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

[mauried@commslab.gov.au (Maurie Daly)]

Stuff deleted
>>
>>>>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.

Depends a bit on what you mean by flogging.
As far as I know there are no Govt Railways that would even come close to 
having to flog their locos in the way the BHP Iron Ore flogged their C 636s 
back in the early 1970s .
For a fully loaded iron ore train of 25000 tonnes with 5 locos running at a 
top speed of 45 km/h for 5 hours in 8th notch  continuously from Newman to 
Pelican Loop, thats flogging.
The Cs in NSW for some bizzarre reason were derated to a maximum of 950 tonnes 
between Junee & Sydney and 1100 tonnes between Junee & Albury ,even though 
Vline rated them at 1600 tonnes between Albury & Melb, so whilst they may have 
been working hard up the 1:40s , lets face it , there arnt that many.
Gunning ==> Oolong  down 5Kms
Jerrawa ==> top of Mt Mundoonen down 5 kms
Yass ==> Bowning down 3.5 kms
Rocky Ponds ==> Cunningar down approx 4 kms
Murrumburrah ==> Demondrille down 3.2 kms
Junee ==> mileage 485.6 kms down approx 1 km not quite 1:40
and thats about it for the down , on the up its a hell of a lot better with 
only the short climb of 1km from the Wagga Viaducts up to Bomen Loop and a 
similar climb from mileage 488 km to the top of the hill just before Junee.
Nothing north of Junee till Sydney worse than 1:66.

The S class were introduced in 1955, and were commonly used on the Jets 
(superfreighters) until well into the middle 1980s.
When the X class was introduced in 1968 they also were used on the 
superfreighters, but were not that popular, for one reason that a common 
working for the Up Overland was to use the locos of the afternoon down Melb - 
Adelaide superfreighter, Xs were not popular on the Overland due to their 
noise.
Some of the S class had done in excess of 6.5 Million kms when they were 
starting to be withdrawn in the early 1990s , 35 years service which is not 
bad.
Considering that WCR are still using S classes today on a regular basis,and 
ASR are still using series 2 GMs today , introduced at the same time as the S 
class,and effectively the same loco, these locos are doing really well.
43 years service.(nearly as old as me.) 
Id be interested to know what sort of mileages the Cs have done?

cheers
MD