Re: C class's and Belarine Peninsula Railways (two qns)

[krel4203@netconnect.com.au (Krel )]

On Tue, 7 Jul 1998 04:08:21 GMT, mauried@commslab.gov.au (Maurie Daly)
wrote:

>In article <35a28dde.7986204@news.enternet.com.au> steam4me@enternet.com.au (Yuri J Sos) writes:
>>From: steam4me@enternet.com.au (Yuri J Sos)
>>Subject: Re: C class's and Belarine Peninsula Railways (two qns)
>>Date: Tue, 07 Jul 1998 12:56:23 +1000
>
>>"Reuben Farrelly" <reubie@bigpond.com.AAA> wrote, and I selectively
>>quote:
>
>
>>>Why are the C class being scrapped when locos such as the Y, T and B
>>>class still live on?  
>
>>C class are in storage, not being scrapped.  I suspect NR is being a
>>"dog in the manger" about them denying high horsepower locos (C,BL,EL,
>>etc) to their competitors (or perhaps it's good business practice -
>>don't give your competitors an even break).  NR aren't using them
>>because they are older, less fuel efficient than NR class; also I
>>don't believe they are covered by a maintenance agreement.
>
>>The C class also were used in long haul interstate service and I
>>imagine would have clocked up very high mileages in that sort of
>>service.  T & Y class just don't get worked that hard. 
>
>For most of their lives , prior to the creation of NR , the Cs were used 
>almost exclusively between Melb - Serviceton , and later to a much lesser 
>extent to Adelaide on the Melb - Adelaide superfreighters.

What about the flogging we gave them to Sydney and back <vbg> (Ahh!,
those were the days). All that crashing around at 115 km/h and then
roaring away up 1 in 40's has to count as wear and tear.

>In this regard they would have clocked up no more miles than the S class & X 
>class hauled superfreighters that preceeded them , in fact the Ss would have 
>done many more miles than the Cs ever did.

Not sure about that one. C's were almost exclusivly used in high
mileage interstate while S's and X's had shorter distance pass and
local freight runs to lower the average.

>Whether their was some fundamental design flaw in the locos when they were 
>built well never know , but since they used a very similar engine to the ALs 
>its unlikely.
>Poor maintenance procedures may have played some part in it , being the first 
>turbocharged locos that Vline ever purchased.
>There may be some argument in favor of the older blower driven locos as being 
>more reliable as they get older,but there are still a lot of pretty old 
>turbocharged locos getting around, all the 48s and their derivatives are 
>turbocharged.

EMD turbos (2 stroke) are different to ALCO turbos (4 stroke). Look
overseas - notice that as a general rule early non-turboed EMDs last
longer than 3000hp turboed ones. Sure there are some old SD40-2's
still around but a heck of a lot aren't.

Cheers

Krel