@@Hyce777 Nice that I left an impression. By the way I was the vacation of my live 8000 miles through the grater US south west. (some stops: Vegas, Grand Canyon, Denver, Houston, Phoenix, LA, Frisco, Redwoods, Sacramento , back to Vegas)
I never knew 491 was WIDER THAN A BIG BOY (That's...actually quite shocking) and yet only as tall as the Narrow Gauge, it does give 491 quite the Striking Silhouette. "Quite an Impressive Locomotive" indeed
I can think of a reason for the Big Boy and other Mallet-articulated locomotives (mostly not actually true Mallet) to be narrower than you might expect for a standard gauge locomotive: The Mallet articulation means that the long boiler sticks out over the side of the front drivers on a curve. This was especially prominent on a x-8-8-x locomotive like the Big Boy. Actually, I'm not sure if you even could take a Big Boy on some of the eastern railroads -- it might hit objects on the outsides of curves. Maybe this is why the heavy haulers of the eastern railroads tended to be x-6-6-x or have rather small driving wheels (like the 2 Triplex types, 2-8-8-8-x); the Norfolk and Western Y6-series seems to be a partial exception (maybe they had better trackside clearances?).
@@steffenrosmus9177 Sort of, but not really -- they reused boilers, tenders, and some other parts from some Class 19/C-41 2-8-0 locomotives, but they had to make an awful lot of parts completely new, so much that this doesn't really count as a conversion.
I’ve been at the D&S on vacation recently, and walking through the museum, my dad asked me the exact same question. It’s one of those things where you don’t realize how confusing outside frame locomotives look to those who aren’t used to them
When I was a little kid going to the Cumbres & Toltec, I always thought that the counterweights were some weird special wheel design. Kinda funny looking back on it.
Fun fact when the d&rgw was running the k-28s up to sliverton for the first time they kept scraping the cylinders against the rock walls along the line because the loading gauge was that much wider compared to the c-19s etc
Thank you! Appreciate the review of "why the hell did they hide the wheels" which actually makes a lot of sense. Watching 491's (relatively) huge boiler coming around the curve and looking at how big the gauge isn't really drove home the point. Thanks again 😊
Absolutely amazing knowledge and I wondered myself where the wheels where on D&RGW 491 and compared to 346 and 20 as they're older the design changed to improve and better the locomotive. Keep launching these great videos Mark H.
Nice job Mark! It's also interesting to note that since Schenectady did their locomotives differently (they built the "Sport Model" K-28s) they put the counterweights on the drivers to counteract the side rods. So the number 1, 2 and 4 axles had small cranks and the number 3 had the counterbalance for the main rod. Bonus points - what locomotive was called a more common name of a "coot" and why? :-)
Hi Hyce! So interesting to see how you started with inside frames but ended up with outside, the opposite of how it happened on a restricted loading gauge railway like over here in the UK (see Kirtly 156 or Churchward 3700 for surviving examples). At one point almost EVERYTHING was outside frames.
Outside frames on early locomotives in europe because the designers at that time are afraid of the center of mass going higher. So much so that they even have those ridiculous designs where the axles punches right through the boiler for the ultimate under slung boiler design. Another contributing factor as to why they want the boiler so low in the first place is because the entire running gear is in between the frames. They are forced to raise the boiler for more clearance. As to why the running gear is in between the frame, the designers are afraid of the crank axle snapping in half due to the moment distance between the applied force. Basically, keep the pistons closer together to keep the force concentrated. It must be done this because the metallurgy of the crank axle is still catching up. This was a time were they want more strength on the material but the processes on making that material is long ways away.
How does the cross compound air compressor work? What I mean by that is how does the steam go in on the right side of the pistons at the right time, because I can't see any sort of valve gear controlling it.
This video randomly popped up in my suggested feed. I have always wondered about the more massive outside framed engines and this video finally enlightened me out of the blue.
Wow, core memory unlocked, because I remember wondering about this exact thing when I rode the Durango & Silverton back in 1993 (I was 6 at the time). Nice to finally have that explained, so thanks!
On the 2 foot guage Sandy River & Rangley Lakes railroad (Maine) Baldwin built a 2-4-4T no. 9 with inside frames which was reported to have a tendency to wobble down the track. The next order to Baldwin was for the same size and design except the no. 10 was outside frame and was one of the sweetest runners they had. Reportedly one engineer routinely ran no. 10 at 60mph on 2 ft guage.
I was considering changing the design of my 10 1/4" gauge 0-4-0 steam powered Locomotive to 7 1/4" gauge ,to reduce the weight of my portable railroad panels as they are dual gauge. Watching your video has inspired to do this conversion by moving the wheel set inside and making counter weights to connect the motion on the outside,therefore not having to move the cylinder set up. Cheers 🍻
Thank you for showing where the 🚂🛞 choo choo wheels are, I had a model train as a kid and could never find ones that looked like mine in movies. The 𐄷⚖center of mass factors within the decision process of choosing to go with inside wheels was a good nugget of insight.
Hi Mark many thanks for your great explanation of outside frames. I really do like the 491. Such impressive presence and when steamed up amazing sounds. Famous 20 is a close second! Thanks again Mark, I’m always learning something new from you professor. Cheers.
Your comment about the frame "holding the locomotive together" reminded me of something I learned recently that I'd be interested in a video about: According to what I read, that's only partly true -- because the boiler expands in length when it gets hot, the boiler can only be attached to the frame at one place (the cylinder saddle), and the firebox and cab just rest on the back of the frame on sliders. Is that correct? I'd be really interested if you could talk about that more, and show how much it moves and how the parts work. Also, I quite appreciated that you made this video interesting for those of us who already knew where the wheels were, too! I knew where they were, but I didn't really know why (even though I thought I did).
That is very correct, the PRR had problems with their Duplex engines with boilers expanding more than the frame. A large locomotive boiler could expand upwards of an inch after it was really hot.
All steam locomotives have to cope with the expansion of the boiler when it’s hot. The frames and running gear will expand as well but only tiny amounts compared to the boiler. The usual way of allowing for this is to fix the boiler at the smokebox end and allow the firebox to move. Of course, the weight of the boiler has to be carried but those supports are designed to allow it to slide.
Now you're got me wondering WHY the great western did this with inside cylinder locomotives with high mounted boilers on a tiny loading gauge. This feels like a "Midland axle boxes" shop pride sorta thing.
Neat video, there's a few things in here that I didn't know. I'm in NSW Australia, we don't have many outside frame locos and the ones we do have come from other states.
They were fairly popular in the UK, where clearances were and still are REALLY narrow (can't even fit a standard shipping container). Edit: The situation there produces a result that is related, but not the same: The British locomotives I am thinking of had the wheels AND the cylinders inside. More modern UK locomotives had a more conventional design, but even so, you still can't fit a standard shipping container on much of the UK rail network.
I often thought that design was because the engine was made for the normal wider track, but now it is being used on a narrow track so it got modified to make it fit having the drive wheel on the inside of the frame to make it work..
My two Henschel HF110Cs (both my LGB/Aster Frank S. and my LGB/Marklin RuBB 99 4652) are outside frame, but in their case it's because the HF110C was originally built for military field railway use so the frame acts as armor for the wheels. The boiler on those sits completely above the footplate, albeit _exactly_ on it with no spacing. There's a lot of different reasons for doing an outside-frame locomotive, it's just one of those design quirks that shows up from time to time everywhere. I think there might be some European rod-driven diesel-hydraulic switchers that are also outside-frame, as well as the RhB's Ge 6/6 I Crocodile.
We've got a lot! 491, 346, and 20 are the three that operate, steam-wise. We also have the DL&G 191, D&RGW 318 on display that we own, then RGS 74, westside 12 and westside 14 on display owned by others that are all steam.
I find it so absurd that the locomotive hangs over each side of the rail more than the gauge of the railroad its on. It just seems like something that would never be stable, but 491 remains not upside down at the bottom of a cliff
I was told one time that the counterweights were originally hallow and they would fill them with lead to match the weight of the side rod. Have you heard of this or are they solid?
Thanks for these awesome detailed videos. I met you briefly at the East Broad Top on the 18th. Was wondering if you will be doing a video about your trip there?
I had thought outside frames would also be a bit easier to lubricate, what with all the lubrication spots for the axles being kept outside, which would have been a concern before the advent of automatic lubrication. On top of that, if the axleboxes are on the outside, any other attention to them doesn't require getting around or through the wheels. But that's just what I'd expect, I'm a tram gal who finds HAVING TO FEED THE AXLES IN THE SIDES weird and wants to find other ways to make it not as annoying to maintain things.
so my thought always was that if you replace the counter weights on the outside with the actual wheels, it would fit standard gauge. and wheels on the inside narrow gauge
Hyce in one of your professor videos you talked about the math and formula on how much a engine is rated for. Is there a formula on how fast a locomotive can theoretically go?
I guess there is, and it differs based on valve type. Your theoretical max speed is limited by the number of movements your cylinder can make while still being effective. That gives a max rpm, which in combination with wheel circumference gives the maximum speed
I knew about the counterweights on the outside, but I was wondering if there would be counterweights on the wheels inside. One potential future question: You talked about why the K-class locomotives (and other locomotives) had outside frames, clearance and center of gravity. Could you talk about some of the other advantages or disadvantages of outside vs inside frame? I've heard from the Georgetown Loop shop foreman that outside frame is a lot easier to inspect from below since the frames are further apart.
Another thing is that with the springs and bearings inside the wheels, they are much closer together, so the center of mass of the engine has more leverage on them when it tries to swing from side to side: this makes the locomotive more prone to rocking back and forth. Putting these outside the wheels gives a more stable ride and can prevent the thing from tipping over. On engines with inside valve gear (like Stephenson), having the gear and the frames inside the wheels made this space awfully crowded, especially up in Maine where the wheels were sometimes less than two feet back to back!
Pfff, in Austria there are narrow gauge engines with have the driving wheels on an inside frame, and the trailing wheel in an outside frame. Yes the frame becomes wider to fit the firebox. Maybe weird but it works.
The biggest secret of all time is how do you put water into a pressurized boiler. After searching for a week, I found out about the steam ejector (injector) whatever. Why does no one talk about this? Can you show me one? Can you make one work so that I can see it? thanks, Hyce!
I have always thought it was more that if you needed to convert one of these to standard gauge, simply move the wheels to the outside. Not sure that would actually work given the other components and it might be wider than standard gauge, but I wonder if the D&RG ever thought of it
I could have sworn to having read somewhere about somebody doing the opposite -- rebuilt a standard gauge steam locomotive to an outside-frame narrow gauge locomotive.
Courtesy of Nick Norton in a different comments subthread: Boilers, tenders, and some other parts from D&RGW standard gauge Class 19/C-41 were used to build new D&RGW class K-37 locomotives.
If you see very little steam coming out of the smoke stack, does that mean that you are running the locomotive at it's highest efficient rate? Like the fire is burning very efficiently and you have the "perfect" amount of steam pressure and water that there is no excess steam to exert out of the smoke stack?
Awesome video. I went to Bethlehem tech for Auto mechanics and was in a co-op from 2002-2005. I balanced a few hundred maybe even a thousand or 2 wheels. Do they balance train wheels like professional mechanics do for highway wheels? I mean put it on a centrifugal spindle, spin it right round baby right round. And apply the weights where the degree marker points? Or do they tap it with a hammer listen for vibrations and add weight until the resonating tones of the wheel is tuned? How do they balance those multi-thousand pound wheels?
Since editor hyce answered my question about stability heading down the rails I'll ask a different one; do you know if anyone built an outside frame standard gauge loco?
Were outside frames ever used for standard gauge locomotives? I can imagine just how wide those would be and how much bigger you could make the boiler.
There were a few crazy ones like the Saxon XV HTV with mixed inside and outside frames. Regular ones were (quickly phased out due to being outdated in 1925) de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayerische_B_IX de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayerische_C_III
One example is the famous "City of Truro". Afaik the Great Western Railway also built some inside frames locomotives for broad gauge meant to be converted to standard gauge outside frame locomotives during the gauge conversion phase.
@@fritz46 Thanks -- and Google even finds the Wikipedia article on this and other sources of pictures of this locomotive. But the "City" class was built new this way years after the conversion was finished. The Wikipedia article on locomotives of the Great Western claims that some locomotives were converted, and the article on GWR class 388 even lists some as being converted from standard gauge to broad gauge and back to standard gauge, but these don't show pictures of converted locomotives.
Hello from France and thanks for the lot of information on the old steam locomotive. I’am trying to build from scratch a k-27 in Fng scale (with parts of Bachmann) and I have a lot of drawings of K-27 (from internet), some of them with a lot of tubing on the cab’s roof. Could you tell me what are they use for?
Hey, I just thought of this while watching. As a video request, would you show us how you de-winterize a steam locomotive or is the one fireup video just that? Also, why not just put counterweights on the wheels as well help with the balance? I understand the outside counterweights are, as you said, more for control the center of mass, which in turn improves the center of gravity, but wouldn’t having them on the wheels as well help with the weight balancing?
@@Hyce777 I WAS RATHER CURIOUS ABOUT THIS TYPE AND WONDERED IF THEY WERE BUILT NEW AS SUCH OR WERE OLDER STANDARD GUAGE SMALLER LOCOMOTIVES REBILT AND DOWNSIZED TO MAKE BIGGER NARROW GUAGE POWER! I SEED TO WORK FOR SANTA FE AND BECAME QUITE INTERESTED IN THEIR STEAM POWER MAITENENCE AND REBUILDS! THEY DID A LOT OF STUFF EXCHANGING BOILERS BETWEEN DIFFERENT CLASSES TO REBUILD OLDER LOCOMOTIVES INTO YARD SWITCHERS AND LOCAL TRAIN POWER! THE AT&SF 769 NOW RESIDING AT MADRID NEW MEXICO IS AN EXAMPLE OF AN KITBASH OF THAT SORT!!
Hey @Hyce I am currently a college student studying secondary education. I am quickly realizing that teaching in Arizona is definitely not for me. I’ve always loved trains and I love working on cars. I want to get into train maintenance at BNSF like you did. Is there anything I need to know about the job? Do I need a degree in something? Or do I just wait until a position is open in my area and just go for it?
All we need is.... All the money. Lol. We talk about it daily. We really could. They're working on master plan stuff right now that will hopefully include things like that.
![[SFS] Locomotives that HIT STUFF...](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/s8dvJrX0t58/mqdefault.jpg)
![[SFS] Locomotives that HIT STUFF...](/img/tr.png)
I still think 491 is a chonker.
You telling me that in person is still one of my highlight moments from this summer, lol.
@@Hyce777 Nice that I left an impression. By the way I was the vacation of my live 8000 miles through the grater US south west. (some stops: Vegas, Grand Canyon, Denver, Houston, Phoenix, LA, Frisco, Redwoods, Sacramento , back to Vegas)
Amen on that, brother~ I mean, just look at her~ These hips don't lie~
So do you guys plan on expanding operational trackage in the future instead of your circle piece of operating track?
491 is a hecken chonker
when you talked about the center of mass i was waiting for a joke on 346 going for belly scratches.
Drunken Belly Scratches!
I never knew 491 was WIDER THAN A BIG BOY (That's...actually quite shocking)
and yet only as tall as the Narrow Gauge, it does give 491 quite the Striking Silhouette.
"Quite an Impressive Locomotive" indeed
I can think of a reason for the Big Boy and other Mallet-articulated locomotives (mostly not actually true Mallet) to be narrower than you might expect for a standard gauge locomotive: The Mallet articulation means that the long boiler sticks out over the side of the front drivers on a curve. This was especially prominent on a x-8-8-x locomotive like the Big Boy. Actually, I'm not sure if you even could take a Big Boy on some of the eastern railroads -- it might hit objects on the outsides of curves. Maybe this is why the heavy haulers of the eastern railroads tended to be x-6-6-x or have rather small driving wheels (like the 2 Triplex types, 2-8-8-8-x); the Norfolk and Western Y6-series seems to be a partial exception (maybe they had better trackside clearances?).
Well the k37s were converted from standard gauge inside frame Consolidations to outside frame Mikados in the 1930ies
@@steffenrosmus9177 Sort of, but not really -- they reused boilers, tenders, and some other parts from some Class 19/C-41 2-8-0 locomotives, but they had to make an awful lot of parts completely new, so much that this doesn't really count as a conversion.
I’ve been at the D&S on vacation recently, and walking through the museum, my dad asked me the exact same question.
It’s one of those things where you don’t realize how confusing outside frame locomotives look to those who aren’t used to them
When I was a little kid going to the Cumbres & Toltec, I always thought that the counterweights were some weird special wheel design. Kinda funny looking back on it.
Same.
I can agree with this XD
I think we all have at some point
Fun fact when the d&rgw was running the k-28s up to sliverton for the first time they kept scraping the cylinders against the rock walls along the line because the loading gauge was that much wider compared to the c-19s etc
I figured it was something to do with sticking bigger bits onto a small track but I had no clue about the centre of mass and springs. Great video!
Thank you! Appreciate the review of "why the hell did they hide the wheels" which actually makes a lot of sense. Watching 491's (relatively) huge boiler coming around the curve and looking at how big the gauge isn't really drove home the point. Thanks again 😊
Absolutely amazing knowledge and I wondered myself where the wheels where on D&RGW 491 and compared to 346 and 20 as they're older the design changed to improve and better the locomotive.
Keep launching these great videos Mark H.
That was very informative. As someone who loves narrow gauge railroading, thank you for taking the time to make these videos!
Nice job Mark! It's also interesting to note that since Schenectady did their locomotives differently (they built the "Sport Model" K-28s) they put the counterweights on the drivers to counteract the side rods. So the number 1, 2 and 4 axles had small cranks and the number 3 had the counterbalance for the main rod.
Bonus points - what locomotive was called a more common name of a "coot" and why? :-)
I love outside framed locomotives, I think the counterweights look really interesting and cool
Hi Hyce!
So interesting to see how you started with inside frames but ended up with outside, the opposite of how it happened on a restricted loading gauge railway like over here in the UK (see Kirtly 156 or Churchward 3700 for surviving examples). At one point almost EVERYTHING was outside frames.
That's quite fascinating.
Outside frames on early locomotives in europe because the designers at that time are afraid of the center of mass going higher. So much so that they even have those ridiculous designs where the axles punches right through the boiler for the ultimate under slung boiler design.
Another contributing factor as to why they want the boiler so low in the first place is because the entire running gear is in between the frames. They are forced to raise the boiler for more clearance. As to why the running gear is in between the frame, the designers are afraid of the crank axle snapping in half due to the moment distance between the applied force. Basically, keep the pistons closer together to keep the force concentrated. It must be done this because the metallurgy of the crank axle is still catching up. This was a time were they want more strength on the material but the processes on making that material is long ways away.
How does the cross compound air compressor work? What I mean by that is how does the steam go in on the right side of the pistons at the right time, because I can't see any sort of valve gear controlling it.
There's a controller that lives on top of the head that makes that happen. How it works I'm not sure myself!
@@Hyce777 Stare at it until you understand it.
491 absolutely reminds me of 90s GT cars, or RWB 911s, simply because it's just so darn wide, but looks good with it's width
The K37 is a lowrider in all reality. It is a channeled and lowered standard gauge locomotive.
This video randomly popped up in my suggested feed. I have always wondered about the more massive outside framed engines and this video finally enlightened me out of the blue.
Wow, core memory unlocked, because I remember wondering about this exact thing when I rode the Durango & Silverton back in 1993 (I was 6 at the time). Nice to finally have that explained, so thanks!
Love the videos, keep up the great work!
346 looks sad but she will soon shine!
You give really clear explanations and your enthusiasm for the topic shines through. Thanks for sharing your insights. Ronn
I’m learning an incredible amount of things from your channel, thank you for your hard work Hyce :D
On the 2 foot guage Sandy River & Rangley Lakes railroad (Maine) Baldwin built a 2-4-4T no. 9 with inside frames which was reported to have a tendency to wobble down the track. The next order to Baldwin was for the same size and design except the no. 10 was outside frame and was one of the sweetest runners they had. Reportedly one engineer routinely ran no. 10 at 60mph on 2 ft guage.
Accurately explained. Many thanks for sharing. Liked, subscribed!
I was considering changing the design of my 10 1/4" gauge 0-4-0 steam powered Locomotive to 7 1/4" gauge ,to reduce the weight of my portable railroad panels as they are dual gauge. Watching your video has inspired to do this conversion by moving the wheel set inside and making counter weights to connect the motion on the outside,therefore not having to move the cylinder set up. Cheers 🍻
Another great video! Thanks for showing these differences to us!
Thank you for showing where the 🚂🛞 choo choo wheels are, I had a model train as a kid and could never find ones that looked like mine in movies. The 𐄷⚖center of mass factors within the decision process of choosing to go with inside wheels was a good nugget of insight.
Cool info - I love your workshops like this.
Neat! Yeah, all that weight up high would tend to make it want to roll over and take a nap going around curves. Thanks for sharing
these are the things they need to be teaching us in school XD thank you so much Hyce!
Hi Mark many thanks for your great explanation of outside frames. I really do like the 491. Such impressive presence and when steamed up amazing sounds. Famous 20 is a close second! Thanks again Mark, I’m always learning something new from you professor. Cheers.
Great video Hyce!
4:30 whaaa... No... That can't be right....
My mind cannot process that peaches is wider than the big boy xD
Your comment about the frame "holding the locomotive together" reminded me of something I learned recently that I'd be interested in a video about: According to what I read, that's only partly true -- because the boiler expands in length when it gets hot, the boiler can only be attached to the frame at one place (the cylinder saddle), and the firebox and cab just rest on the back of the frame on sliders. Is that correct? I'd be really interested if you could talk about that more, and show how much it moves and how the parts work.
Also, I quite appreciated that you made this video interesting for those of us who already knew where the wheels were, too! I knew where they were, but I didn't really know why (even though I thought I did).
That is very correct, the PRR had problems with their Duplex engines with boilers expanding more than the frame. A large locomotive boiler could expand upwards of an inch after it was really hot.
All steam locomotives have to cope with the expansion of the boiler when it’s hot. The frames and running gear will expand as well but only tiny amounts compared to the boiler. The usual way of allowing for this is to fix the boiler at the smokebox end and allow the firebox to move. Of course, the weight of the boiler has to be carried but those supports are designed to allow it to slide.
Now you're got me wondering WHY the great western did this with inside cylinder locomotives with high mounted boilers on a tiny loading gauge. This feels like a "Midland axle boxes" shop pride sorta thing.
Great explanation Hyce, I often wonder why a narrow gauge engine don't fall over. . .
Thanks for the clear up on the wheels, Hyce!
Great video Hyce
Great information thank you Have a great weekend
Theoretically, we c o u l d be a silly, dubious little character, and put the wheels on the outside and run 491 on the mainline.
It'd be broad gauge.
@@Hyce777 So the Russian mainline?
Neat video, there's a few things in here that I didn't know. I'm in NSW Australia, we don't have many outside frame locos and the ones we do have come from other states.
Quite the informative video! Were there ever any standard gauge outside frame locomotives that you know of?
They were fairly popular in the UK, where clearances were and still are REALLY narrow (can't even fit a standard shipping container). Edit: The situation there produces a result that is related, but not the same: The British locomotives I am thinking of had the wheels AND the cylinders inside. More modern UK locomotives had a more conventional design, but even so, you still can't fit a standard shipping container on much of the UK rail network.
“Sometime soon we’re gonna talk about this thing behind me”
*takes a full year to talk about the broken choo-choo*
Love watching the video. Crazy to think that the 491 was wider than a big boy
I often thought that design was because the engine was made for the normal wider track, but now it is being used on a narrow track so it got modified to make it fit having the drive wheel on the inside of the frame to make it work..
nope.
My two Henschel HF110Cs (both my LGB/Aster Frank S. and my LGB/Marklin RuBB 99 4652) are outside frame, but in their case it's because the HF110C was originally built for military field railway use so the frame acts as armor for the wheels. The boiler on those sits completely above the footplate, albeit _exactly_ on it with no spacing. There's a lot of different reasons for doing an outside-frame locomotive, it's just one of those design quirks that shows up from time to time everywhere. I think there might be some European rod-driven diesel-hydraulic switchers that are also outside-frame, as well as the RhB's Ge 6/6 I Crocodile.
Thank you Prof Hyce, I learned a lot from this video. I really want to know more about the 346. What other narrow gauge engines does the museum have?
We've got a lot! 491, 346, and 20 are the three that operate, steam-wise. We also have the DL&G 191, D&RGW 318 on display that we own, then RGS 74, westside 12 and westside 14 on display owned by others that are all steam.
So THATS why outside frame locomotives were built that way. They look very odd but are very very powerful
4:44
Well, DUH~ It's the BIG Boy, after all. Not the WIDE Boy.
XDD
I find it so absurd that the locomotive hangs over each side of the rail more than the gauge of the railroad its on. It just seems like something that would never be stable, but 491 remains not upside down at the bottom of a cliff
Make a video about how the tender is connected to the steam locomotive I have never seen that very closely
I was told one time that the counterweights were originally hallow and they would fill them with lead to match the weight of the side rod. Have you heard of this or are they solid?
That's what I've always heard as well. Not honestly sure.
Thanks for these awesome detailed videos. I met you briefly at the East Broad Top on the 18th. Was wondering if you will be doing a video about your trip there?
Oh plenty of video to come from EBT. They just take a minute to put together. :)
“where are the wheels?”
sorry i ate them
Were they tasty?
@@burnerheinz I have had them before, they were good and made well in a k-37 kitchen but they were wheel-y hard to swallow.
@@burnerheinz iron’s good for the body, steel is good for the soul
L I M E S with those!!
my favorite outside frame locomotive besides the rio grande Ks are the south african railways ng15s which were 2ft narrow guage
I had thought outside frames would also be a bit easier to lubricate, what with all the lubrication spots for the axles being kept outside, which would have been a concern before the advent of automatic lubrication. On top of that, if the axleboxes are on the outside, any other attention to them doesn't require getting around or through the wheels.
But that's just what I'd expect, I'm a tram gal who finds HAVING TO FEED THE AXLES IN THE SIDES weird and wants to find other ways to make it not as annoying to maintain things.
Loved it!
so my thought always was that if you replace the counter weights on the outside with the actual wheels, it would fit standard gauge. and wheels on the inside narrow gauge
Nope. It's wider.
When your interest in railways is very much the narrow gauge, then the inside frames are just normal and obvious but a great explanation ✔️
Very interesting videos thanks for your knowledge
Hyce in one of your professor videos you talked about the math and formula on how much a engine is rated for. Is there a formula on how fast a locomotive can theoretically go?
Mathhhhhhhhh
I guess there is, and it differs based on valve type. Your theoretical max speed is limited by the number of movements your cylinder can make while still being effective. That gives a max rpm, which in combination with wheel circumference gives the maximum speed
I knew about the counterweights on the outside, but I was wondering if there would be counterweights on the wheels inside.
One potential future question: You talked about why the K-class locomotives (and other locomotives) had outside frames, clearance and center of gravity. Could you talk about some of the other advantages or disadvantages of outside vs inside frame? I've heard from the Georgetown Loop shop foreman that outside frame is a lot easier to inspect from below since the frames are further apart.
There certainly are a lot of plusses and minuses; that'd make for a good video. :)
Another thing is that with the springs and bearings inside the wheels, they are much closer together, so the center of mass of the engine has more leverage on them when it tries to swing from side to side: this makes the locomotive more prone to rocking back and forth. Putting these outside the wheels gives a more stable ride and can prevent the thing from tipping over.
On engines with inside valve gear (like Stephenson), having the gear and the frames inside the wheels made this space awfully crowded, especially up in Maine where the wheels were sometimes less than two feet back to back!
In addition to spring rigging, having an outside frame also probably helps the boiler clear the cylinders/saddle.
well, see, it physically has to do that no matter what and they don't move, lol
Yes, but with bigger cylinders than would otherwise fit
Happy to say I'll be out at CRM during the Narrow Gauge Convention!
Were any outside frame locomotives used on the standard gauge networks?
Finally, a concrete answer as to WHY.
Side note, it looks like 346's smokebox would fit inside 491s firebox.
It would, if you took the backhead off... lol
@@Hyce777 Jesus, really puts 491s size in perspective.
Mmmm counterweights
Pfff, in Austria there are narrow gauge engines with have the driving wheels on an inside frame, and the trailing wheel in an outside frame. Yes the frame becomes wider to fit the firebox. Maybe weird but it works.
Curious what that front to back U bent series of pipes is on the sides of 491.
491 almost looks like a monorail on that narrow gauge track!
We got you reacting to 2102 I would love to see your thoughts on Pennsylvanias narrow gage the East Broad Top
491 is still my favorite narrow gauge engine.
RGS 20 is one of older 4-6-0 on 3 ft, and is more modernized while ET&WNC 12 hasnt been changed since it left the ET&WNC
The biggest secret of all time is how do you put water into a pressurized boiler. After searching for a week, I found out about the steam ejector (injector) whatever. Why does no one talk about this? Can you show me one? Can you make one work so that I can see it? thanks, Hyce!
I have always thought it was more that if you needed to convert one of these to standard gauge, simply move the wheels to the outside. Not sure that would actually work given the other components and it might be wider than standard gauge, but I wonder if the D&RG ever thought of it
I could have sworn to having read somewhere about somebody doing the opposite -- rebuilt a standard gauge steam locomotive to an outside-frame narrow gauge locomotive.
Courtesy of Nick Norton in a different comments subthread: Boilers, tenders, and some other parts from D&RGW standard gauge Class 19/C-41 were used to build new D&RGW class K-37 locomotives.
If you see very little steam coming out of the smoke stack, does that mean that you are running the locomotive at it's highest efficient rate? Like the fire is burning very efficiently and you have the "perfect" amount of steam pressure and water that there is no excess steam to exert out of the smoke stack?
I'd wondered if it was to allow some parts sharing between standard and narrow gauge locomotives with manufacturing.
Awesome video. I went to Bethlehem tech for Auto mechanics and was in a co-op from 2002-2005. I balanced a few hundred maybe even a thousand or 2 wheels. Do they balance train wheels like professional mechanics do for highway wheels? I mean put it on a centrifugal spindle, spin it right round baby right round. And apply the weights where the degree marker points? Or do they tap it with a hammer listen for vibrations and add weight until the resonating tones of the wheel is tuned? How do they balance those multi-thousand pound wheels?
Since editor hyce answered my question about stability heading down the rails I'll ask a different one; do you know if anyone built an outside frame standard gauge loco?
I am not aware of any, but I wouldn't be surprised if one does exist.
I wouldn't have expected a narrow gauge locomotive to be wider than Big Boy.
Were outside frames ever used for standard gauge locomotives? I can imagine just how wide those would be and how much bigger you could make the boiler.
Not that I've heard of, but I wouldn't be surprised if one existed. That'd be a loading gauge nightmare.
There were a few crazy ones like the Saxon XV HTV with mixed inside and outside frames.
Regular ones were (quickly phased out due to being outdated in 1925)
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayerische_B_IX
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayerische_C_III
I could have sworn some weird UK locomotives had both outside frames and inside cylinders, but now I can't find a picture.
One example is the famous "City of Truro". Afaik the Great Western Railway also built some inside frames locomotives for broad gauge meant to be converted to standard gauge outside frame locomotives during the gauge conversion phase.
@@fritz46 Thanks -- and Google even finds the Wikipedia article on this and other sources of pictures of this locomotive. But the "City" class was built new this way years after the conversion was finished. The Wikipedia article on locomotives of the Great Western claims that some locomotives were converted, and the article on GWR class 388 even lists some as being converted from standard gauge to broad gauge and back to standard gauge, but these don't show pictures of converted locomotives.
Interesting video. Thx.
Hello from France and thanks for the lot of information on the old steam locomotive. I’am trying to build from scratch a k-27 in Fng scale (with parts of Bachmann) and I have a lot of drawings of K-27 (from internet), some of them with a lot of tubing on the cab’s roof. Could you tell me what are they use for?
Holy cow, can’t believe 491 is wider than the big boy
Hey, I just thought of this while watching. As a video request, would you show us how you de-winterize a steam locomotive or is the one fireup video just that?
Also, why not just put counterweights on the wheels as well help with the balance? I understand the outside counterweights are, as you said, more for control the center of mass, which in turn improves the center of gravity, but wouldn’t having them on the wheels as well help with the weight balancing?
He mentioned in the video where some builders did that.
At some point when i have money, i plan to get an HOn3 K-clasz Mikado
Thank you
If you want to see wobbly check out of the South African Steam Locomotives that look like they shouldn't be on such a narrow gauge.
MANY YEARS AGO , I RODE THE GEORGETOWN LOOP RR THAT HAD A LOCOMOTIVE OF THIS TYPE!
WAS IT THE 491 ??
KEEP THEM ROLLING BROTHERS!!
👍👍
The loop has had the 40, 44, and 111, that are all outside frame 2-8-0's for a number of years. Likely one of those. :)
@@Hyce777 I WAS RATHER CURIOUS ABOUT THIS TYPE AND WONDERED IF THEY WERE BUILT NEW AS SUCH OR WERE OLDER STANDARD GUAGE SMALLER LOCOMOTIVES REBILT AND DOWNSIZED TO MAKE BIGGER NARROW GUAGE POWER!
I SEED TO WORK FOR SANTA FE AND BECAME QUITE INTERESTED IN THEIR STEAM POWER MAITENENCE AND REBUILDS!
THEY DID A LOT OF STUFF EXCHANGING BOILERS BETWEEN DIFFERENT CLASSES TO REBUILD OLDER LOCOMOTIVES INTO YARD SWITCHERS AND LOCAL TRAIN POWER!
THE AT&SF 769 NOW RESIDING AT MADRID NEW MEXICO IS AN EXAMPLE OF AN KITBASH OF THAT SORT!!
Hey @Hyce I am currently a college student studying secondary education. I am quickly realizing that teaching in Arizona is definitely not for me. I’ve always loved trains and I love working on cars.
I want to get into train maintenance at BNSF like you did. Is there anything I need to know about the job? Do I need a degree in something? Or do I just wait until a position is open in my area and just go for it?
Do you ever think that the museum will put the 3-foot engines on display back in service eventually?
Not likely.
Hyce, is the frame for the inside narrow the same dimensionally as a frame for an outside standard?
based on a quick google search, a k-37 (10.4ft) is not wider than the Big Boy (11ft), but thats still impressive on 491's part lol
Ah yes, OUTSIDEFRA-
which is easier to maintain? inside or outside frame?
Is the CRRM ever considering building another roundhouse stall or a dedicated machine shop? Looks like you could use the space
All we need is.... All the money. Lol. We talk about it daily. We really could. They're working on master plan stuff right now that will hopefully include things like that.
@@Hyce777 Do you have a maintenance pit? I know at my local museum we've been talking about putting one in for years (but that costs a lot of money!)
@@andrewreynolds4949 we do, thankfully.
@@Hyce777 No crawling upside down under locomotives to work on brake systems then!
We're parts of the k37 reused from standard gauge engines?
Yes, check out the 10:30 mark in our recent Big Trains Tour video on 491 - ua-cam.com/video/nL7jbTyD5B0/v-deo.html
I think the boiler was made along side standard gauge boilers but only the boilers.
The museum itself replied, but the short answer is yes, the boiler and domes were re used, and the tender was converted.
Imma say, outside frame supremacy
Some 2ft narrow gauge have forney 's have outside frame also
Never knew they existed… what is maintenance like? And inspections? Harder or just as hard ?
They've got more work to do on the driver boxes (double the hubs), but otherwise quite similar.
491 is wider than big boy? Literally mind blown and by how much?