I keep reading about automatic devices that would start a water pump and dump the fire in the event of low water. Do such devices actually exist that would work on a boiler under the continuous state of change a locomotive boiler is? While water levels in a stationary boiler remains virtually consistant water in a moving boiler is subject to surges caused by things like changing grades and throttle position. Are there devices that would read the boiler conditions and not start the pump and dump the fire every time the water surged out of the glass for a few seconds? Also, it is one thing to shut off an oil fire but quite another to dump a coal fire. Can such a device be rigged to dump a coal fire? I hate to be ignorant of the facts but I have been asking myself these questions since the discussions began.

Thanks in advance for sheding some light on this for me.

John Bohon

I think its a bit of a misnomer to characterize the Grand Canyon Railway as a "plaything." Their 64 mile line between Williams and the Grand Canyon has several 3% grades, and maximum track speed is 40mph. That's a 128 mile round trip, or more than a division "back in the day." When it was owned by the Santa Fe, many employees considered it the most challenging run in the entire system. It was even filmed for a Link training simulator shortly before the AT&SF abandoned the line. Train lengths can be 15 cars or more at the height of the season. 4960, flagship of the Grand Canyon steam fleet, has a tractive effort of 58,090 lbs. That's almost as much as a Grand Trunk Western 4-8-4. Each season, 4960 and 29 will accumulate nearly 6000 miles of revenue service a piece. Its quite an impressive and professional operation!
-Chris

It was strictly a hypothetical argument. Having seen the Grand Canyon RR myself, I agree that it's no "plaything". My opinion is irrelevant to the hypothetical Road Foreman of Engines or Division Sup't that doesn't know that, however--and whose word is law when it comes to deciding if your loco or GCRR-trained crew can operate on his line.

Answering John's question about instrumentation devices, there are accelerometers, inclinometers, fluid level sensing devices, temperature sensors, pressure sensors, flow meters, and other instrumentation available that are all off the shelf devices used in other railroad applications. Getting a package together that could monitor the boiler water level in a steam locomotive and correctly relate it to the ride attitude, operation, and the design of the particular boiler would require some good application engineering, but it could be done.

From an engineering and physics point of view, a temperature sensor on the crown sheet itself would be more useful than a water level indicator. It would also have no moving parts. It could sense the tiny metal temperature change as the water level approached uncovering the sheet, and give an accurate warning of impending metal failure. It would be the least likely to give a false positive warning, since elevated metal temperatures would not be the result of vibration or water sloshing, and elevated metal temperatures would be a shut-down warning regardless of cause (low water, water circulation problems, etc.).

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Give that man a cigar.

If what happened with SP 745 has been described accurately here, it's not a failure of equipment. It's not a failure of training, even.

It's a failure of judgement, and of priorities. Someone allowed the wrong people to be responsible for the locomotive. And those people didn't do their jobs properly.

All this chatter about idiot-proofing steam locomotives has one goal - to enable unqualified or unsuitable people. The goal should be to keep idiots OUT of the cab, not find a way to let them INTO the cab.

Steam locomotive operation is not a right, it's a privilege. No locomotive has a right to be on the road, and no person has a right to run or fire a steam locomotive, no matter how many hours or how many dollars they have contributed. No matter how much they "love steam."

No one should get the benefit of the doubt - each crew person should have to prove his abilities, and prove his suitability by always showing maturity, focus, and good judgement.

Learn the skills, and keep your mind on your job. If you're not willing or able to do that - if you have a tendency to get so wrapped up in the romance and glory that you stop paying attention, even for just a moment - either settle for a cab ride or get off the locomotive entirely. Because you don't belong there.

"In Case of Doubt or Uncertainty, the Safe Course MUST be Taken."

JAC

Amen, Amen and Amen..........
If you don't know how to run an injector, stay home. To me, all this talk of electronica is rediculous. If someone wants to kill steam, just put that requirement out there.

Due to the dynamic nature of steam locomotives, I can't imagine any type of automatic system that would work well...remember, not only does one want to keep water in the boiler, he has to control it as well... one water level doesn't fit all.

I find it very interesting that none of the real steam professionals advocate these additions. Could it be that those who really know what they are talking about realize that adding "idiot proofing" is really "idiot enabling".

Amen is right. My wife's grandfather was a locomotive engineer, retiring in 1958 with 42 years and 4 months service, during which he never had an accident. He told me that when he went on the railroad in 1916, he had to fire for 945 days before he could even sit for the engineer exam. After he successfully passed the exam, he continued to fire for several years before he was able to move up to the engineer extra board, and it was 15 years after he began working before he could hold an engineer's job.

Take note, please, that 945 days is nearly three years of 7-day weeks. Realistically, he probably worked about 5 or 6 years before he sat for the engineer's test. And this was a man who did this every day for a living! There is no substitute for experience. I remember asking him if he had any training manuals or books, and he just showed me the calluses on his hands (even then, more than 15 years after he retired). He made a couple of students trips, and after that, he was on his own. No stoker, no Hours of Service Law, either.

The Frisco 1522 had an elaborate digital temperature reporting system for their bearings that they were very proud of, and which was specifically highlighted in media stories on the group. The stories made a point to say that the modern equipment was a mark of their professionalism, and was a point of pride in their negotiations with host railroads.

Now we are discussing a similar modern application to the boiler of the locomotive, and it has hit a nerve. There seems to be great fear that any technological change to the relationship between crew and boiler will reduce the quality of the historic re-enactment. There also seems to be an argument that additional safety appliances will actually make operations less safe, which is an exhausting argument not limited to railroads.

Woulda-shoulda-coulda hindsight: If 745 had used a safety appliance with the features we have discussed, an alarm would have sounded, maybe the fire shut off, and the crew would either have to stop or let the diesel take over. They could have refilled the boiler, relit the fire, and continued with a half hour delay. As it is, the engine is disabled, and relations with host railroads are worse. Could a crew duct tape and disable the alarm like the Conrail crew did to the warning whistle at Chase, Maryland in 1987? Sure. Crews can do anything if they are mean spirited enough, including suicide.

When you compare the 1522's temp sensors to boiler operations, it is comparing apples and oranges. And I will also state that there were problems with that installation.

Absolutely no one has given "historic re-enactment" as a reason to not add all of this electronic crap to an engine. There is no need to nerd up an engine...they are perfectly safe with a good crew, and an unqualified crew shouldn't come near the engine.

If you aren't professional enough to run an engine with the proper and traditional equipment, you ain't gonna do any better with more junque to maintain.

Any of you that want to put this stuff on a steam just need to stick to something that doesn't boil water.

I will tell you something that you seem to be ignoring... a very low tech, easy to maintain device prevented an uncontrolled evaporative event...a soft plug.

A good, properly installed soft plug is as good a idiot proofing as one could ask for.

In the case of the 745 crew and the events as related in these threads I think all the electronic gadgetry is not needed. A Barco low water alarm of 75 years ago would have sounded a warning before the crew needed to drop the fire. On WM pacific 202 displayed in Hagerstown, MD city park there is a sign on the alarm whistle that says when the whistle blows start the water pump and injectors immediately. There is no need to stop, drop the fire, or perform any other drastic actions unless the pump or injectors fail because there is still time to react. All of this is accomplished without use of electricity. I have been in the cab of locomotives when the low water alarm was tested and have heard one peep during a momentary surge of boiler water and believe me they get your attention.

Kelly brings up one of the points I have been considering. What do you do when the device fails or gives a false indication? I guess there could be a procedure in place to take action but as he noted if the divice is on the locomotive the FRA says it must be functioning. Steam locomotives, even the interior of the boilers, thrash themselfs to pieces when in motion. Not being very electronics oriented I have no idea if such devices could be made reliable under those conditions.

This peoblem could boil down to the local FRA inspector you are dealing with. Some will tell you it is rediculous to have a certain appliance working on a locomotive on your railroad just because it was there when the engine was built. Still, they are forced by law to make you comply with the law. In one case on the A&R several years ago we had an inspector insist all GP-38 locomotives came equipped with a certain device. When we told him ours was built for the A&R, delivered new without the device, and had not been off the property since delivery he decided we must have been the ones who removed the device. The fact that we had to drill and tap new holes in the frame because the ones EMD would have drilled did not exist still did not convince this inspector the locomotive was never equipped with the device. We had to install something not originally there just to make him go away. Such an inspector would certainly not let you run a steam locomoitve with a failed electronic boiler water sensor regardless of what the water glasses and gauge cocks say.

I recall reading about the bearing sensors on 1522 and other locomotives as well. I am not sure how they compare to trying to operate such a sensor on the interior of a moving boiler. I understand how sensors could work on a stationary boiler but locomotive boilers work under the most demanding boiler conditions I can think of. Any such device would have to be quite sturdy to survive conditions on the railroad. I am aware of some of the divices mentioned by mxdata on modern railroad equipment but not in the world of steam. I agree it would be an engineering challenge to make them work inside a boiler.

Unless I am misreading some of the earlier threads some folks are suggesting equipment that not only sounds an alarm but also automatically starts putting water in the boiler under low water conditions. I can see the possibility of rigging something to turn on the water pump on an engine with a feedwater hearter but can not believe a machine could be designed to start an injector, especially a cranky lifting one. In cases of locomotives with only injectors this would seemingly involve installing some kind of electric water pump tapped into the cold tender water. In a low water situatiion injecting cold water into the boiler could cause more damage when it hits the crownsheet. To correct this I would see the need to add a method, probably electronic, to preheat the water. That seems like a lot of electronics to maintain. Is there a simpler way to do this or am I misreading the posts and nobody is suggesting this?

John Bohon

Enough already of all this silliness about adding this or that gadget to compensate for a competent crew!!! The answer is forthright and simple-make sure the assigned loco.engineer is equal to both the engine and the assignment and he'll make sure that the fireboy and anyone else on board do their jobs as they must.
All this nonsense about idiot proofing the machine with some gadgetry is just that-nonsense!!!
Ross Rowland

*Flame proof suit ON*
Advocating a safety appliance that works properly is not advocating to reduce training or the need to have qualified personnel. Furthermore, I don't think that is really the debate. The question here is how to reduce the chances of an accident that is inevitable as long as human beings are solely responsible?
Could we perhaps consider that there are two ways to destroy a boiler that is in operating and in good condition: one is to over pressure it, two is to have the water too low. I may be ignoring other possibilities, but I believe these are the primary ones.
In the first case, while the pressure is somewhat controllable by firing rate, water input, etc, long ago it was recognized that it would be advisable to automatically control the maximum pressure. Hence the safety valve, and after long evolution it is became reliable and accepted as a requirement on all boilers.
Not so with the low water failure mechanism. No successful device was ever devised to automatically control the water in a locomotive boiler at NOWL. There are appliances on stationary boilers that do this, but not on locomotive boilers. (Anyone know about marine boilers?)
I suggest that a low water alarm, or automatic water level system is NOT, by definition a bad idea, or has a fatal flaw, but that the engineering never was available in the steam era to do it accurately, reliably, and in a way that didn't cause unnecessary on the road delays.
Given the advances in the past 60 years, why not take advantage of new technology to keep us all safer and keep these wonderful machines on the mainline? I'm sure we all can come up with examples of devices that work well now, but had to wait for technology and evolution before they were effective.

It's called a Barco Low Water Alarm.
Reliable, requires little maintenance, works well, easy to maintain, easy to test, simple rather than complex, and gets the job done. I've seen a Barco Low water Alarm. I've heard a Barco Low Water Alarm. (In test only, fortunately) That's all that would have been needed to get the attention of an inattentive crew.
What more is needed? Electronic Diapers?
Mark D.