The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1888-11-28
AN IMPROVED LOCOMOTIVE.

To Haul Fifteen Coaches sixty Miles an Hour
No Smoke, No Sparks No Steam Chests.
Providence Journal.
In the Acorn-street round-houss Of the New
York, Providence & Boston railroad, yesterday,
q number Of men were rubbing, and grooming.
and tightening up with wrenches, here and
there, with all the pride that owners and breed
ere take in their track favorites, a monster new
locomotive, built, as a plate upon either side Of
her smoEe-bcx desienates, by the Hinkley Loco
motive Company, Boston. She is designed AMI
constructed for the Strong Locomotive Company,
% Broadway, New York. for the Atchison, To-
pska & Santa Fe railroad. It is the latest built
of the "Strone" locomotives. which COM
ordinary locomotive practice. and which
have attracted the attention Of railway
men and locomotive-builders wherever their
performance could be studied. The improve
ments are the invention of Mr.. George S.
Strong, at one time mechanical superintendent
of the Lehish Valley road. and the initial ma
chine, which was built to handle heavy express
trains mp a long steep grade, has been exhibited
in various parts of the country. while a second
machine, like the one 10 this city, has been put
through a thorough series of tests in competi-
tioL with an ordinary standard American en-
CINE aud an eieht-wheel engine with the ordi-
nary fre-boX, but fitted with the Strong valve
gear. The peculiarity in the construction of
the Strong locomotive is in her furnace and
combustion chamber, her cylinder valves
and valve gears, and in the arrange
ment OF her wheels and running
gear. The boiler had two furnaces, each one
being a welded and corrugated steel cylinder.
forty-two inches in diameter and seven feet
long. These two furnaces are Joined by a
Hanged and corrugated junction piece, a cor
ruga,ed cylindrical combustion chamber, making
tho great area of fifty square feet, with a COM
bustion chamber nine feet from the face Of the
bridge-rail 10 the tube sheet, and sixteen feet
from the fire door to the tube-sheet. The total
heating surface is $50 feet. By this c%onstruc-
ton all braces and stay-bolts and crovn-bars
are done away with, the gases being all con-
sumed and all smoke prevented. The sparks
are not drawn from tho fire-box, and no spark
arrester is required, the engine running without
smoke or sparks. The original Strong engine
would even burn culm, the refuse a. the pit
mouth. and this engine will use anthracite or
bituminous coal with good results.
The other radical departures in the build OF
this locomotive are in the cylinders. valves. and
valve gear. there being no steam chests on
top OF the cylinders. as in ordinary engines.
There are four valves interposed in the pas
ssges back of the cumbersome for steam aud
one for exhaust at each end, every valve being
a gridiron plain slide. There are nine ports
AZ inches long on each valve. making 3St
inches. the length OF port on each valve. This
large valve area admits the steam at very
nearly boiler pressure on the piston, and the
steam valve cuts il off az tho will of the engineer
at any place from four TO twenty-five inches.
the exhaust valve holding on TO the steam until
the last inch OF the piston travels, when it opens
wide. letting the steam 60 freely with very
little back pressure. This popularity enables
the engine, athigh speed. to develop ABOUT double
the horse power that an ordinary locomotive,
with equal sized cylinders. l9x24 inches,
at an equal cut of. would be able to do, an on
CINE similar 10 this one having shown the enor-
nous strength of $40 horse power. while pull
ing a train of twelve Pullman coaches on the
Northern Pacific road Ct Q speed exceeding sixty
miles an hour. The same engine has pullsd Q