For a real railroad yes but the example was UP, not BNSF. UP on this very same division like to put the local at the beginning of the parade so everyone can stop and see the country side while the local works. A 4-8-4 stopping every fifty miles is moving further than the rest of the parade.
UP has gone from we can handle it to promoting trucking with their service.
Robby Peartree

The concept of "protection engines" is not just limited to steam locomotive excursions on modern railroads.

I have read that in the old days even railroads with plenty of well maintained locomotives had "protection" engines waiting and ready at strategic locations along the mainline.

I believe that for many years the PRR had a GG1 staged at the Wilmington Delaware station on a stub track ready to "re-power" any trains coming through that developed problems enroute. Especially during heavy traffic times like holidays, WWII, etc.

I have also read that the NYCRR had "hot and ready" steam engines on "standby" at passenger stations every couple of hundred miles (Syracuse NY, IIRC).

For busier RRs that had several dozen passenger trains passing along a mainline every day being able to swap out an engine that developed trouble in-route was a smart move. The train schedules were carefully planned out to make sure not all the trains arrived at the same station at the same time, and there were multiple connections involved. If a train was delayed for a few hours waiting for a replacement engine to be fired up and brought over from the engine house it would muck up all the schedules for a few days.

Same as happens today when a big weather event closes a bunch of airports, it takes days to get all the equipment and crews back in the proper sequence.

The modern railroad operates (well, let's just say they try) freight trains much like passenger trains of old, they are carefully scheduled with "windows" of track time when they are expected to move from "here" to "there" within a given time so the next train can do the same.

I think the diesel protection engines on steam excursions have more to do with smart railroading than the reliability of the steam engine itself. Those tracks are expensive and there is lots of demand for limited rail (in many places). And since the steam engine is a "one of a kind" item the availability of spare parts to "get back up and moving" is
limited. Since the "most likely thing" to breakdown is the oldest (the steam loco regardless of how meticulously maintained) the smart thing to do is send the protection engine along with the steam engine.

As well as the additional tractive effort, dynamic braking, wear and tear on steam loco auxiliaries like air compressors, water and fuel, HEP, etc, etc.

Cheers, Kevin

To all who have responded to my original question, I thank you very much!

So, THAT's what this is all about?

I don't recall any steam train during the steam heyday being assisted by any diesel.
The trend today's runs is an extra water tender, and like 765 they added coal sides to the tender for some extra coal, and they've traveled with coal hoppers for their train.

A steam engine is quite reliable, the diesel is just in case anything. I'll repeat a story told from an NKP engineer, he ran the berks on some runs in Indiana, and after steam he ran the diesels, and on the same runs and same train, he had all kinds of trouble trying to get his diesels to make the same run as effectively as he did with the berk.

so blah on diesels...

A steamer can track thru low floodwaters, diesels the motors would short. Theres some steam shortline operation somewhere, or was wherever, that regularly ran a shay thru a running creek.

It happened often enough. It was avoided, though, because it mandated two crews, whereas a diesel could run in MU lash-up. (There were times when diesels from different manufacturers, or even diesels and electrics, had incompatible MU systems, mandating two crews anyway.....)



An utterly classic example of not understanding or properly utilizing the technology. I'm sure a bus driver trying to drive a tractor-trailer, or vice versa, or a farmer trying to drive a bulldozer instead of the tractor he's driven for thirty years, is similarly going to "embarrass" himself.

Steam and diesel-electric are such different creatures in performance and personality that the clash in operating styles in the transition is actually covered in several books on the transition, such as Albert Churella's From Steam To Diesel. The old adage is "A diesel locomotive will start a train it can't possibly get up to speed; a steam locomotive will run the wheels off a train it can't possibly start." The Nickel Plate, especially, had built its train operations and schedules around the "Fast Freight" capabilities of its Berkshires, and it took them a while to effectively transition operations to diesels such as the Alco PA and RS3 and EMD GP7. (Similarly today, Southwest Airlines built its entire operations around having only three variations of Boeing 737s, two with identical seating; if you suddenly threw Boeing 777s or 747s into the fleet, logistical and financial chaos would ensue.)

If you take anyone who has spent a career with one technology and transition them by force into a new technology requiring different handling, you are guaranteed to not only see problems with the transition, but also engender hostile reaction and even outright sabotage or deliberately impaired performance, especially in fields with "conservative" labor set in its ways who see the new technology as eliminating their jobs and those of their fellow workers. Railroad workers of the 1950s were now being asked to run longer, heavier trains with multiple diesels than they handled with one steam locomotive, and run them further. That was more responsibility and work, and maybe more time away from home, with the pay not necessarily rising as a result. The labor negotiations and agreements of the era reflected this. and is part of why some railroads still had bloated five- and six-man crews and "hundred-mile days" as late as the early 1980s, even a pokey local or a non-stop express between yards.

Many people seem to forget that a modern steam locomotive, when maintained properly was and is very reliable. Unfortunately, in general terms a steam locomotive is envisioned to be some worn out 2-8-0 wheezing along some decrepit line somewhere. Locomotives like #611, #844 and the like were designed to run at track speed all day and night long. Just look at the monthly mileages NYC was getting out of their Niagaras as a prime example. As for smaller locomotives, reliability can be excellent as well. We regularly get (and expect) 81 miles a day for 31 days in a row from our engines. (2,511 miles/month) We average one engine failure every 3 years.
There is no denying the advantages of diesels over steam locomotives. Diesels are much cheaper to operate and maintain and their overall availability is superior. Reliability on the other hand is a wash as far as I am concerned.

Rick

During the "golden age" of steam revival, in the 70's, Diesels were sometimes place on the ends of steam specials, and the little Clinchfield 4-6-0 had a "B" unit placed behind it to make up for lack of power. It was very rare that a steamer would fail, although BR&W's #60 failed to steam on her return from Montauk, on the 1967 LIRR excursion, mostly due to poor coal. But compare that experience to NKP 759, and there is no comparison!

"Protect" Diesels were stationed occasionally, but rarely required.

Today, the whole concept of moving fast-freight on high speed, single-track corridors, is critical to the hosting RR's bottom line. Either there are Diesels in the consist or no steam excursions, which is sad for us in restoration and preservation.

I'm not exactly a Black River fan, but have to point out that my understanding of 60's problems on LI came not from poor coal, but from some over-zealous firing. If a little coal is good, lots of coal is better, right? I was told by Sam Freeman, BR&W's GM at the time (and one of my mentors, long ago), that the engine came back with many of the lower flues and tubes plugged with coal. 'Fire light and often' just wasn't followed there.

Dear Dinwitty

Consider this Otto Perry photograph of UP 4014 and GP9 225.

http://digital.denverlibrary.org/cdm/si ... 770/rec/64

From the current newsletter for the Arizona Railroad Museum you can also read about the boiler explosion of SP 5037 that killed the crew in the following diesel.

http://www.azrymuseum.org/Brochure/V32-I2.pdf

The SP 5037 incident I head about quite a bit growing up in El Paso. It was photographed and posted in area roundhouses.

Robby Peartree

Protection units are far from a new idea, and for a damn good reason. Every mass transportation business has some kind of service protection plan in place, usually extra units stationed at key points along the route. This happens with trucks, trains, and buses. Is it so hard to believe that someone hosting some mode of power that's unusual to them would want to take the extra step by putting rolling service protection in the consist? If done right, the diesel locomotive doesn't do much in the way of motive power anyway. It's not that hard to overlook a diesel locomotive in the consist, and, in my opinion, it's kind of childish to call such things unfortunate. We've still got a plethora of railroads willing to host steam locomotives in the 21st century. Isn't that enough? Isn't this a great example of a healthy compromise? Would you rather stomp your feet and throw a fit until the host either tells you to pound sand or they cave in, allow a trip with no diesel, and have a trip where something fails and snarls traffic, this solidifying the host's idea that steam locomotives are terrible and shouldn't be allowed out period?

Also for dinwitty: UP 4-8-8-4 4008 double-heading with gas turbine 74, at Laramie in August 1957 (my photo with 35mm camera).

Classic image, Mr. Leonard.

In the ‘50's, diesels weren’t necessarily helping the steam engines, but plenty of the opposite happened. Until they were able to totally “dieselize”, railroads like the SP used diesels for the main part of a run, but used steamers as helpers. At the Pacific Southwest RR Museum, in Campo, CA, one engine in our collection is ex-SP 2353, a 10-wheeler. It’s last duty in the mid 50's before it was retired, was as a helper on the east side of the San Diego & Arizona Eastern, helping up the grade on the way to San Diego.

Another example is a photo taken by Richard Steinheimer at Dos Cabezas on the SD&AE. I’ve seen it in a couple of places. Four crewmen, one identified in one caption as the “helper engineer,” are standing in front of SP 2700, a consolidation, as they wait for an opposing train to pass. That caption says the date is Sept, 1952. A caption in a different book, says, “A borrowed SP 2-8-0 heads the drag, but a diesel may be hidden behind it, for the year is 1953.”

That certainly implies that it was common to have a steamer helping a diesel. So people complaining about a diesel being behind a steamer are a bit incorrect. Although I’ll admit that a modern diesel would look a little different in a current photo compared to something like a GP-9 or two in a 50's photo.

There are some pictures on this page that are relevant to this conversation about half way down. It looks like in Canada is was common to have a diesel helper on a steam powered freight.

http://www.trainweb.org/oldtimetrains/C ... ACTIER.htm