Does COAL size matter in STEAM TRAINS? | Railroad 101

Does the size of coal matter to a steam locomotive? We've talked about it before, but this shows some fun data from a few runs of Polar Express at the
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[@SignalLightProductions]

As a fireman, I will add two things to this. I think it's harder to get as full of a scoop of powder as lump coal since it only goes about the height of the shovel wings. Secondly powder has some advantages, both for capping your bank and getting fast heat in the box if you spread it out. No fun if you aren't working the engine hard though.

[@Hyce777]

Very true! Excellent additions. Powder is nice in certain applications.

[@kleetus92]

I suspect that would throw a lot of it right out the flues on a heavy draft though too... Heck it might even be burning as it's exiting the smokebox!

[@SignalLightProductions]

@@kleetus92 if the locomotive has arch brick, throwing it to the front of the firebox will allow more time for combustion

[@kleetus92]

@@SignalLightProductions true statement, unless it's really really fine then it will be a flour explosion! lol

[@eliotreader8220]

@@Hyce777 I have a question about the Polar Express events. do the engine crews play the part of Steamer the engineer and Smokey the fireman from the film.

[@fudgebaker]

I can attest, slack coal is one of those problems that firemen like to avoid, and by "avoid," I mean pass on to the next person. When there really isn't anything other than slack left, rather than use that, they'd rather fill the tender with fresh coal (on top of the slack) and use that, thereby increasing the amount of slack in the tender over time. I remember when I decided to fire with almost nothing but slack, and our line is at a constant steep grade. On the way up on the last trip of my shift, I had to shovel almost every 30 seconds or minute to keep up with demand. I had made them into clumps of wet dirt, but it still almost instantly vaporized the moment in went in the hole. To my credit though, the tender was almost exactly empty when we arrived back in the yard. :D

[@blendpinexus1416]

you were like "fuck it, tender is half full of this shit and it burns anyways so why the hell not?"

[@robertbalazslorincz8218]

In Hungary we had a saying in the 20s: "Kűfőd szén" ('stonedirt coal') it refers to sh*t coal that barely even burns because its composed of dirt and stone

[@geoffgunn9673]

we used to get coal wash and use it for fill and leveling out yards. Be about the same quality

[@JohnGeorgeBauerBuis]

I’ve also heard of this mix of dirt and coal being called ‘culm’.

[@kosmostimber1174]

you knew exactly what you were doing with that intro 💀💀💀

[@robertbalazslorincz8218]

*HE DAMN WELL DID*

[@Sil3ntD3ath478]

Hyce already down bad in November

[@Speedgaming802]

In November is crazy

[@ATJonzie]

Big black rock

[@masonalwolf2770]

Everybody gangsta till Hyce shove a 2 foot long piece of coal into the hole

[@JT1967]

It definitely matters with the 1/8th scale locos too. In my loco in particular, if you use nut coal you'll find it's steaming capabilities rather lack luster in comparison to using pea coal. Rice coal is almost small enough to fit through the grates but while it's in there it'll burn out quick.

[@godlugner5327]

What is this coal rating for ants

[@andywomack3414]

I worked at rail yard that handled coal for export. There were many classifications for the coal, with names like "pea" and "grape." I was told that the coal was often graded according to BTU's, which might reflect it's size. At that time, my curiosity was somewhat limited to knowing enough to do my job. That youth is often wasted on the young is true at least in my case.

[@JT1967]

@@godlugner5327 At least 1/8th sized humans... In my experience, the actual size of the coal is one step above the rated size. Rice being the size of actual peas, pea being the size of actual grapes, so on.

[@psycotria]

@@andywomack3414 Different coals of the same size can have different BTU ratings. Coals are sub-bituminous through anthracite, i.e. brown, soft through pure, rock-hard, black carbon. I think bituminous coal has the highest BTU per weight, but anthracite has the highest BTU per volume, if I remember correctly.

[@andywomack3414]

@@psycotria Amazing stuff. Too bad it might wind up killing us.

[@TheMostUt]

Before watching the entire thing, prediction: Smaller particles have greater surface area, which means fire will move faster through slack than lumps. This would present (given equal air flow through the box) as a fast, hot fire, but likely with less overall energy content. The flame may be hotter, but with less burn time (unless the powder is literally FLOWING into the box) the burn will happen in phases, a hot phase and a cool phase. Since boilers work (water=BIG thermal inertia) on AVERAGE temps, the water temp would ~remain the same~. End result= more shovels, more human work, same or slightly reduced engine performance. I would love the engineers' talk on boiler thermal inertia and effects of coal size, injector flow rates, etc.

[@Hyce777]

Smart man. :)

[@chrislaarman7532]

Yes! Even more: some 30% (or more: I may be mixing numbers up) of the energy in coal comes from burning the gases that escape from the burning coal. So big lumps make it harder (cube : square) for the gases to be released. (The mixing up may be with the 30% of energy left in the ashes after "first time" burning. I got those numbers as a fireman on a ship from my engineer.) As to firing a steam locomotive "properly", query KZbin for the 1947(?) LMS instructional movie "Little and often", which I have also seen condensed here on KZbin. This movie made me try firing that (small) steam ship.

[@michaelimbesi2314]

Yep, except the engine would actually be much less efficient. The amount of air going through the firebox is a function of the locomotive’s draft, which only depends on how hard it’s working. All of the slack would try to ignite fairly quickly after being shoveled in (because of low surface area/volume ratio), which would probably use up all of the available combustion air and result in a lot of black smoke in the hot phase, followed by too much air in the cold phase, which would make the engine actually run much less efficiently because so much of the energy in the coal is being wasted by inefficient combustion.

[@chrislaarman7532]

@@michaelimbesi2314 The matter of "air flow" may be more complicated. Air may enter the firebox over the fire (in locomotives: through the firebox door) or from below (there may be a valve). The draft may be regulated by a valve in the smokestack (on "my" ship) or by the amount of exhaust steam used as an ejector. In pidgin English (the Dutch expression translates to "coal English"!): on "my" ship "over air" would be applied upon building the fire, "under air" as the default working state. We firemen would monitor the state of the fire by the colors under the fire and the accumulation of whatever would fall through the grid. We would regulate the draft by repositioning the valve in the smokestack (outside). To us (notably this engineer, with a passion for steam), the state of the fire would be a point inside a virtual triangle of air in, smoke out and coal. And obviously, the manometer was the boss... Note that this ship has a condenser, while that has been an exception with locomotives. :-)

[@Yardmaster_Media_110]

I hope that you're able to sort out whatever went wrong last year with the Polar Express movie reaction. That would be great to see that come to the channel next month! I'm sure that a lot of people would like to see an actual railroader's perspective on the movie!

[@Hyce777]

I'll try and see what I can do. It was a fun video to make and would've been neat for folks to see but copyright do be like that sometimes....

[@milesprower6641]

does it detect it if the movie is flipped and hue shifted 90 degrees? like yellow is green or something@@Hyce777

[@ZergSmasher]

I would think with a giant piece (dinosaur egg had me lol-ing) you might actually break something if you threw it into the firebox the wrong way. And regarding the dust, I would think it would just burn too fast to even be worth trying to use, but apparently it works even if it makes the fireman work harder. I learned something! Keep the great content coming Hyce!

[@sambrown6426]

The only firing I've done is chucking wood into a 1917 40-horsepower Case steam tractor, which is very different to coal firing a locomotive, but it's still something. I also got to run the old girl, which was actually surprisingly easy, since you really only need to worry about the steering wheel, the governor takes care of the speed. You only need to touch the clutch if you want to idle the thing or run something off the flywheel, and you only need to touch the johnson bar when you've just gotten moving, and you want to hook it up, though you only get 3 notches each forward and reverse. It does have a handbrake, but it's really only useful for controlling speed going downhill, or as a parking brake. The thing also had chain steering like most steam tractors, so you need to constantly correct the front wheels, as the slack in the chains allows them to pivot a bit, even when the steering wheel's not moving. She also had the most atrocious ride quality of anything I've ever ridden.

[@FJX2000_Productions]

When I fired the K-28s and K-36s on the D&S we had large coal like the good stuff you were using. But towards the end of the day you’d start getting into that crummy stuff and it just stunk. I heard though that back in the day with certain railroads, obviously the grades of coal would vary depending on where it’s from, but the standard size of the coal chunks was smaller than what we use today. Probably about half the size, which I guess made for a more even burn. But who knows 🤷‍♂️

[@andywomack3414]

I think the coal delivered by an automatic stoker would be mostly slack. I toured the Big Boy at the Forney Museum and that coal was blown into the fire after delivery to a ceramic (?) receptacle inside the firebox door,. Could gravel-sized chunks pass through the auger? My dad, who fired steam locomotives, said that even with an automatic stoker, a fireman was constantly monitoring and poking the fire to keep it even. I think a fireman's job to be like that of a one-armed paper hanger, even when the coal is fed into the fire mechanically. Are any automatic stoker locos in Golden? Did any western roads scoop water?

[@sambrown6426]

The New York Central did use track pans on the water level route between NYC and Chicago. Unfortunately, some of those track pans were receiving inadequately treated water, which wasn't discovered for quite some time.

[@andywomack3414]

​@@sambrown6426 The PRR also used them, and even the B&O had them as far as I know. I might even have a WTF story about them somewhere in my memory. Most RR stories are WTF.

[@andywomack3414]

I think the big late model beast at Golden, a Burlington 4-8-4 I believe, probably has an automatic stoker.

[@sambrown6426]

@@andywomack3414 If you're thinking of the CB&Q 4-8-4 at the railroad museum, she's actually oil fired, though she was originally coal fired, and presumably did have an auto stoker.

[@andywomack3414]

@@sambrown6426 Many western roads used oil instead of coal. I doubt if the B&O had any, and that may have been the case with all eastern rails.

[@AlRoderick]

In the coal-fired power plants that I've seen depicted in museums and on KZbin elsewhere they tend to use pulverized coal. That's extremely fine powder, but they introduce it to the boiler being blown in with a jet of compressed air and it burns in the air before the ash settles down. I would suppose that an auto stoking engine like a big boy as seen in the Animagraphics video recently would have an easier time with slack coal because it would just lift it up and blow it into the fire without much issue, and it would likely burn before it even touched the firebed.

[@technus6187]

Yeah, I wonder how much material falls straight through to the ash pan or ends up drafted straight out of the smokestack.

[@andrewreynolds4949]

There’s probably a limit where it gets too fine and causes problems, but mechanical stokers are generally known for not getting tired

[@michaelimbesi2314]

Yep, it would burn a bit like a blowtorch. The coal and the compressed air jet would mix together and form a mix of fine dust being continuously blown into the boiler, which would continuously burn as a jet of flame.

[@psycotria]

Locomotives with stokers use more expensive "stoker coal" of a uniform size.

[@kleetus92]

@@michaelimbesi2314they use steam for directing the coal, not air. The westinghouse compressors would have a hard time staying ahead of a hungry engine. The stoker drive is steam, as are the directing jets off the firing plate.

[@missyd0g2]

My grandmother furnace was a coal burner in 1966 when I was ten years old. Cold January day in Michigan so dad told me to stoke the fire with coal. Little 10 year old me loved steam locomotives and here grandma had one in her basement. So I stoked it up because this train had to make it over the mountains in my mind. My dad came running downstairs yelling at me what I was doing. My reply was building up steam to get this locomotive over the mountains. As my father would tell the story grandmother house was over 90 degrees inside and all the windows were open. Unfortunately I used a month of coal per my dad. Also I was covered in coal dust. I do remember shoveling in the coal. That summer my father paid for conversion to natural gas furnace. Dad gave me the coal shovel as a gift and reminder. I still have that coal shovel and have visited the Colorado Railroad Museum. Great videos Hyce.

[@trainnerd25]

Bro got our tenders with that intro

[@KerboOnYT]

I've only ran wood fired steam but size matters there as well. For example, use big chunks for a slow burn if you're idle but want to keep pressure or use small pieces for a quick, hot fire when needed. Fun video!

[@dennisolsson3119]

Bit the same weight would mean the same energy per scoop. I would assume that a finer powder would burn faster but also mean you need a smaller fire because it burns more/faster/hotter. And if I recall an earlier video of yours you said that back in the day the coal was much finer. Like sugar cubes instead of fists. And that meant it could be transported using a screw (like on Big Boy).

[@geoffgunn9673]

as you said, powder burns faster and you loose heat energy out the stack as it cannot heat the water. nice lump coal burns at a steadier rate and transfers more of it's heat into the boiler.

[@dennisolsson3119]

@@geoffgunn9673 flip it around. Independent of the fire size: if 1 kg of coal burns up (that is the weight loss of the train) per minute, that could either be a small fire of powder that burns quickly or a large fire that burns slowly. The amount of hot gases exiting should be the same per energy and the amount of energy should be the same per fuel. If you can burn the fires equally complete. Of course it is easier to fire big chunks because you have more time to react, but I'm arguing against it having more energy per weight if you can handle the fire.

[@geoffgunn9673]

@@dennisolsson3119 it's more all the fuel is burnt quickly and lot energy is lost out the stack, where bigger chunks will transfer more of their energy into the water over a longer time. Ends up throwing more fuel in powder form to compensate for the loss out the stack. Some boilers where made to take powered coal, usually mechanically at a constant feed rate and no shovel work.

[@That9one1Guy]

At 2:07, that is some of my favorite audio I think you've ever produced. Not the conversation, but the way the mics picked up the bassy, deep thrum-rumble-thrum-rumble, that chugga-chugga... I love that sound. Machinery breathing at work.

[@ducewags]

When I was a small Duce, great gram showed us, my brother and I how to cook with food. Her statement at the time, "if it's larger then the arm, it won't feed the belly, as you don't get the heat needed to cook". I burn wood and go by that idea for heat. Coal, never gave it a try and you never want to mix coal with wood as that will make an acid that will eat the pipe. Might be a show, or get talked about by Hyce some time, maybe? Thanks for the shows Hyce, and the schooling that goes with it.

[@VintageJunior]

I'm mostly just overwhelmed by the near-cartoonish coincidence that the fireman is named Dusty.

[@Twiggystix4470]

I remember when I was firing for an engine on the steam ranger (victor harbour, south Australia) and I was still new to firing and I thought ‘well I can’t be that much more difficult to normal coal’ and one of the more experienced fire men told me that I was making a huge mistake but I thought that I knew everything so I didn’t listen… never made that mistake again 😅

[@PalomboDylan]

NOTE THIS IS POSTED BEFORE THE VIDEO EVEN STARTS. I will say one thing. The way the brits go about it is fire little and often. No lump of coal should be larger than a mans fist. And no coal should be fired for about two minutes depending on how hard the locomotive is working and how much steam is being used for example more high pressure steam due to the reverser (Johnson bar) being in the more full forward position or low pressure steam with the reverser (Johnson bar) being in a less forward position like more towards neutral but not quite in neutral. Love the vids Hyce. I’d love to go work with you guys out there. I can speak for a lot of people when I say it’s my dream

[@seymoarsalvage]

If it didn't have the master mechanic frontend, I bet that powder would put on a nice spark show lol

[@NorfKhazad]

Clearly Dusty's parents knew he would grow up to be a fireman with a name like that.

[@whisper9539]

A whole 3 minutes of channel members. A very strong community

[@TrainMedia00]

That thumbnail you posted💀💀💀 WHY IS THE COAL SO DAMN BIG What the F&@K HOW IS THAT THING GOING TO FIT THE FIREBOX 😭😭😭😭 I'm laughing my Ass off here

[@SheepInACart]

Some warships had mechanical "sizers", big mechanical wheels that crushed larger lumps down to a fairly consistent dimension while letting the fines fall through without further grinding. By using a fairly small target size they got far better consistency and faster burn rates, which where required and desirable with the automatic firebox feeding systems, but not nessesarily well loved on vessels where crews where shoveling by hand, as the average stoker was expected to fuel 5 tons of coal per day (often in fairly enclosed confines with other crew doing the same task), so even very minor changes in how difficult it was to shovel would have huge repercussions on their workload/conditions.

[@SimonBauer7]

fun fact: there where locomotives in germany that were fired exclusively by this stuff. like by coal dust. they had automatic blowers that blew the dust into the locomotive.

[@protorandom9097]

A couple questions that my brain decided were somehow relevant: 1. Is there locomotives / firebox designs specifically designed to exclusively use slack? 2. Is there such a thing as a coal "auto loader" or something of that nature that basically acts as a chute from the coal bunker to the fire box?

[@trainnerd25]

i didn't know jesus lived in colorado and ran steam

[@49shinn]

Thank you once again great community here for the channel sub! Would love for hyce to get to visit the texas state railroad some day. Alot of great engines and exhibits that could be featured here.

[@AuraKnightTheLucario]

@hyce a coworker of mine was telling me about a device he seemed to recall seeing for a train where the train would have a scoop (pressumably below it) so as it was going along it could pick up water from man made troughs without having to stop. is/was this ever actually in use ? and if so what is known about it?

[@Hybris51129]

Train of Thought has a video on this water scoop. It was used on some parts of the British Railway but I don't recall it being used elsewhere. If KZbin would let me I would give you a link.

[@leechowning2712]

I don't know if it was used here in the states. I know the big express trains in England did it as part of their London-Edinburg run.

[@AuraKnightTheLucario]

neat, thanks guys

[@BrooksMoses]

The New York Central and Pennsylvania railroads used those, as did a few other railroads in the Northeast. It's just called a scoop, but the trough is called a "track pan". Wikipedia has an article with a lot of interesting detail.

[@theromanorder]

Wasn't expecting a video on slack (sounds like clinca or just smaller coal..) In summary hyce used 30 scups over 3 miles Well dusty used 49 of the dust, dirt and coal inpurtys of slack coal (its smaller too)

[@kevinlawrence2127]

I was driving a Showmans Steam Road locomotive near where I live, going up a very steep road. I put 2 shovels of coal on with alot of coal dust. The coal dust flash fired with wooshing sound, straight through the tubes and out of the stack. Here's the funny bit. A white van was following me got covered with the hot dust/ash. it took ages for the van driver to clean up the mess.

[@richardsmith579]

Very interesting. Nutty slack wasn’t too good in domestic fires when I was young either.

[@Engineer5344]

you know it's interesting mark, even as a live steamer. my father's 1.5 scale hudson on average will burn up to a bucket and a half a coal a day during the spring and summer hauling mostly a 5 car 1000 pound train. now the coal we get from a supplier in nj is basically pea sized and we have been burning pea size coal for 30 years. it's easier to shovel, it catches quicker. but like you said for slack coal which is basically dust. the smaller stuff burns up too quick and for us fills our ashpan more meaning we have to stop more often to dump ash. once we burn up the last of our pea size bags. we are gonna try going for nut size. the idea we hope is that the grates will stay covered better and hopefully won't have to stop and dump ash so much.

[@SkorjOlafsen]

The thermal energy of the coal should just be proportional to mass (unless the chemical composition of the slack is different, which it could be), so it should take the same poundage of coal to turn the same volume of water into steam, either way. But with big chunks of coal, it seems like the coal scoop would hold more, no?

[@jeffreyblack666]

Exponential is different to quadratic. I think it is also more complex than that. If it was a simple matter of burn rate, then I would expect the smaller coal pieces to burn faster, so you need less in there for the same amount of heat. i.e. the heat should be moderated primarily by the amount of coal surface area, not mass. This should then balance out to mean the same amount of coal is used. I think the bigger contributor is that small coal, like dust, is more likely to be pulled through by the draft and go out the smoke stack. This means you would be wasting much more coal as it just flies out.

[@briancooper562]

Lump size also influences the relative amount of combustible gases/fluids retained in the volume. The smaller the pieces the more lost gases/fluids to the air. It was the gases in household coals that gave the dynamic fire that provided entertainment before TV. The small size coal used in large power stations and some locomotives is like that for ease of mechanical handling and predictable energy levels through out the 'batch'

[@bluescrew3124]

This reminded me of the MythBusters episode about running versus walking in the rain

[@CTW-G]

Watching hyce makes me so excited for my trip to Durango next summer! So excited!

[@Ryan_Rail]

Dusty is living up to his name 3:30

[@Bubbarain717]

One of my friends has a 7.5 gauge steam loco. That uses coal. To help save on waste and keep cost down, he collects the dust (slack) and mixes it with cornstarch to make briskets. Might be able to sift through the slack and sell it for the 7.5 gauge locos. I know we use Pocahontas coal for our live steam engines. Not sure how the difference would be but it’s an idea.

[@ravenbarsrepairs5594]

To minimize waste, every fireman should be using a mixture of all sizes of coal. Blending the slack coal in uses it up without adding in an excessive amount of shoveling, and as it's nearly instantaniously combusting, generating near instant energy into the firebox. vs the slower burning normal coal.

[@GrapesWatermelon]

I love your content you made me laugh and happy. Thank you, also you made motivated me to play derail valley 😊

[@UmoadoGaming]

What kind of whistle was 346 wearing in that first clip? Great video!

[@Hyce777]

SP 6 chime.

[@UmoadoGaming]

Ok cool 👍🏾

[@lucashinch]

Now we're sure to have the right sized coal for the right sized hole !

[@cobrag0318]

Faster burning, but same amount. That'd mean the same energy from the same volume is getting released quicker. More energy released would mean hotter fire. Sounds like, while slack isn't what you'd want to run on bread and butter, it'd be useful for things like starting up in the morning, or if you need extra steak for heavier loads. A boost for lack of a better word.

[@johndeereboy1945]

"Ooh it's a nice quick ten minute video" *realizes that 3 1/2 minutes of it are member credits "Ooh it's a nice quick six minute video" On a serious note Hyce, keep up all of the awesome work that you do. I've loved every minute of it, and I'm sure everyone else has too. Your massive member scroll is a testament to how much so many people enjoy your channel(and love breaking the economy)

[@Hyce777]

Thank you my friend!

[@PalomboDylan]

OMG THAT FUCKING INTRO HAD ME ROLLING!!!!! 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

[@rgsrrofnc]

Back in the day, we'd pull the 346 up to the water tower, lower the spout over the coal pile and give it a good rinse. Of course that was some of the "rented coal" that was not the good stuff from Hesperus. (Don't recall where it came from but it was dirty. I think Lakeside bought some from the same source around the same time as when we screened the coal after breaking it, it was a lot of shale and the slack under the screens was enough to fill in the transfer table pit they wanted us to fill in...)

[@Hyce777]

Been there, done that, got the T shirt every once and again. :)

[@Newberntrains]

would have expected the fine slack to get dra wn up in the draft and blown out the stack in a rain of embers

[@andrewlaverghetta715]

I’d like to learn about how oil locos work. Do you have that anywhere? I can’t imagine a good way it would work besides just constantly spraying oil into the firebox and having it just instantly light, similar to a home oven but MORE. Also, loved the video I recently watched where you showed yourself breaking a large piece into smaller pieces. I think it was about firing the engine.

[@kakeboss72]

I can see Dusty talking notes 😂😂😂

[@dylandepetro4187]

A little tip about the youtube algorithm for you. Because of your long outro, it is likely that not everyone watches the whole video, which hurts your video in the youtube algorithm. If you want to get your videos suggested to more people, and get more views, I would suggest shortening the outro or maybe adding some sort of bloopers or commentary to your outros so that people don’t just click away or fast forward through the credits. (I may be a tad guilty of fast forwarding through the credits. I apologize for that.) granted, this is just based on my knowledge of how the algorithm works.

[@rocketplane]

How much of the slack coal just falls through the grate too?

[@3900Class]

My limited exposure to coal firing only comes from overnight hostling the MILW 261, but that slack looks similar to the junk we have had in the tender recently.

[@LoveShaysloco]

the big one in the thumb nail probably would be good if you park the engine and wana keep her warm but not cooling down so it would have time to break down as it burns. and probably the same to the slack coal at lest to use it

[@No_Skill_Life]

nah that intro caught me off guard

[@watchvideosok7441]

I love steam engines but I haven’t gotten to ride a full blown steam engine yet unfortunately, I’ve watched them drive by though, I’ve seen 4014

[@bradwilmot5066]

Since slack is basically "flammable dirt" as you said, instead of "coal goes in the hole", would this not be "dirt goes up her skirt"? 🙂

[@nw611J]

Man this a cool video Mark hard to believe Dust fired only with slack is it basically dirt slash coal dust?

[@Hyce777]

Coal dust, there's no real dirt in it. But it looks like black dirt!

[@awildjared1396]

That moment you realize over 30% of the video is the channel members scroll.

[@SDE1994]

As far as i know (with no personal experience) the main reason railways never used coal dust is because most of it just gets sucked out up the chimney by the draft before it can burn so its a waste of effort

[@Hyce777]

That definitely is a bit of it depending on firebox design haha

[@forgegamer3118]

Lmfao that intro 💀💀😂😂

[@ThePrairiesRailfan]

0:00 Bill and Jimmy

[@bwlyon]

Okay Hyce, here’s question. Since in the smaller shovel fed steam locomotives like fist sized chunks of coal. Would the same be true for the much larger steam locomotives such as UP 4014 like the same fist sized coal if it were possible to feed that hungry beast that sized coal. Or does the draft on the 4014 create such a fire storm when it was mechanically fed the finer ground coal, that the feed rate could be cut down to achieve the same result? This is relatively speaking of course. Love the content!

[@Name-ot3xw]

I heard that they built the locomotive around a coal boulder. Your way seems easier.

[@Pystro]

I wonder how much of the difference is due to the slack being much closer in size to the gaps in the grates that the coal sits on. When you initially talked about the slack, I imagined something the size of coarse sand, and was wondering how you'd expect it to not drop straight into the ash pan.

[@peregrina7701]

This was fun! Thank you for including an explanation of the square cube law; I knew the concept but never heard it called that until Firing 101. did the tender fill up with slack because of a wonky coal load or did it just accumulate over time and Polar? Kudos to Dusty for clearing it out. Thanks for the video!! PS. I have now also learned that when one of my favorite KZbinrs appears to have recorded a video in an inebriated state, check the settings: one of my beloved felines somehow reset the playback speed to 0.75x in the night. 🙄 thanks again :)

[@Hyce777]

Lol! That's hilarious. Yeah, 491's tender slowly accumulated more and more slack over polar. This was towards the end of last polar and we almost ran out of coal so dusty did the honorable thing. Haha

[@Zimmzamm]

Firing slack in engines with arch bricks like 491 is WAY easier than in small keyhole fireboxes lacking arch bricks like 20. I’ve been stuck firing slack on Valley 97 and if she’s working hard she will just suck your coal dust straight into the flues instead of it going where you want it on the grate.

[@Hyce777]

Yeaaaaaaaah that's *very* true.

[@RetroHoo]

“Dusty” a very apt nickname in this case 🙂

[@SeymourBalz]

I ain't sure, but I'm bettin that bolder yur luggin is a "bit" large.

[@SkyS1b2024]

Awesome video like always

[@slanderedstone]

Coal in the hoooooolllleee

[@Surkai25]

ya heard it first here yall! size does matter! - Hyce 2023

[@jaroldscottwilliams.3rd832]

It's a shame you can't just vacuum the slack coal into a bucket-like area above another fire door and just open the fire door when the bucket is full. Like with a shop vac or something.

[@dominicwroblewski5832]

If the loco is working hard, wouldn't the draft just suck the slack through the flues with out ever touching the grates creating some serious holes in the fire ?

[@mafarnz]

Hang on, wouldn’t the fact that it’s burning up faster meaning more BTUs in a given amount of time have an impact on the firing of the engine? My thought process here is that since it’s burning faster, you’re putting more heat into the firebox/boiler in a given amount of time, so wouldn’t that equate to having to do less work overall? Clearly not based upon your demonstration here, but I am curious if the fact that it burns faster affects things at all.

[@trainanimator8150]

hey hyce question for ya which is your favorite engine to drive at the museum?

[@Teufelstiger13]

Well i am not a fireman or so. But i do maybe know that the reason for the fine coal power burning quicker. Basically the more surface area you have for a material to reacted the quicker the reaction is. For a other example dust is something you wouldn't normally think it could really burn or explode. But if you blow it into the air and give it a ignition source it can happen that you get a dust explosion. A bigger chunk of coal will burn slower then the finer coal powder since the most of material is not involved in the reaction happening on surface of the coal. I am no a expert so please have mercy with me ^^

[@vonduus]

I would have thought the slack burned hotter, and that this fact would somewhat even things out? Cheers from Denmark!

[@fowlplay6409]

I was there yesterday it was fun

[@generalcodsworth4417]

The slack coal will burn faster due to having more surface area, but won't that also mean it burns hotter? So long as enough air keeps coming in for efficient combustion, wouldn't using mostly slack mean that you're reaching higher firebox temps and thus producing mores steam? Or is the air intake limited enough that using slack produces less efficient burning and more dirty exhaust?

[@Foamer_extroardinaire]

Hey hyce I’ve got a question. are you all right with people coming up to you at the museum to say hi if you’re around? I was at the museum a month or two ago, and was too scared to say hi because I didn’t know if you were okay with that

[@paveloleynikov4715]

Are there examples of coal dust's self combusting or making volumetric boom from fire?

[@vincentandhimi6990]

MORE BEANZ ARE NEEDED

[@pineapplemaan9]

That intro

[@bobbysenterprises3220]

Coal size works like firewood size

[@LMYS5697]

Lololol anyone who's ever loaded their own cartridges or just thought a moment knows size matters. As you decrease size of the coal, you increase surface area, thus increasing the speed by which it burns. High pressure powders, like magnum powders, tend to be smaller individual grains of powder, as they burn faster and reach peak pressure sooner, pushing on the back of the bullet harder.

[@hoghead4846]

How much of that slack would just get blown out the stack from the draft when working a hard grade?

[@StarlordYT69]

half of the vid being your supportive members (like me):

[@stekra3159]

Fire man Dustey

[@ianmcnab9534]

Would it be worth getting there and periodically collecting the slack coal out of the tenders and mixing it with resin to make it clump up a bit? Would be interesting to see if that changes how it burns.

[@Hyce777]

That sounds like a ton of work haha. More than just using it. Though an interesting premise.

[@UncleGrizzley]

Would it not still come down to the number of heat units provided by the type of coal being used? I.E. 600 BTU vs. 800 BTU

[@rgsrrofnc]

Although... I do wonder if there is relatively the same volume but burning a lot faster, where did those extra BTUs go? Out the stack?

[@Hyce777]

A great question. Probably, slack does make a lot of smoke.

[@Robbie_Prz]

So overall more coal was used and therefore it would have been more expensive to use slack coal rather than larger pieces?

[@mentalizatelo]

This is awesome.

[@RatzBuddie]

Was/is there no method of compressing the slack into larger balls or bricks? Or does coal not work like that? Seems like a missed opportunity to minimize inefficiency

[@tsufordman]

But how was the smoke show for all that extra effort?

[@True_NOON]

Ashpan size on below does matter , cuz itl burn up in the barrel (i know) all the same(but not quite)