Coal the fuel of the past.

While I do not know the details the old Puffer VIC 32 trialed various biomas type fuels with very differing successes last year. This year it has successfully been fired by the fuel that showed to be the most suitable from last years trial. I know that its boiler is not the same as a locomotive boiler but it does indicate the way that heritage steam is heading. It certainly isn't smokeless and does have a strange aroma about it. Here it is seen heading away from Corpach along the Caledonian Canal

Peter

 

As an add on note.
Once you have the basic setup right provided the fuel is not contaminated with solids that might block the burner, i found that I could mix and match fuels on a daily basis. This was from gas and diesel oils to the Vegetable oils. At one site we cleared all the tanks of unusable oil for internal combustion engines. It was the same railway that a local company was collecting and cleaning waste soya oil which arrived in a tanker and pumped straight in the tank.

I know that the growing of oils is limited. That they smell differently but I’m mostly talking about secondary use of liquids which can be used. One such liquid was described as liquified paper.

The amount of fuel heritage uses is small in the general picture but we must be seen to doing something green even if only by redraughing the locos to reduce emissions and increase efficiency. Doing nothing is not an option.

 

No, it's made from pitch, a byproduct of making paper from pine trees, if that's what you meant.

https://www.drt.fr/en/markets/dertal-600/

 

I don’t know as I never took that one any further. This guy with recycled soya oil turned up and that did me fine.

 

The talk at HRA on Tuesday was most interesting - and I can contrast the American locos including the "BigBoy" and current practice with what I experienced as a passenger guard during the waste oil-firing era on the Ffesty ...

Personally, I suspect that "multi-fuel" capabilities are going to feature at some point.

 

With oil firing, how do you prevent the firebox cooling down too rapidly at the end of a day? With coal you can leave the remains of the fire to die overnight so the heat diminishes slowly.

(Given oil firing has been used, it must be a solved problem or else not a problem, but I don't know the solution myself).

Tom

 

I think that you close all the dampers, and put a lid on the chimney, IIRC

 

My work is nearer Laidlaw practice than the American practice. Either way my system is highly developed beyond what is used by the Americans and the welsh railways. It has to be both efficient and capable of high output. Thus the whole system has to be considered. You can not expect a good result unless you do so. An evolution not a historical copy. Evolution or extinction.

 

In addition to the brick arch, the lower area of the firebox plates are lined with refractory brick to stop burning of the plates and also retain heat in the situation you describe.

 

A dying fire doesn't put out much heat relatively as there is no significant draught and thus there's little in the way of combustion products going through the boiler tubes. Th oil fired firebox is well lined with firebrick so will be pretty much equivalent to a dying fire.

 

the NYMR, among other trialled various versions of the CPL product. The version with a resin binder was reasonably successful and could be used on a day-to-day basis. The big reason for not using it is simply cost. Coal is still available and the price has dropped significantly over the year and likely to be cheaper still in the short term. Whilst that remains the case, coal will win.