Steam & Excursion > Who spotted for water?

Any old guys out there that spotted for water?
Wasn't the easiest job either. You could get the hang of it in passenger Service because you had a general spot to shoot for.
But freight with a big long handle was another story altogether.
Here in L.A. we had a nice enough hogger  named  R.L. but the poor man had a hell of a time getting under that spout!
Now a diesel is a piece of cake isn't it? Or is it? Hot Engine and the water glass is full? What then?
Soungs like a G.E.!
But those GE U-28B's could really pull.
Water Service used to employ hundreds of "Rails" and the RR'S used quite a few hydology tricks too get the water to the tender
less alone all the Stand Pipes.

I suspect ( especially with double-headers) that stopping the train short
of the penstock, then running "light" to the spout --- saved the most time.

But, then too,you had 'location markers' that aided experienced engineers 
where to stop, un-erringly, with the tender’s fill-hatch right opposite the penstock.

Both PRR & NYC RR, + others used track pans, to scoop water on the-fly..
But, the pans needed constant monitoring .... with winter being
the most brutal, and requiring the most labor hours.

Also, scooping water required tenders be equipped with compressed-air controls
to raise & lower the water-scoop apparatus.  Later generation NYC RR tenders were
fitted with multiple air-venting tubes --- to allow more successful loading, at high
scooping speeds..---without needing to slow down ( the sudden increase of 
water-space air pressures could burst the tenders' sides...).

Without specialized air-venting arrangements, scooping water at  too-fast
track-speeds splashed & wasted more water than was actually added into
the tenders' water cisterns. 

​W.



Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 10/01/23 19:50 by wcamp1472.

Who is the Engineer?

Therein lies the difference.

-LD

wcamp1472,
Your note about scooping water is really interesting.  I saw a video of it once, but I never thought about the details. 
Any idea how many locations the NYC or PRR would have had track pans at?
How long would a track pan have been?   Presumably the track profile had to be very close to level at the location of the pan. 
And presumably only certain classes of locomotives were equipped for taking water on the fly, which complicated power mangement.

Your presumptions are very good.

I'd be presuming on any answers to your inquiries, that I'd try to provide.

PRR tended to have conventional penstocks, to manually fill tenders,
near the main tracks.
Lengths would have been 2,500 ft or more.
Many locations had small power plants to provide for heated pipes under 
the pans.

The scoops fitted to tenders had rectangular fill pipes, with goose-neck
bends at the top to direct the water flow downwards, inside the water tank.
The water followed a 'C-shaped' duct, up inside the water space.

The tender had levers controlling the air-cylinder under the tender that
raised and lowered the movable scoop.  The levers were on the forward,
right, water-leg of the tender, behind the engineer.  

There were white posts trackside to indicate where to lower the scoop,
and where to raise it.   The posts were on the engineer's side--- so both
crew members could easily coordinate the scooping operation.

Trains were generally scooping water at  about 40 mph.  Some NYC locos 
were fitted with extra cistern air-venting pipes, to scoop water at 60 to 70
mph.

All scoops were designed to break-away from the fill tube,
in case of a failure to retract before reaching the end of the track pans.
The scoop could be ripped from a few mounting bolts, but the tender bottom
would remain intact.  The only water 'lost' would be what had been in the 
internal fill-duct.   The tender cistern would remain intact.  

The sheet metal scoop was designed as a weak structure, so that ripped-off
scoops would NOT present a serious derailing hazard to the following train cars.
Also, the ends of the track pans were reinforced & would withstand the impact
that a lowered scoop would have had ---- so that the retained water in the pans
would not be lost.

The pans were filled from elevated water tanks, and pan levels were maintained
by trackside supply-pipe float valves.

When I was growing-up in Long Branch, NJ ( 1942 to 1959) ...there were long
track pans just north of the Broadway St crossing ( up until about 1954).
It was a nice, flat, straight area, located midway between South Amboy, and
Bay Head storage tracks, at the south end of NY&LB RR.
There had also been a turntable in Long Branch.

CNJ locos might also have been fitted to scoop water.

​W.



 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/02/23 01:32 by wcamp1472.

IF you know you are coming in for water and have done it many times before, you know you get your speed down early and drift to the spot very slowly....do it right and you can stop with the independant brake while you are grabbing air....but yes...stop short and cut off if you think you can't do with your train hooked up. Only new engineers would fiddle around not knowing the best way to do it, and I am sure the people at the penstock let everyone get into the spot their own way....once they realized that joe blow had a method that worked even if wasn't sam's way of doing it. And I said new Engineers! Back in the day a new engineer was an old fireman....so he probably already knew how to spot for water.....at every standpipe on his route. Low speed handling is a matter of repetition over and over and over and over and over. Indeed everything we do, we do it the way we do because we do it everyday. 

VERY TRUE!
"New" Engineers are old firemen.   
Many engineers would let firemen do the running over portions of the RR.

The skill of being a good engineer wasn't in handling the loco's 
'controls'; but, in knowing the railroad's territory by heart.
 It's knowing where you are, by the feel at the seat of your pants.
So that running at timetable speeds, in the darkest of fogged-in nights,
is as familiar as the bright, sunny days.

You know every crossing, every signal, every. bridge, every foot of the way.
When sh*t begins to go wrong, it goes wrong in a hurry!  
You've got to know exactly how to respond... to recover quickly, and control
the damage 
as best as you can.

Years ago,in upstate NY, a driver of a loaded school bus raced a speeding freight train
for a grade crossing.  The school bus lost the race.... it was truly tragic for the train crew--
there was nothing the crew could do, to avoid a collision.  it's takes more than a mile, to
stop a heavy train.  The driver and many children were killed.

In excursions, I always preferred 'firing' --- I knew in my gut that running a train was 
more than meeting the challenges of what's within my range of vision...  its in knowing
what's around that next curve...and you know that curve and every 'hitch' in it,
by mental acuity.

I had the greatest respect for skilled engineers.  
And I got to fire for some of the BEST. Its different today.

Back in the days of the High Iron Co' trips, there were many  assigned engine 
crews that had years of 'running steam'.  There were many individual RRs that we 
operated over---- the CNJ, the Reading, the NYC, the PRR, the WM Ry, 
the B&M,  Lehigh & New England, the D&H....all had wonderful crews...
( some were grumpy, and set-in-their-ways ---- but they were few, and far between )

I've seen too many situations and surprises that arise unexpectedly --- I've seen
engineers react instantly, and with certainty, and "muscle memory" to immediately
take control of the situation.  There's no time to get out of the seat and let the
experienced-guy take over!

I've experienced only one accident, not excursion related, that resulted in the death 
of a vehicle passenger at an unprotected street crossing.  
I had hired-on as a trainee 'fireman' on diesel switchers, a week earlier...
I learned a LOT about airbrakes & trains --- in a fraction of time...
​W.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/03/23 14:45 by wcamp1472.

Here's the water scoop for under a tender such as Wes described.


-LD

---

Thanks for the. very descriptive post..
It clears things up, in a lot of ways.

​W