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Steam & Excursion > How much on-the-road repairing were engineers expected to do?


Date: 01/19/25 12:50
How much on-the-road repairing were engineers expected to do?
Author: timz




Date: 01/19/25 14:45
Re: How much on-the-road repairing were engineers expected to do?
Author: engineerinvirginia

It is up to you, if you think you can make it work then make it work. If you have some tools, all the better. You learn a few tricks as progress in your career. 



Date: 01/19/25 15:20
Re: How much on-the-road repairing were engineers expected to do?
Author: HotWater

engineerinvirginia Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> It is up to you, if you think you can make it work
> then make it work. If you have some tools, all the
> better. You learn a few tricks as progress in your
> career. 

You are apparently referring to the "modern diesel era" but, back in the steam days (as depicted in the photo) the Engineer and/or Fireman were far more trained and equipped to make "repairs", especially to get the steam locomotive off the main line.



Date: 01/19/25 15:26
Re: How much on-the-road repairing were engineers expected to do?
Author: Earlk

I have a copy of a 1946 Santa Fe Steam Engineer's Mechanical Promotion Exam.  It's over 400 questions.  A majority of it involves how to repair items on the road to get your locomotive over the road and into the terminal. 

It's your locomotive.  It's your job to get it over the road and to the tie up terminal.



Date: 01/19/25 16:11
Re: How much on-the-road repairing were engineers expected to do?
Author: Frisco1522

Looking at an old, old Frisco employees magazine from the teens/20s, they would have articles or notes about stuff the crew did enroute.  It mentioned that my Dad as fireman and the engineer repaired an air pump and got it working and avoided an engine failure.
I don't know how union rules were back then, but if you're on the road, you do whatever you can to get in the hole or back home.
 



Date: 01/19/25 16:44
Re: How much on-the-road repairing were engineers expected to do?
Author: wcamp1472

I doubt that's a "tool box".
For one thing, steam engine 'tools' are HEAVY.
You would NEVER store tools or a tool box that's stored over your 
head.   You want easy access to emergency tools, down low, where you
can get too them.

A common problem that could happen, is for loco spool valves that open the steam ports,
could often break a valve ring --- and get it wedged part-way in a steam port,..
that leads to locked spool valve, and often resulted in a bent eccentric rod.
(The eccentic-rod reaches from the main driver to the reverse link, on either 
a Walschaert valve gear or a Baker valve gear.    Often, the other side 
is undamaged, and the loco can complete its run, "running on one-side".)

With simple tools, a crew can remove both securement bolts, at the ends of
the  bent eccentric rod.  At the damaged side you could 'center' the affected 
valve, by closing-off the steam ports --- the valve is 'lapped', blocking the 
steam flow through those blocked ports.   There is a 'locking' bolt at 
the center point of the valve guide.  

Normally, locking bolt is secured with a nut, and,in emergency, is used as a valve
cross-head lock, the nut is removed, and the valve stem is 'centered', and locked.  
( The spacing of the 'lock-bolt', matches perfectly when the steam ports are lapped,
   and the valve is "centered").

A challenge with a "one-cylinder engine", is stopping with the 'good' piston
stopped at either cylinder-end,  and stopped on 'dead-center'...
Thats never how you want to stop.... if you only have one 'good' piston.

When coming to a stop , at a station , or a signal, or a bridge, the fireman 
jumps down on the engineer's side, in plain view, and signals the engineer,
when the 'good' side has it's piston at mid-stroke.  Typically, mid-stroke is 
when the crankpins are either at the top of the wheel, or at the bottom.
Either at 12 O'clock or at 6 O'clock.   That way, the engineer can have a fully 
strong power stroke, to get started.  On lighter trains, like commuters, "running on 
one side",  was possible --- a heavy train needs an additional loco.

But, you still gotta get over the road, and a few simple tools facilitate that,
so they'd be at a very accessible location, down low, somewhere.

On the R-O-W,  you couldn't reach up where that shelf is, and the 
loaded tool box is too awkward and too heavy to handle,up thst high!

So, it's probably for lighter stuff like spare equipment for the cab.
Fusee's, torpedoes, cab supplies, ..... that kind of thing.
Its easily accessible at loco service points, and crews would 
check that it's well supplied, before departing,  with the "extras" they might
need on the Road.

Again, that is stuff that's  NOT too heavy, to be stored up as high as that shelf.

W.

not proofed, yet
 



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/19/25 18:11 by wcamp1472.



Date: 01/19/25 23:46
Re: How much on-the-road repairing were engineers expected to do?
Author: Notch7

How much on-the-road repairing were engineers expected to do?
There was a lot expected of steam era engineers and firemen, and it was better for them to try, rather than do nothing.  The majority of what I know of those days were told to me by oldhead Seaboard Air Line and Southern Railway engineers that I fired for or knew, plus my surviving uncle who was a SOU roundhouse foreman as well as a former fireman for both PRR and B&O.  In all respects, I was fortunate to work in engine service for both SCL(SAL side) and SOU.  The oldest SAL engineer dated from 1920, and the oldest SOU engineer dated from 1937.  The three year progressive mechanical examinations (one each year) given to both SAL and SOU firemen were hard, inclusive, closed-book, minimal on fill-in-the-blank and true-or-false questions, no multiple choice, and concentrated on "what would you do?" to fix or remedy a situation questions.   I knew one SAL fireman who was used as an "emergency engineer", even doing mainline through freights; but he couldn't pass his third progressive exam.  That ended his SAL engine service career and his chance to be regular "bona fide" engineer.  I also knew very well , a junior SOU engineer that tried to fix/improve the air pump on his little old Consolidation stopped on the southbound mainline in SC.  He tried and failed and wound up blocking tbe southbound main  with the hottest freight- the "Flash" - coming.  But he tried and that was the end of it, other than an enduring legend of being picked at over the occurrence.  It was very important to the Southern though - not because of delaying the "Flash" (and maybe the Piedmont Limited).  The concern was that the SOU was publicly fully totally dieselized, yet an old 2-8-0 was still working regularly on a 6-day local.

Some railroads had steam troubleshooting books.  On my part of the SOU in later steam days,  the "Bradshaw" book was popular.  It was put out by a SOU engineer at Asheville NC.  International Correspondence Schools also put out steam troubleshooting books.  At one point ICS evidently had traveling classroom cars.  My grandfather, already a veteran SOU Charleston Division engineer, had an unlimited access card to all ICS classroom cars issued maybe 1905-08.

As for that toolbox - many older steam engines had seatboxes with padded hinged lids.  Inside is where you kept smaller tools - like hammers, cold chisels, smaller wrenches, dope hooks, and lunchboxes too.  SAL had this style of seatboxes on the Baldwin diesel switchers and road-switchers I workled on too.  I noted that the pictured engine had a later pedastal style engineer seat.  Maybe that occasioned a separate toolbox.



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