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The question of the day: “Could a steam locomotive be refueled without stopping?»
The answer of Philip Castle:
A steam locomotive consumes a lot of water. Except to bring enormous volumes of water, the water supply of the machines had to be done more often than that of fuel, which explained the presence of water cranes in many stations.
In 1860, the British company L&NWR (London and North-Western Railway) decides to speed up its Irish Mail express train and make the Chester-Holyhead journey (134 km) non-stop. James Ramsbottom, chief mechanical engineer at the company, is tasked with solving the problem. He imagined an ingenious system which made it possible to bail out water in a channel between the rails (“water troughs”) without excessive lowering of speed.
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A locomotive dating from 1903. | Valerio Giuso via Wikimedia
The bailer is lowered by the driver before arriving at the channel and the track descends sufficiently when the locomotive arrives there to place the scoop spout in the water.
The recommended speed for optimum filling is between 40 and 80 km/h (in the USA, the system is more generously dimensioned and operates at its maximum at 100 km/h). The channel is fed at a constant level by a water tower. At the end of the channel (approximately 400 meters long), the track rises sufficiently so that the bailer spout does not catch the ballast and the driver can then raise it.
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The locomotive could thus take 10 m3 of water in minutes. The filler hatch of the tender had to be opened before filling to make a vent.
This system has been widely used in Great Britain and the USA. In France, only I’State Railway Administration (ex-Ouest) has installed some between Paris and Le Havre, between Paris and Cherbourg, between Paris and Brest, and between Paris and Tours.
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