❓🤔 Here's a question I've never heard anyone ask on these videos: did these engines ever suffer mechanical failures with the centrifugal governor systems, that caused the system to fail at opening the exhaust valve, and leading to the engines turning faster and faster until they ran away, and suffered catastrophic damage as a result of basically flying apart? Or is there a secondary backup system that would prevent an engine running away, even if the centrifugal governor failed?
Good question! On these old engines the 'back up system" was the operator! This particular engine was a mine hoist engine with a big winch on the back, and so the operator was standing on the back side of the flywheel running the clutch and brake for the winch, and would be able to step over and stop the engine if the governor failed or jammed. Otherwise, if the governor failed in the Accelerate condition, there would be nothing stopping the engine from speeding up until destruction, and I am sure that was not an uncommon thing.
lul it goes brrrt and then sneezes XDD
❓🤔 Here's a question I've never heard anyone ask on these videos: did these engines ever suffer mechanical failures with the centrifugal governor systems, that caused the system to fail at opening the exhaust valve, and leading to the engines turning faster and faster until they ran away, and suffered catastrophic damage as a result of basically flying apart? Or is there a secondary backup system that would prevent an engine running away, even if the centrifugal governor failed?
Good question! On these old engines the 'back up system" was the operator!
This particular engine was a mine hoist engine with a big winch on the back, and so the operator was standing on the back side of the flywheel running the clutch and brake for the winch, and would be able to step over and stop the engine if the governor failed or jammed.
Otherwise, if the governor failed in the Accelerate condition, there would be nothing stopping the engine from speeding up until destruction, and I am sure that was not an uncommon thing.