Looks like there really will be a new PRR T1

[edwardsutorik]

When the T1 project started, I didn't think it was gonna happen.

Wrong (hopefully).

Here's a link to their latest info release:



Looks like maybe in a couple of years.

I certainly hope it's a successful build, and that the locomotive can come out to play. Oh, yes. THAT would be fun to see.




Ed

[jonklein611]

It'll be interesting to see if they have the wheel slip issues of the original. Finding the tender was huge to their progress.

[wagnersteve]

4/24/2024, about 11:20 a.m., EDT

Gentlemen, thanks for this thread! When I spotted it a few minutes ago, I didn't know it wasn't a model railroading news but instead bulding a full-sized version of the prototype! I watched about the half the video, then stopped because there's no way I can get out to Altoona anytime soon. Will try to mention this project in what I submit to the BLHS Bulletin later today. Since I grew up in the Philadelphia area I still have a many memories of the PRR and considerable interest in its history. One of the best train-related articles I ever read was one about the high-speed run a T-1 made in Indiana hauling a mail and express train late in its career, when it was quite dirty except for the road name on its tender, a comedown from its glory days, but it was as speedy as ever. That was in either Trains or Classic Trains; I haven't time to search for it now.

[hudsonyard]

What they are doing is incredibly impressive but......the T1 was limited to a relatively short section of the PRR and was generally considered a failure. I'd imagine an L1 or M1 would have been a lot more practical, just less flashy (and harder to source funding for)

[edwardsutorik]

I do wonder to what extent the locomotive will be "modernized". I think it will have to be "bolt-on" stuff, as opposed to some sort of re-design (the whole point being to "reproduce" a T1). Note that this is not a totally accurate reproduction, as the frame is welded up from plate, rather than being cast. I also wonder whether it will be coal fired.

For a start, there'll likely be some sort of MU system for diesel accompaniment. And maybe there's some new things in the air brake system that might be included. And likely some FRED equipment. Maybe spiffier headlight LED bulbs.

I started wondering about that because of jonklein611's comment about wheel slip. It would seem that, today, there could be various added sensors and such that might lessen or eliminate wheel slip, IF the builders think it's a problem. Perhaps they would feel that the wheel slip is an attractive visual/auditory feature.

I first heard steam engine wheel slip in 1951, when my mother would take me to New York City from where we lived in Long Branch, NJ. It seemed weird to have a normal steam engine that just went chuff-chuff to sort of suddenly explode in sound. These would have been commuter engines, not T1's.


Ed

[Baikal]

Apr 26, 2024 6:51:09 GMT -8 edwardsutorik said:

I do wonder to what extent the locomotive will be "modernized". I think it will have to be "bolt-on" stuff, as opposed to some sort of re-design (the whole point being to "reproduce" a T1). Note that this is not a totally accurate reproduction, as the frame is welded up from plate, rather than being cast. I also wonder whether it will be coal fired.

For a start, there'll likely be some sort of MU system for diesel accompaniment. And maybe there's some new things in the air brake system that might be included. And likely some FRED equipment. Maybe spiffier headlight LED bulbs.

I started wondering about that because of jonklein611's comment about wheel slip. It would seem that, today, there could be various added sensors and such that might lessen or eliminate wheel slip, IF the builders think it's a problem. Perhaps they would feel that the wheel slip is an attractive visual/auditory feature.

I first heard steam engine wheel slip in 1951, when my mother would take me to New York City from where we lived in Long Branch, NJ. It seemed weird to have a normal steam engine that just went chuff-chuff to sort of suddenly explode in sound. These would have been commuter engines, not T1's.


Ed

Would coal be allowed by the gov'ts?  I see it will be oil fired.

Has there ever been steam locos with MU capability?  Sounds nuts, but there were steam-diesel hybrid locomotives, which was even weirder.

Or this  "...the diameter of the upper drivers as 72 inches, the friction wheels they drove as 56 inches, and the diameter of the drivers actually on the rails as 70 inches".

www.douglas-self.com/MUSEUM/LOCOLOCO/fontaine/fontaine.htm

LOL Google

[jonklein611]

Apr 26, 2024 6:51:09 GMT -8 edwardsutorik said:

I do wonder to what extent the locomotive will be "modernized". I think it will have to be "bolt-on" stuff, as opposed to some sort of re-design (the whole point being to "reproduce" a T1). Note that this is not a totally accurate reproduction, as the frame is welded up from plate, rather than being cast. I also wonder whether it will be coal fired.

For a start, there'll likely be some sort of MU system for diesel accompaniment. And maybe there's some new things in the air brake system that might be included. And likely some FRED equipment. Maybe spiffier headlight LED bulbs.

I started wondering about that because of jonklein611's comment about wheel slip. It would seem that, today, there could be various added sensors and such that might lessen or eliminate wheel slip, IF the builders think it's a problem. Perhaps they would feel that the wheel slip is an attractive visual/auditory feature.

I first heard steam engine wheel slip in 1951, when my mother would take me to New York City from where we lived in Long Branch, NJ. It seemed weird to have a normal steam engine that just went chuff-chuff to sort of suddenly explode in sound. These would have been commuter engines, not T1's.


Ed

There's a whole bit of info here:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennsylvania_Railroad_5550

Cliff notes:

• Oil Fired
• Built to FRA standards
• Franklin Type B2 rotary-cam poppet valves in place of the Type A oscillating-cam poppets
  
• Aluminum cab
• Welded boiler, in house design to meet ASME codes / standards
• MU compatibility
• modern 26-L braking system
  
• wheel-slip alarm

[The Ferro Kid]

Then we need a New York Central J3a Hudson. Or Niagara.

[12bridge]

Just keep Ross Rowland away from it.

[kentuckysouthernrwy]

I sure hope they are making it in the correct scale...

[wagnersteve]

2/26/2024, starting about 10:15, just before going to bed

For us sentimentalists of a certain age who are interested in children's books as well as railroads, real and model, one of the significant achievements of the PRR's T-1 design was its obvious inspiration of the streamlined "Flyer" steam loco in the classic 1945 Little Golden Book Tootle, written by Gertrude Crampton and illustrated by Tibor Gergely, who was lucky enough to get out of Hungary before the Nazis and their Magyar sympathizers killed a huge proportion of the Jews and leftists living there. He was also the artist for The Little Red Caboose, Scuffy the Tugboat, A Day in the Jungle, and many other children's books. It's no coincidence that many of the male characters in them have huge mustaches. Tootle was also part of a great Little Golden Book thicker than most that also included Mr. Punnymoon's Train and other railroad stories, at least some of which had likely also been initially published separately. I loved those books as a child.

I strongly recommend to all with young relatives or friends the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in the southern part of Amherst, Massachusetts, founded by an artist who was born in the USA but grew up in Germany as the Nazis gained power and during the Second World War.  It features his own work but also great temporary exhibits and a marvelous library and gift shop.

[fr8kar]

Apr 26, 2024 18:27:22 GMT -8 wagnersteve said:

2/26/2024, starting about 10:15, just before going to bed

For us sentimentalists of a certain age who are interested in children's books as well as railroads, real and model, one of the significant achievements of the PRR's T-1 design was its obvious inspiration of the streamlined "Flyer" steam loco in the classic 1945 Little Golden Book Tootle, written by Gertrude Crampton and illustrated by Tibor Gergely, who was lucky enough to get out of Hungary before the Nazis and their Magyar sympathizers killed a huge proportion of the Jews and leftists living there. He was also the artist for The Little Red Caboose, Scuffy the Tugboat, A Day in the Jungle, and many other children's books. It's no coincidence that many of the male characters in them have huge mustaches. Tootle was also part of a great Little Golden Book thicker than most that also included Mr. Punnymoon's Train and other railroad stories, at least some of which had likely also been initially published separately. I loved those books as a child.

I strongly recommend to all with young relatives or friends the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in the southern part of Amherst, Massachusetts, founded by an artist who was born in the USA but grew up in Germany as the Nazis gained power and during the Second World War.  It features his own work but also great temporary exhibits and a marvelous library and gift shop.

I still have a soft spot for all those books, and I especially loved all the illustrations. They were a big part of what got me reading and drawing at an early age, two hobbies that have served me well over the years. Thanks for the info on the author and illustrator.

[wagnersteve]

4/27/2024, about 8:15 p.m.

Ryan, you're more than welcome. Here's another classic children's book with a tenuous link to model railroading: Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel, published by Houghton Mifflin in 1939. It was, interestingly, written and illustrated by a woman, Virginia Lee Burton. She was inspired by a town meeting in West Newbury, Massachusetts. In the book, MIke Mulligan and his steam shovel Mary Anne -- the name was inspired by the Marion firm that built steam shovels, were having trouble getting work because of competition from firms using newer, diesel powered shovels. He offers to dig the basement for a new town hall and promise to do it for free if it takes more than a day. Burton started with pictures and realized that she had had MIke and Mary Anne dig themselves into a corner with no way to get Mary Anne out. IShe discussed this with friends at whose home she was having dinner and their son, twelve years old, suggested turning Mary Anne into the heating furnace for the new town hall. That solved the problem. Years ago I bought an HO kit for a steam shovel resembling Mary Anne; I 've forgotten the type of steam shovel and the kit's maker; it's somewhere in my trove of things to be built. When my granddaughters were younger they were at least as fascinated by the tractors at Massachusetts Audubon's Drumlin Farm in Lincoln as by the farm animals, deer and smaller wild animals and birds there.

Another work by Burton, The Little House won the Caldecott Medal in 1943 as the best picture book for children published in the USA the previous year. In it a big city grows around the house mentioned in the title.