket price is like four times the regular transit fare.

Certainly steam plays a role in the demand, but also the old coaches and the open platforms (which you can ride on without limit).

Steven -

How about just a little info on the locomotive, and maybe the cars too. Or at least a website. Thanks.

Les

softwerkslex · **Posted:** Tue Dec 16, 2014 6:19 pm

No I just want to keep it a secret known to a few...

But, if you really force me.

It is Nordsjællands Veterantog, at veterantoget.dk, or "North Zealand Veteran Train".

The cars are pretty darn near original, mostly wood body with steel frame. They are steam heated, and a few have auxiliary boilers that are wood fired. About half are lighted with kerosene lamps, which are required because the sun sets here about 3pm. I was not kidding about the dry hopper toilets. We really use them. The coaches are certified for 70 km-hour on the mainline.

The locomotive is a "K" class 4-4-0, which is certified for 100 km-hour. We had to run light for some distance on the mainline at night, and we were slotted between scheduled express passenger trains. That was a run! The K has a lot of preserved variations. This one was built in Italy with slide valves, and later converted to piston valves. It has external Allen valve gear. It is superheated and has an arch.

The ash pan has to be raked out in a pit from underneath, and there is no drop grate. Ugh.

I say "we", because I am a member and was firing on the trip last Saturday.

Really interesting: Denmark is going to ERTMS Level 2 signals, which means all cab signals and no wayside signals. We have to install ERTMS on all our locomotives, and this includes automatic brake supervision by the onboard computer.