Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1910-02-16
ENGINE FAILURES
ON RAILROADS
CT AssgFlED REPORT ANALYzING
THE CAUSE OF SUCH
TROUBLES.
BREAk-DoWNs COME IN EPIDEM-
les, so IT rs
CLAIMED.

SAYS the classified report, analyzlng
the cause of road failures (stoppages
of trains). and also shop failures, Is
not quite generally in use. Shop
failures do not however affect the
train schedule so disastrously as road
failures. Regardless of the definition
of what constitutes a road failure, the
following record On a railroad owning
about a thousand locomotives will be
Of interest:
The engine mileage per road failure
is $4,000. This includes all classes OF
locomotives and extends over a period
of several months. A daily report OF
every road failure is received by the
Superintendent of motive power. he
and his assistant keep personally
after the failures, day by day. Their
endeavor is to make up the failures
on the spot, with the master me-
chanic, roundhouse foreman, ROAD
foreman of engines and the engine
men if possible. Thus less than
week elapses before one or the other
mechanical head in travelling over the
road will be able to follow up each in
dividual failure. Every effort is made
to Undue the force with the funda-
mental idea that knowledge of the
real cause of the failure is the object
of this personal investigation. Discl.
pine is made incidental to the pre-
vention of further failures from the
same cause.
According to the well established
legends, railroad failures come in cpl
denies, each of it's kind. At sucn
times no step is left untaken to fol-
low the trouble to it's source. For ex-
ample, the general term 'airbrake
failure" was classified into pipe,
pump, etc.
On finding that outside few burst
pipes the pumps seemed to be caus-
ing trouble, a diagram of the working
parts was issued In the place for
notation the following information
was required: Date pump, last over
hauled? Part failed? Circumstances
of failure? Probable cause of failure
Defects old Or new?
In connection with this report,
which was promptly made out by the
roundhouse clerk and sent direct 20,
the mechanical superintendent, a sys-
tematic inspection of air pumps was
instituted every six months. By fol-
lowing the same course with eacn
class OF failure the source was prac-
tically eliminated once tor ALL
For example, flues are always con-
sidered to be a source of trouble. At
one important terminal on this par
ticular road were 40 boiler makers,
and getting in overtime at that By
making clean sweep of the family
which seemed to be making work for
itself, the present force consists OF
six boiler makers. The failures now
number one where they formerly
numbered five.
Hard work. consistent and persist
ent, is, of course, the secret of this
good record. 1t was not all done in
a month Or year, but it was done to
stay done. The road foremen of en-
gines have been brought up through
this process to state of better CON-
prehension of the problems. Their
attention has been directed chiefly to
fuel economy all along. The entire
mechanical department shows the
spirit of getting at the root of things.
The results are reflected in the I'M
proved showing above.