by djwmusk65 » February 20, 2021, 9:40 pm
I recall a set of books in our library that has everything you needed to know about steam locomotives. On the section on firing ,it depended on weight of the train as to how deep a fire to carry. A heavy train would need 6" fire where a passenger train would have a 2-3" fire. Anything bigger than a certain size grate area would need to have a stoker because it became impossible for one man to fire. Pennsylvania Railroad's K-4 pacifics had grate areas that didn't need stokers, but they had two men firing on trains like the Broadway Limited. Also it said to fire half the firebox at a time so as the gasses in the coal burned off, the hot side would consume them. In the back was a chart that had the names of all the coal mines and listed how many btu's in a ton of coal, also how much moisture, how much ash it produced, chemical makeup, etc., by the mine and even down to which particular seam the coal came out of. I don't know if the steamship companies bought their coal the same way or if they got it at which ever port they were in that had coal fueling dock.
I recall a set of books in our library that has everything you needed to know about steam locomotives. On the section on firing ,it depended on weight of the train as to how deep a fire to carry. A heavy train would need 6" fire where a passenger train would have a 2-3" fire. Anything bigger than a certain size grate area would need to have a stoker because it became impossible for one man to fire. Pennsylvania Railroad's K-4 pacifics had grate areas that didn't need stokers, but they had two men firing on trains like the Broadway Limited. Also it said to fire half the firebox at a time so as the gasses in the coal burned off, the hot side would consume them. In the back was a chart that had the names of all the coal mines and listed how many btu's in a ton of coal, also how much moisture, how much ash it produced, chemical makeup, etc., by the mine and even down to which particular seam the coal came out of. I don't know if the steamship companies bought their coal the same way or if they got it at which ever port they were in that had coal fueling dock.