Sadly, that's simply not the case. Diesels proved themselves originally on long-haul routes out west during WW2, when 4 unit FT lashups proved to be able to be able to haul almost as much just as fast and cheaper than UP and ATSF's big steam. The last roads to go diesel were the ones doing big slow coal drags like Virginian and Norfolk & Western as it wasn't until the SD's, FM Trainmasters and RSC's showed up in the mid 50's that you had a design suitable for drag use (you'd burn out the traction motors on a 4 axle unit doing long slow and heavy drags).
Heavy trains like coal drags were 20mph jobs with steam and with diesel, due to efficiency. The big coal engines like the 2-8-8-2's were slow, the big electrics were slow and the big diesel lashups were slow. With diesel you just kept adding units for more speed if you wanted it. The drop off in track speeds is directly related to the end of widespread passenger travel and even then it only dropped by 20mph or so. Typically diesel locomotives are geared for 65mph and can do that with all they can reliably pull. Some 4 axle units are geared faster (usually 72mph or 80mph), for intermodal express work. There's issues now with MOW repair nowadays, especially on CN, but most of the issues with that back in the 60's and 70's was due to the fiscal issues with many roads, especially the eastern roads, that led to Penn Central and then Conrail. Hard to do MoW work when you can barely afford to keep the trains moving. That self-same issue also led to a lot of dirty diesels going slow in the east as they were poorly maintained. -Adam Bob Sullivan wrote: > I'm a fan of trains and worked for a railroad for a time. Any of the > managers in the Operating Dept. would have transfered back into the > line to be a steam locomotive engineer. > > Any train that a steam locomotive could get rolling, it could pull at > 60+ mph. (Traction is poor with steel wheels on steel track, but steam > locos had plenty of horsepower. So if you got it rolling...) > > Diesel-electrics had the weight to get the train rolling, but didn't > have the horsepower to move much faster than 20 mph. They were sold > by companies like GM to the Maintenance Departments based on repair > records and available time. > > The Maintenance Departments knew that Steam Locos were available only > 50% of the time or less. Diesel-electrics were (are) available 90-95% > of the time. Less cost per hour to operate, smaller maintenance > facilities around the line, more cost efficient all the way around. > > As a result, railroads became much less exciting. Speeds slowed to a > crawl, then maintenance of the right of way fell off as high standards > weren't needed to keep the speeding trains on the tracks. More > savings for the Maintenance of Way Depts. > > Regards, Bob S. > > On 12/4/06, Adam Maas <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> Brian Dunn wrote: >>>>> Write time to the X's drive is a bigger issue for me - it took a solid >>>>> 20 minutes to download each card to the X's Drive II. >>> >>>> I have the same (Dane-Elec) card in 1Gb configuration. It takes about 3 >>>> minutes to write a full card (90+) to my PC, which is steam powered. You >>>> must have a really slow card reader. >>> >>> >>> Possibly interesting trivia: >>> >>> Supposedly steam powered locomotives have massive torque and pulling power >>> and >>> can reach crazy speeds. They were phased out for other reasons, such as >>> maintenance and infrastructure support, but speed wasn't really a problem... >>> >>> >>> Brian >>> >> Speed wasn't an issue with steam. But low-end pulling power was. Electrics >> had replaced steam on several coal roads for that reason, and >> Diesel-Electrics were even better as they lacked the infrastructure support >> cost of electrics (Although electrics did offer 10,000HP single units). >> >> Steam's advantage wasn't torque (It was clearly outmatched by electric >> traction motors at low speeds) but horsepower. A single large steam >> locomotive has 6000+HP compared to 1350-1500HP per unit of an early >> diesel-electric unit (3000-4500HP on the average unit today). However >> Diesel-electrics can MU (Have multiple units under the control of one and >> operating in sequence) while multiple steam locomotives is an exercise in >> difficulty. In fact today you can MU with diesel-electric locomotives in the >> middle and rear of the train via radio link. >> >> Steam is maintenance intensive, short ranged and required a lot of >> infrastructure (Water and fuel, especially water). Diesel-Electrics have >> them beat on all fronts. And now they're even matching the HP, with 6000HP >> single units in service (GMD SD90MAC-H and GE AC6000). >> >> Steam is a whole lot nicer to look at though. >> >> -Adam >> Sometime railfan. >> >> >> >> >> -- >> PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List >> [email protected] >> http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net >> > -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
