Re: North Australia Railway Mk1

["< Tell >" <telljbAS@ozemail.com.au>]

"< Tell >" <telljbAS@ozemail.com.au> wrote:
> 
> The NAR was vacuum braked up to and including the NSU
> class diesel.  NSU's 63 & 64 (the last two members of
> the class) had dual braking systems when delivered to
> Darwin.  The vacuum brake utilised an "exhauster" as
> the poms called it, driven by the Sulzer prime mover
> which was a vacuum pump to the rest of us.


The above statement needs to be qualified as there is
no "historical" record of this.

I worked for the Contractors who lifted the CAR from
Oodnadatta to Ewaninga.  Roberts used four NSU's on the
job including the original NAR units 63 & 64.  One of
these, cant remember which, developed a massive air
leak under the cab floor.  I lifted the floor plates to
get to the pipes and was amazed to discover a whole
bunch of redundant steel pipes nestled amongst the
other control and brake pipes, a couple of them were
for the sanders which had long been abandoned, but the
others were a mystery, they were chopped off with the
ends still open.   
Later I was thumbing through the workshop manuals which
Roberts had obtained from ANR, and covered everything
from minor adjustments to major overhauls that I found
supplementary drawings of the vacuum system with
reference to the NAR locos.
This was 19 years ago and since then I have never been
able to confirm what the exact status of the vacuum
brake system was on these two units.  
One thing I am certain of, those particular workshop
manuals from the Birmingham Railway Carriage & Wagon Co
had all the details in them.
 
----Tell
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