NYC Steam (history) oil burners?

 

As far as I'm aware, the only NYC locomotive converted to oil was Mohawk #2873 for use on the barnstorming Rexall Train.  The train wandered far from NYC rails traversing 47 states and trips into Canada.

 

After the Rexall tour ended, the streamlining was removed and converted back to coal.

 

Rusty

Didn't they have to run oil fired steam through the adirondacks in the summertime . I know the D&H converted a couple to run to north creek and Tahaws in the summer. I beleve it was state law.

 

Thank you for the answers!

That is an interesting post to me about the Rexall tour. I was actually surprised. I have never heard of it.

 I'm also working on some large UP steam and see they have both models of tenders for coal and oil.

 

Joe

 

High BTU Coal was mined in large quantities in Pennsylvania and Ohio.  It was easily available to the NYC so they used it almost exclusively.

 

Coal is virtually non-existent in California and Oregon.  California crude oil yielded plenty of heavy fuel oil with old refining techniques and coastal tankers brought California oil up to Washington and Oregon at low prices.  Therefore many western railroads used oil, especially on passenger locomotives.

 

The UP and NP received extensive land grants from congress for their construction.  Both had coal on their lands.  In Wyoming (UP) and Montana (NP) there was low grade coal that by the 20th century could be inexpensively mined.  Therefore the UP and NP had modern steam locomotives with very large fire boxes to burn the low BTU coal.  Both the UP and NP also used oil fuel on some of their passenger and freight locomotives. 

 

On the Rexall engine, a Mohawk 4-8-2, had streamlining like the Commodore Vanderbilt 4-6-4 painted blue and white. This may have inspired Lionel on the Blue Streak set.

Engineer-Joe, thanks for bringing up this post about the NYC, and the Rexall Train!

I asked a question sometime back on the forum, about how you could find out what engines ran where on the various railroads. "Hot Water", gave me some direction, as I was looking to see what Big Four (NYC) types of engine came into Louisville, Ky. I remember seeing some Big H-10's 2-8-2's at the Louisville Water street Yard, as well as the freight yard across the river in Jeffersonville, Ind.

Hot Water directed me to the NYC Historical Society in Northern Indiana. I talked with those folks at length, and finally I got a home phone number of an old retired NYC Engineer who was still alive in his 90's, living in Jeffersonville, and had ran a multitude of various steam locomotives down the Louisville Branch from Northern Ind, thru Crew change at Greensburg, Ind. NYC got trackage rights over the B&O from North Vernon Ind, to Louisville,Ky.

 

I've talked with him 3 different times as conversation tires him out. I remember him telling me of his father was one of the assigned engineer for the Rexall Express, as he called it.

 

Well at the time I didn't know of what he was talking about, until I read this post you had. I'm very glad you did, as it connects some dots, that I didn't think or know to ask about, during my discussions with this old timer. That being the Rexall Train, as it did come to Central Station, and Jeffersonville for a Showing, enroute to Indianapolis, and St.Louis, as per this old engineer.....

 

NYC did this one, and C&O did the "Hadicall Express", that was another Pharma promotion, that railroads did back in the day. NYC did the Rexall in the mid 30's and C&O did the "Hadicall in the late 40's early 50's.

 

One other thing, be sure, all that click on, and go read the story about the Rexall Train, when you get to the Diesel Punks site, and scroll down to "Next article", there is a multitude of various subjects that you can look , and read about, just clicking on next article.

I'm probably dumb, as I'd never heard of this site.........Period!................Brandy! 

 

 

To add a bit to Ted Hikel's post, above, oil burning steam locomotives really did NOT burn "oil". The fuel of choice, back in the early 1900s on the west coal where coal was extremely scarce, was the residual product leftover from the refining of crude oil, i.e. Bunker C. The Bunker products had to be heated to over 150 degrees F, just to get it to move and be fluid enough, thus wayside steam heating facilities had to be built and maintained at every locomotive fueling terminal. Trying to compare the steam era Bunker C product to diesel electric locomotive #2 diesel fuel, is like comparing apple juice to tar.

Bunker C can be used as Turbine fuel, but #6 works better.  Not sure how this would relate to steam power usage.

Lots of great info here.....thanks to all that have posted.....you learn lots every day on this site!

 

Peter

The fuel of choice, back in the early 1900s on the west coal where coal was extremely scarce, was the residual product leftover from the refining of crude oil, i.e. Bunker C.

 

And to add a little bit more to HWs post, in the old distillation method of oil refining light products that evaporated when heated and then were condensed were distillates.  No.1 and No. 2 Diesel are distillates.  The stuff left at the bottom that did not evaporate were residuals.  The distillation process was not very efficient at yielding lighter products, especially with heavy crude like that in California.  Therefore residual oils were relatively inexpensive on the west coast and competed well against coal, even in areas where coal was readily available. 

 

Seattle and Tacoma had coal mines nearby with good grades (by western standards) of bituminous coal.  That was a big competitive advantage for world trade against Portland and the California ports from 1890 to about 1920 since the Puget Sound ports had local coal available to refuel ships.  After WWI ships switched to oil fuel and that leveled the playing field on the west coast for Pacific shipping.  Even some Puget Sound area electric plants converted to burning fuel oil.  The Hooker plant in Tacoma was built with oil fired boilers.

 

The Northern Pacific had company owned mines just east of the Cascade crest at Roslyn.  Despite the company coal, some Seattle and Tacoma based NP steam locomotives were oil fired.  Many of the Seattle based passenger locomotives were oil fired since the NP had a big Seattle to Portland passenger business and Portland had no coal.  Freight locomotives were sometimes converted back and forth between coal and oil as prices fluctuated.

 

The Great Northern was built without a land grant or federal subsidy.  It did not own any mines.  Therefore, many GN locomotives were built as or converted to oil burners. 

 

On the east end of the GN and NP eastern coal was available at low prices.  The coal was backhauled to Lake Superior ports thousands of tons at a time by ore boats. 

 

While the Milwaukee Road was famous for its electrics it had a gap of over 200 miles of unelectrified main line track in Idaho and eastern Washington.  After the big burn of 1910 the Milwaukee converted their main line and branch line steam locomotives to fuel oil to reduce to risk of forest fire.  Milwaukee steam on the Pacific Extension stayed oil fired up until Dieselization in 1954.  

 

Utah and Colorado have high grade coal.  So does New Mexico.  Railroads there tended to use the local fuel, even as the oil industry developed. 

 

 

Regarding the Rexall Train, has anyone ever made one in O gauge? If not, I think it if someone did it would have broad appeal beyond NYC fans.

 

Pete

Lionel's "Blue Streak" Pre-War set would have been the one to fit the bill.  I think it was recently offered as a reissue by MTH under the Lionel Corporation tinplate banner as well.

Just to comment, to my knowledge there were NO coal burners in Mexico. Even though their handsome Alco 4-8-4's were commonly called nee-AHG-ra's. 

True, and they even spelled the name differently too.

MTH made a Rexall train in the RailKing lineup in 2007, using the RailKing Commodore Vanderbuilt Hudson and streamlined cars.

 

http://mthtrains.com/prod-search/rexall

 

The fact it hasn't been rerun in or made in a Premier version over the past 9 years may pretty much indicate how popular it was(n't.)

 

Rusty

 

The fac

Baldwin had experimented with an oil burner or two in the late 19th century, but didn't start commercially building them until 1902, after the 1901 Beaumont, Texas, oil strike, made the fuel type abundant.

 

About the same time, a small sugar plantation in Louisiana needed to buy a new narrow gauge steam locomotive to be ready for grinding season in the fall of 1902. The owners ordered the engine in the spring, and they were insistent that the locomotive be built as an oil burner.

 

Because of this, it is highly likely that this engine was the very first narrow-gauge oil burning steam locomotive Baldwin ever produced--and one of the very first oil burners of any gauge built by Baldwin.

 

That engine continues to operate today, still being fired with liquid fuel, on the Disneyland Railroad in Anaheim, CA.

Found a picture of the Rexall locomotive.

 

 

As Azubal noted, the New York Central ran oil burners to Lake Placid (NY). This was documented in a photo story by Phil Hastings in Trains, about 1951. It was pictured as Pacifics as it was specifically passenger trains running up for skiing and summer recreation; not pictured was any freight power, but presume that would have been oil fired, too.

     Piggybacking on Ted Hikel's post, the Great Northern converted 100% to oil firing for it's remaining steam power in 1950. I have long speculated that that was facilitated by the oil deposits in the Williston Basin, as Williston, ND is a Big G town (there is even a GN 2-8-2 on display there). Williston had an Ogle coaling tower, so clearly coal was employed there, prior to 1950. GN steam power that worked from Havre west appears to have been always oil fired, as photos taken in 1945 by Jack Pontin, Ben Cutler and Hans Jackson (the RR Photo Service) around Whitefish, Great Falls and Havre depicted oil burners. Presume the coal the GN burned pre-1950 even as far west as Williston came in lake boats, on Lake Superior?

I don't know if NYC ran oil year round or not but th D&H switched to coal in the winter. Al

Good post Joe. According to NYC Diagram & Specs. book, 01/01/46, twenty K-11 Pacifics were converted to oil burners for use on the Adirondack Division.

re: Rexall train, I remember a book on NYC locomotives with a photo of the Rexall engine captioned "visiting San Francisco," but no other info.

May have been a Morning Sun book.

Regarding the other part of the OP's question...4-8-2 Mohawks were generally considered freight engines on the NYC. Hudsons were used on the top trains beginning in the 1920's. In the '30's, some were streamlined. By 1945 the Hudsons needed to be replaced with more powerful engines, so the NYC bought 4-8-4 Niagaras, and two-unit EMD E-7 passenger diesels - at the same time! Testing showed both the Niagaras and the E-7 could handle the same trains at the same speeds, but the steam engines required much more extensive maintenance work. So NYC concentrated on buying passenger diesels and used them on top trains, while relatively new steam engines were relagated to secondary or commuter trains. Hudsons continued to be used on passenger trains between Cincinnati and Chicago into the mid-fifties, long after steam was phased out in the eastern part of the railroad. I believe all NYC steam was retired by the end of 1957, which would be pretty normal time for most large US railroads.

Addendum:  last run of a NYC steam locomotive was in May 1957, a transfer freight in Cincinnati, pulled by 2-8-2 #1977.

This is great!

Thank you all for the answers.

Regarding the Mohawks, they handled many passenger and mail trains during WWII, especially the L4 class which were built with 72" drivers for dual-service work.

 

Interestingly, until diesels took over, Hudsons (with 12 wheeled tenders) ruled the St. Louis route west of Mattoon, IL. Niagaras and anything with a PT tender were prohibited west of Mattoon. I've seen at least one photo of a Hudson taking over the Southwestern Limited from an S1b at Mattoon.

The following is quoted from the NYCHS Headlight Magazine, 2nd Quarter 1981 Issue:

 

"The most unique item about the Adirondack Division, and

for that matter the entire New York Central Lines, was the

operation of oil burning engines. To reduce the danger of

forest fires, New York State had decreed in 1908, that locomotives

operating within the limits of the Adirondack Forest

Preserve during the summer months in the day light 

hours would be required to use oil as fuel. Approximately

140 miles of the division was in the Forest Preserve.

By 1916 the shop forces at West Albany had become quite

knowledgeable in converting coal burners over to oil. Bricking

up the firebox, sealing the backhead doors, putting

tanks in the coal bunkers. Firemen appreciated the oil

burners because riding the seatbox working an oil valve

beat swinging a #12 "Rededge" to keep the old girl hot. Initially,

engines assigned to the Adirondack would be changed

back and forth between coal and oil as the season dictated.

The heaviest period of traffic on the Adirondack was during

the summer season and required about twice the number of

engines to meet assignments than during the winter months.

As more K-ll's became available the company adopted a

policy of withdrawing the oil burners from service during

the winter to receive required shopping or just be stored.

A 1936 list shows some twenty K-ll's as permanently assigned

oil burners."

"in the day light 

hours"

???

it was safe at night? They didn't run trains at night? What am I missing here?

Just a wild guess but maybe the dew which occurs at night and in the early morning hours lessens the fire hazard from hot cinders.

 

Anyway, that was a cut and paste from the original article, so I only know what the author reported.

 

I'm sure they didn't have two engine pools to draw from, so oil burners probably operated day and night on the Adirondack Division. These engines operated all the way from Utica, NY to Montreal QC, Canada.

"in the day light 

hours"

???

it was safe at night?

 

The risk of forest fires is greatest in the early afternoon and evening hours.

 

In western forests dry summer conditions often result in logging being restricted to Hootowl hours of operation - 8:00 PM to 1:00 PM.

 

Hootowl is an actual legal term used by the US Forrest Service and in Washington and Oregon statutes and regulations. 

 

http://www.fs.usda.gov/detail/...?cid=stelprdb5270159

 

Here is a little more...Tony Wagner wrote an interesting Central Headlight article in the Fourth Quarter of 2007, for the New York Central System Historical Society, entitled "NYC's Oil Burning Steam Locomotives in the Adirondacks." Here are a few excerpts:

• The Public Service Commission...eventually ruled in 1908...all common carrier railroads entering the Preserve would be required to burn oil in steam locomotives from 8am to 8pm between April 15 and November 1. (The conversion was to be complete by April 15, 1910. The Central tried to have the order rescinded, but failed. As a result, the order continued until diesels came along to replace the steamers in 1951-1952).
• Refueling facilities were located at Malone, Tupper Lake Junction, Saranac Lake and Lake Placid on the Adirondack Division.

It is a lengthy, detailed article. Anyone interested may want to try to get a copy from someone like Paul Gibson of Railpub or the historical society itself.

 

Tom