The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1894-10-20
In PLACE OF COAL.
An Interesting Account Of Two New
Railroad Devices.
a Cheap Kind of locomotive Fuel.
Guarding Against the Operations of
Bold Train Robbers-A Vestibuled
From the washington Star.


Tender.
From the Washington Star.
If there is one thing more than another
that will start a controversy among rail
road men it is the praise of new appli-
ances as applied to railroad equipment.
Everybody outside of railroad circles.
with humane instincts, will hail with de-
light the adoption of the self-coupling
platform on freight cars, but seven out OF
eight railroad employees will give the in
novation sarcastic praise. They have be-
come so familiar with the old appliances,
which required skill and nerve to master,
that they dislike to see this experience go
for naught.
Yet developments in the past year or so
have almost compelled the adoption OF
two new ideas by the railroads of the
country These are the substitution OF
cheap fuel for coal and wood for the loco
motives and the protection of the en-
ployes and cars from train robbers. Wood
is becoming scarcer every year, and the
forest fires in the west this summer are
Fastening the end. Coal has always becn
expensive. The month of October has al
ready furnished the details of a success
full "hold-up" down in Arizona, the blind
baggage car, or, more properly speaking,
the car platform next to the locomotive
tender, again being the vantage spot for
the robbers. The locomotive engineer
must always be controlled before train
robbery can be successfully attempted,
and this cannot be done from the ground
or any other place so we'll as from the
front of a blind baggage car.
1t is now proposed to use oil in loco
motives and to protect the engineer and
fireman from robbers by doing away with
the blind baggage platform and substi
tuting a sort of combination tender and
baggage car.
The mode of making steam for rail
road locomotives through an oil instead
of coal fire is accomplished by placing
steam radiator, the coils of which should
be perforated, at the base Of the fire box
and the feeding of the same with oil.
This description, although crude, really
covers the ground minus technical terms.
OF course there are a hundred and one
patents involving the idea of running
locomotive with steam made from an oil
fire, hut the majority of them are based
| on the plan of utilizing the present fire
box for the flames and the locomotive ten
der as the reservoir.
One of these oil boilers that seems to
be very practicable and simple was pat
D
has been experimental with by many Of
the western railroads with considerable
/ success. coil of pipes resting on the
/ crate at the base of the fire box is per
| forated on the order of a gasoline burner
/ From this coil there runs a pipe back to
/ the tank, the space formerly used for car
| rytng coal being utilized as an oil reservoir
/ Another pipe runs up to tAe top of the
/ boiler to the steam chest and there catches
waste steam, which is used to quicken
| the combustion, by being mixed with the
/ original flame through a fine spray and
also to produce a forced draught.
Leading from the pipes are three rods,
which run up into the locomotive cab and
are within easy reaching distance of the
! engineer. One of these rods controls the
flow of oil from the reservoir to the
burner. Another regulates the flame and
the third rod the draught on the same.
/ The heat is so intense at times that the
! pipes that supply the oil would be melted
| inside an hours time, but to guard against
/ this they are packed in asbestos, leaving
only the top surface exposed. which is
also in turn protected by the first flame,
which is many degrees less intense than
the flame resulting from the spray of
/ steam and waste oil.
In the side of the fire box a peep-hoIe,
or tube is provided, which enables the
| engineer to see the exact status of his
fire and to increase or modify the same
as the necessity arises.
As to the advantages of oil-burnlng To-
! comotives on our railroads, it is stated
that they are many. Contemplate for
! instance, a hundred-mile ride free from
/ the pesky cinder. That would be the chief
comfort derived by the travelling public.
For the railroad corporations it is
claimed there is a great saving as between
| the oil and coal and wood 1t has been
shown that to kindle a fire only one and
| one-half gallons of oil is required to do
| what takes one-eighth of cord of wood.
One car load of oil. equaIing 1000 gallons.
/ will kindle as many fires as seventy-one
loads of wood, equaling 500 cords. The
difference in the cost of transporting.
handling, saving and storing the wood
| and oil is saved by the use of the latter
| Less space is occupied by the appliances
| and the material for kndling with oil than
is needed for the wood. Oil is always