The First Successful 3 Cylinder Locomotive in the U.S. - 1925
WHAT HE CHARACTERIZES as "perhaps the most significant of our modern locomotive advances" is described in The Scientific American (New York, February), by Albert C. Ingalls.
It is the first successful development in America of the three-cylinder locomotive. There is nothing complicated about this new development, Mr. Ingalls assures us. Simply, instead of the two cylinders of the average locomotive there are three. These are all practically alike, they all use steam at the same pressure and there are three evenly spaced power-thrusts in each direction. He goes on:
"The three-cylinder locomotive is in no sense a compound engine. Two of its cylinders are placed identically as the cylinders are placed on the ordinary two-cylinder locomotive, but there is an additional cylinder in the center, its connecting rod attaching to a crank-bearing in the center of one of the drive-wheel axles.
"The advantages of the three-cylinder locomotive are: more power, steadier pull, greater economy in the use of steam, and more economical combustion of the fuel.
"Nearly every one is familiar with the reason for the advantage the six-cylinder automobile engine has over the four-cylinder motor. The over-lapping power strokes give a more uniform torque or twist to the crankshaft. The same principle applies to the three-cylinder locomotive. This even torque is especially valuable for starting heavy trains, as it takes more power to start a train than to keep it going. The addition of the third cylinder also permits an earlier cut-off which effects a saving in steam.
"The purring exhaust results in a much steadier draft on the fire than is the case where the more pulsating draft of the two-cylinder locomotive is used. This promotes fuel economy.
"At the time when this article is being written there is just one of these locomotives, designed and built as such, in operation in America; but so successful has been the operation of that one locomotive that the eyes of every railroad official in America have been on its performance, since it was put in use on the Lehigh Valley Railroad a little over a year ago.
"The noted Number 5000 was built by the American Locomotive Company at Schenectady, New York, and is running every day of the week over the mountainous grades of eastern Pennsylvania on the Lehigh Valley main line. On that line, one of the most important of all trains is the train that brings a part of New York's daily supply of milk from the farms of Pennsylvania and western New York. That train must get through on time, rain or shine, and it is run on a passenger schedule, the time for its run over the mountains being but six minutes slower than that of the famous Black Diamond Express."
Late last September, Mr. Ingalls went to Sayre, Pennsylvania, and rode Number 5000 to Mauch Chunk, 145 miles, the run taking four hours. He found the Lehigh Valley officials more than pleased with the performance of this new marvel, and that feeling extended to the men who had direct charge of it. He was greatly surprized, he says, not only with regard to the high efficiency of the locomotive, its remarkable performances in starting heavy trains on steep grades and its lower fuel consumption, but especially its ease of riding. To quote again:
"This locomotive is really a large passenger engine. Her drivers are nearly six feet in diameter, her weight is 185 tons, her boiler pressure is 200 pounds per square inch, and her tractive effort or pull is 64,700 pounds.
"I asked the road foreman of the division on which Number 5000 makes her daily run what the saving in coal, due to the use of the three-cylinder locomotive, amounted to. 'Well,' said he, 'you can figure it this way. Before we got Number 5000, it took one engine and one helper to haul this train. The three-cylindered Number 5000 now hauls it alone, and with less delay.'
"Based on the remarkable performance of Number 5000, which has been ridden, studied and closely observed by railroad officials who during the past year have come for the purpose from all over the country, more three-cylinder locomotives are being built by the manufacturer of Number 5000 for the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad; for the Louisville and Nashville Railroad; for the Southern Pacific Railroad; for the Missouri Pacific Rail-road; ten for the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad and five more like Number 5000 for the Lehigh Valley Railroad.
"When it is remembered that rail-road men are positively hard-boiled when it comes to spending money on innovations of unestablished merit, or on stunts and notions, it begins to look as if Number 5000 were destined within a few years to be regarded as the forerunner of a great advance in American locomotive practise."
Source: The Literary Digest for February 21, 1925
It is the first successful development in America of the three-cylinder locomotive. There is nothing complicated about this new development, Mr. Ingalls assures us. Simply, instead of the two cylinders of the average locomotive there are three. These are all practically alike, they all use steam at the same pressure and there are three evenly spaced power-thrusts in each direction. He goes on:
"The three-cylinder locomotive is in no sense a compound engine. Two of its cylinders are placed identically as the cylinders are placed on the ordinary two-cylinder locomotive, but there is an additional cylinder in the center, its connecting rod attaching to a crank-bearing in the center of one of the drive-wheel axles.
"The advantages of the three-cylinder locomotive are: more power, steadier pull, greater economy in the use of steam, and more economical combustion of the fuel.
"Nearly every one is familiar with the reason for the advantage the six-cylinder automobile engine has over the four-cylinder motor. The over-lapping power strokes give a more uniform torque or twist to the crankshaft. The same principle applies to the three-cylinder locomotive. This even torque is especially valuable for starting heavy trains, as it takes more power to start a train than to keep it going. The addition of the third cylinder also permits an earlier cut-off which effects a saving in steam.
"The purring exhaust results in a much steadier draft on the fire than is the case where the more pulsating draft of the two-cylinder locomotive is used. This promotes fuel economy.
"At the time when this article is being written there is just one of these locomotives, designed and built as such, in operation in America; but so successful has been the operation of that one locomotive that the eyes of every railroad official in America have been on its performance, since it was put in use on the Lehigh Valley Railroad a little over a year ago.
"The noted Number 5000 was built by the American Locomotive Company at Schenectady, New York, and is running every day of the week over the mountainous grades of eastern Pennsylvania on the Lehigh Valley main line. On that line, one of the most important of all trains is the train that brings a part of New York's daily supply of milk from the farms of Pennsylvania and western New York. That train must get through on time, rain or shine, and it is run on a passenger schedule, the time for its run over the mountains being but six minutes slower than that of the famous Black Diamond Express."
Late last September, Mr. Ingalls went to Sayre, Pennsylvania, and rode Number 5000 to Mauch Chunk, 145 miles, the run taking four hours. He found the Lehigh Valley officials more than pleased with the performance of this new marvel, and that feeling extended to the men who had direct charge of it. He was greatly surprized, he says, not only with regard to the high efficiency of the locomotive, its remarkable performances in starting heavy trains on steep grades and its lower fuel consumption, but especially its ease of riding. To quote again:
"This locomotive is really a large passenger engine. Her drivers are nearly six feet in diameter, her weight is 185 tons, her boiler pressure is 200 pounds per square inch, and her tractive effort or pull is 64,700 pounds.
"I asked the road foreman of the division on which Number 5000 makes her daily run what the saving in coal, due to the use of the three-cylinder locomotive, amounted to. 'Well,' said he, 'you can figure it this way. Before we got Number 5000, it took one engine and one helper to haul this train. The three-cylindered Number 5000 now hauls it alone, and with less delay.'
"Based on the remarkable performance of Number 5000, which has been ridden, studied and closely observed by railroad officials who during the past year have come for the purpose from all over the country, more three-cylinder locomotives are being built by the manufacturer of Number 5000 for the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad; for the Louisville and Nashville Railroad; for the Southern Pacific Railroad; for the Missouri Pacific Rail-road; ten for the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad and five more like Number 5000 for the Lehigh Valley Railroad.
"When it is remembered that rail-road men are positively hard-boiled when it comes to spending money on innovations of unestablished merit, or on stunts and notions, it begins to look as if Number 5000 were destined within a few years to be regarded as the forerunner of a great advance in American locomotive practise."
Source: The Literary Digest for February 21, 1925