Seaboard Central - Tractive Effort vs Horsepower

[@ronaldrondeau7870]

thanks Tim very clear explanations

[@SeaboardCentral]

Thanks for watching! Glad to help

[@michaelmcdougall4527]

Well, Tim once again your spot on thanks for all you do for the hobby and 🎩🎩off to you!

[@SeaboardCentral]

Thank you! Much appreciated

[@trainglen22]

Great video. Very useful also.

[@SeaboardCentral]

Thanks!

[@mikedurhan9941]

Thanks, Tim. I understood all of that lesson. Much obliged for the video.

[@SeaboardCentral]

Thanks for watching!

[@beeble2003]

The key equation is that power = force x speed. So, for example, something like a GP60 (high-power, light four-axle unit) can't exert a lot of force on the rails, but can exert that force at high speed; something like an SD38 (low-power, heavy six-axle unit) can exert a lot of force on the rails, but can't go very fast while doing so. And then the railroads and manufacturers just said, oh, eff it. Let's just build high-power, heavy six-axle units and not worry about all this stuff.

[@SeaboardCentral]

Yeah that’s pretty much it.

[@gp3829]

Hi Tim thanks for the video and info, especially the Roster tables. Although I am not on Facebook, these are always always useful to see and a make note of.

[@SeaboardCentral]

Thanks! Glad to help.

[@David-yo5re]

Hey Tim, I love the education I'm getting from your videos.

[@SeaboardCentral]

Thanks!

[@NeshaminyValleyRR]

thanks for explaining it in a language that most us can understand

[@SeaboardCentral]

Thanks for watching!

[@garynugent4400]

Sorry I'm late, work and such. GREAT VIDEO SIR!!! You know what I really love about your channel? You teach us like in a classroom. You share the information with us while giving us examples on your beautiful growing layout while not trying to keep the information to yourself or that you know more than ANYONE... alot of times in my life with other modelers I have found them to be a wanna be know it all or (Look what I have and know and you dont, .) addatuide. I enjoy your layout, the information, the dedications along with the construction and all other tips and instruction you give! The best part, you ARE A REAL Engineer, Thank you sir! - Gary

[@SeaboardCentral]

Much appreciated Gary! Always glad to share my layout and prototype info.

[@mikedeberg6326]

Tim, well stated in a way that we can understand how railroads think and why/where locomotives are used.

[@SeaboardCentral]

Thanks Mike!

[@RFMCabooseNP1713]

That was a good one. Thanks for the explanation in layman's terms.

[@SeaboardCentral]

Thanks for watching! I appreciate it.

[@bbrailroad6284]

Great lesson. Thanks for sharing.

[@SeaboardCentral]

Thanks for watching!

[@AMPProductionsVideo]

Very Nice!

[@SeaboardCentral]

Thanks!

[@blainedunlap4242]

I have been looking for this explanation for a year. I understood all the terms, but I could not figure out the practical relationship between them. Thank You for that. Looking forward to tomorrow's episode. So you want to make a train, how much tractive effort is it going to take to pull. And Fridays wrap up, as a generalization, how much traction per car. How does all this change vs. a grade?

[@SeaboardCentral]

Railroads establish tonnage profiles for all of their lines. So they put the locomotives in different groups based off of their tractive effort. Then they look at the steepest grade on a district and set the tonnage rating for each group. So on one district an SD40-2 might be rated for 4,000 tons where another district with a more severe grade it might only be 2,700 tons.

[@barneyleadhead2596]

Great video - very enjoyable and well explained! I'd be interested to know how the use of multiple locos/consist has an effect on the locomotive choice for a given load - for example how would two 2000hp locos perform against a single 4000hp loco on a train of the same weight?

[@SeaboardCentral]

Thanks! Yes a single ES44AC will definitely pull the same size train as two GP38-2s. I didn’t really get into too much specifics because I was afraid the video would end up being too much for people to try to understand.

[@rogerthomas9017]

Great stuff! Now, how does this equate to actual drawbar pull for each model loco in ounces? Do you measure that to set a nominal # of cars a loco can pull on the flat? And up the helix? That usually correlates with actual loco weight plus how square the trucks are on the rail. so that all wheels pull equally.

[@SeaboardCentral]

Thanks! I wish that models had similar weights but some are lighter than others. I will do like the prototype and instead of tonnage, I will use maximum number of cars. For example, the maximum number of cars a single GP38 or GP40-2 is rated for over the line would be 7 due to the grades.

[@rogerthomas9017]

Curious as to which throttle you generally use when creating the videos.- Proto or NCE? Do your locos have fairly high values of CVs 3 and 4? They seem a bit abrupt at times.

[@SeaboardCentral]

I use the ProtoThrottle. I have a video on the channel on how I program my locomotives

[@25mfd]

so tim, did you add any EXTRA weight to your locos... or are you happy with the "from the factory" weight... i do know KATO was known for being really heavy right from the factory... i had two of their GE C44-9ws way long time ago... very heavy locos (smooth running AND whisper quiet as well)

[@SeaboardCentral]

No extra weight added. Not much space with all the electronics.

[@25mfd]

@@SeaboardCentral yea for sure, some of these locos could use some extra weight

[@Joe-d7m6k]

​@@SeaboardCentraland remember, that all the boards and other things under the hood ,that take up space, cause the weight of the model to be less. In N , for example--- I defy anyone to find a smoother, heavyweight loco than a ORIGINAL Kato F3,or F7.

[@stephenhottle6783]

645 cubic inches 👍🏻

[@SeaboardCentral]

Yes my bad. 😂

[@stephenhottle6783]

@SeaboardCentral oh I know that you knew. Easy slip up there. I've always heard and you probably have too, but the old timers would say that steam locomotives could pull more than they could start and that diesels could start more than they could pull 🤷🏻

[@SeaboardCentral]

@@stephenhottle6783the old heads I knew told me with steam if you could get it started then you knew it would make it. Diesels produce more TE at low speed where steam is the opposite.

[@stephenhottle6783]

@@SeaboardCentral yes that would make sense. We actually have a guy still running where I'm at that's been around so long that he used to run FT's. It's really impressive to me.

[@beeble2003]

645 cubic inches _per cylinder._

[@richardnew1215]

Don't understand what horsepower or tractive power has to do with models--except in modeling what type of engines run with which trains. But that can be based on era, also.

[@SeaboardCentral]

It’s more prototype information for those who are interested in that sort of thing. For folks who are only interested in modeling I have a number of other how to videos on the channel I hope you will find more appealing.