How fast do steam trains go? (2024)

How fast do steam trains go?

How fast was the average steam train? The old steam engines were usually run well below 40MPH due to problems with maintaining the tracks– but could go much faster. I seem to recall a 45 mile run before 1900 in which a locomotive pulled a train at better than 65MPH… (Stanley Steamer cars were known to exceed 75MPH).

An additional 16-18 trains are expected, and each train may be over 1.5 miles long. At a speed of 50-60 mph, that would be an approximate 3-4 minute wait time at crossings.

Seventy five years ago a world record, still unmatched, was achieved by a steam engine called Mallard. For just a couple of minutes the locomotive thundered along at speeds of 126 miles per hour on a stretch of track just south of Grantham.

In the early days of British railways, trains ran up to 78 mph by the year 1850. However, they ran at just 30mph in 1830. As railway technology and infrastructure progressed, train speed increased accordingly. In the U.S., trains ran much slower, reaching speeds of just 25 mph in the west until the late 19th century.

The highest speed ever ratified for a steam locomotive is 201 km/h (125 mph), with a brief spell at which the speed reached 126mph, by the London North Eastern Railway 'Class A4' No.

Most Shinkansen trains operate at speeds of about 500 kilometers per hour (200 to 275 miles per hour).

The steam locomotive, as commonly employed, has its pistons directly attached to cranks on the driving wheels; thus, there is no gearing, one revolution of the driving wheels is equivalent to one revolution of the crank and thus two power strokes per piston (steam locomotives are almost universally double-acting, ...

Tractive effort

The amount of horsepower determines an engine's strength. Huge models of steam locomotives are very powerful and can give off over 4,000 HP. They're also large in size and require a lot of fuel to run them. The more fuel an engine requires, the more power it gives off.

Then, the “Flying Scotsman” became the first steam locomotive to be officially recorded reaching 100 mph, during the 393-mile trip for London and Edinbugh.

Harmony CRH 380A, with maximum operational speed of 380kmph, is currently the second fastest operating train in the world. The electric multiple unit (EMU) set a record by speeding at 486.1kmph during its trial operation on the Shanghai-Hangzhou intercity high-speed railway in December 2010.

How fast did a Civil War train go?

Railcars at the time-- rail engines could only pull at about 20 miles per hour. They were still not terribly fast means of transportation, and they would often get overcrowded by the demands of an army.

By the late 1800s, there were at least 100 patents for railway braking systems. An early solution was to simply apply enough brake power on the locomotive to bring the vehicle to stop. This initially involved screws and linkage, but was soon developed to be actuated using steam diverted from the boiler.

Passenger train travel during the 1880s generally cost two or three cents per mile. Transcontinental (New York to San Francisco) ticket rates as of June 1870 were $136 for first class in a Pullman sleeping car, $110 for second class and $65 for third, or “emigrant,” class seats on a bench.

The fastest recorded speed of a train belongs to the Japanese bullet train—SC Maglev—which has reached a top speed of 375 mph. Based on the theoretical speeds, the new Super Maglev train would be capable of travelling from New York City to Washington, D.C. in just over 20 minutes.

The current world speed record for a commercial train on steel wheels is held by the French TGV at 574.8 km/h (357.2 mph), achieved on 3 April 2007 on the new LGV Est. The trainset, the track and the cantenary were modified to test new designs.

The locomotives weigh between 100 and 200 tons (91,000 and 181,000 kilograms) and are designed to tow passenger-train cars at speeds of up to 125 miles per hour (200 kph).

It is the nation's only high-speed intercity passenger rail provider, operating at speeds up to 150 mph (241 kph) over current infrastructure. More than half of Amtrak trains operate at top speeds of 100 mph (160 kph) or greater.

With maximum speeds of 350 kph (217 mph) on many lines, intercity travel has been transformed and the dominance of airlines has been broken on the busiest routes. By 2020, 75% of Chinese cities with a population of 500,000 or more had a high-speed rail ink.

The United States has no such corridors. High‐​speed rail is an obsolete technology because it requires expensive and dedicated infrastructure that will serve no purpose other than moving passengers who could more economically travel by highway or air.

The tender could greatly extend a locomotive's range and by the late steam era (1930s-1940s) a locomotive used in main line service could run anywhere between 75 to 150 miles before needing to refuel, which typically coincided with a train crew's district/territory.

Why do locomotives run back to back?

They're on those rails so the rail is the only direction of travel they can go in." Jacobs says it's actually more efficient to leave locomotives facing whatever direction they are facing because it takes a lot of energy to pick a train up and turn it around so that it would face the other way.

A The color of exhaust you see coming out of a steam locomotive's smoke stack indicates how efficiently it is burning fuel. Darker or blacker smoke is an indication that small fuel particles (coal, wood, fuel oil, etc.) have made it through the firebox unburned and are therefore wasted.

To begin with diesel locomotives were less powerful than steam engines which meant smaller train sizes (ie. e the amount of carriages they could tow) which you would have thought made them a less preferable option - so why make the switch?

Saturated steam from an HP steam generator was pumped through HP superheater tubes which lined the firebox. There it was superheated to about 900 °F (482 °C) and the pressure raised to 1,700 psi (11.72 MPa).

Temperatures of Steam and WaterEdit

To illustrate: Temperature of the steam in a locomotive boiler at 190 psi is 383 degrees Fahrenheit (195 degrees Centigrade). This is also the temperature of the water at that steam pressure.

It was on 30 November 1934 that Flying Scotsman achieved the first properly authenticated 100mph for a steam engine. This was while she was running between Leeds and London. The Flying Scotsman was saved for the nation this year and is now - like City of Truro - in the ownership of the National Railway Museum.

The most powerful steam locomotive currently in operation is the Union Pacific "Big Boy" 4014, a simple articulated 4-8-8-4 locomotive capable of a tractive effort (pulling force) of 135,375 lbf (602 kN) at 10 mph.

The legendary Flying Scotsman locomotive will be back in the south-east one more time during 2022, running along a route near Surrey for five days at the end of August this year. It will be running non-stop return services on the 11-mile Bluebell Railway between Sheffield Park and East Grinstead in West Sussex.

The first high-speed rail system, the Tōkaidō Shinkansen, began operations in Japan in 1964 and was widely known as the bullet train.

Who has the fastest bullet train?

China debuts world's fastest train

(CNN) — A maglev bullet train that can reach speeds of 600 kilometers per hour (373 miles per hour) has made its debut in Qingdao, China. Developed by the state-owned China Railway Rolling Stock Corporation, it's considered the world's fastest train.

The journey west on railroads wasn't only faster and easier than covered wagons, it could also be luxurious. First-class passengers reveled in what they saw as the comfort and modernity of the trains themselves. The train cars were “a constant delight,” wrote Henry T.

It was reprinted in August Mencken's book, "The Railroad Passenger Car," and describes what it was like to ride in a Pullman car during the 1870's: "The average speed on the American lines is about twenty miles an hour. The express trains rarely exceed thirty miles.

A train driver, engine driver, engineman or locomotive driver, commonly known as an engineer or railroad engineer in the United States and Canada, and also as a locomotive handler, locomotive operator, train operator, or motorman, is a person who drives a train, multiple unit or a locomotive.

If a steam locomotive runs-out of water, either the firebox plug will melt (which is embarrassing for the fireman / driver and expensive to fix), or steam pressure will rise extremely quickly until either more water is supplied, or the boiler explodes.

There is only one place left on earth where steam locomotives are still widely in use: the Chinese industrial hinterland.

Fuel Efficiency - CSX.com. According to the AAR, moving freight by rail is 4 times more fuel efficient than moving freight on the highway. CSX trains can move a ton of freight approximately 492 miles on a single gallon of fuel.

Trip Summary

Traveling by train from New York to Los Angeles usually takes around 77 hours and 57 minutes, but the fastest Amtrak train can make the trip in 67 hours and 20 minutes.

By Covered Wagon In The Early 1800s: 4-5 Months

Given the distance between New York and California is around 2,445 miles, the journey would take approximately 122 to 162 days, or from 4 to 5.5 months.

To travel across the United States by rail, you'll have to ride more than one Amtrak train. The shortest trip time without any delays is approximately 61 hours (between two and three days) , plus a four hour layover.

How fast does Japan's bullet trains go?

It can run up to 360 kilometers per hour, a new record set during a test run in 2019, making it one of the fastest trains in the world. The operating speed, however, will be capped at 285 kilometers per hour.

Trains in northern England are so slow because of railway congestion they travel at just 16mph - the same pace as a horse and cart. Trains in the north of England are nearly as slow as a horse and cart, a new study has found.

The shinkansen train uses superconducting maglev (short for magnetic levitation) to achieve these incredible speeds. As the train leaves the station, it's rolling on wheels. But as it speeds up, the wheels retract, and the power of magnets allows the vehicle to hover four inches above the ground.

At any given time on Class Is' networks, trains stretching from 10,000 to 15,000 feet long are snaking their way to a destination. Pulling well more than 100 cars, the trains are much longer than — and in some cases more than double the size of — a typical 5,000- to 6,000-foot train.

Currently, the shortest route of a slow passenger train in India is Barkakana–Sidhwar Passenger (numbered 53375 / 53376) with a record distance of 6 km (3.7 mi) with an average speed of 18 km/h (11 mph).

Modern locomotives employ two air brake systems. The system which controls the brake pipe is called the automatic brake and provides service and emergency braking control for the entire train. The locomotive(s) at the head of the train (the "lead consist") have a secondary system called the independent brake.

Coal still accounts for roughly 30 percent of U.S. power generation. CSX and Norfolk Southern, West Virginia's remaining Class I railroads, still operate across much of the state. West Virginia's rail plan showed them using 2,100 miles of track four years ago.

U.S. delivered coal costs, which reflect commodity and transportation costs, have declined steadily since 2010 (in constant 2017 dollars per ton). In 2019, the average transportation cost of coal was $15.03 per ton, down from $16.07 per ton in 2018.

At any given time on Class Is' networks, trains stretching from 10,000 to 15,000 feet long are snaking their way to a destination. Pulling well more than 100 cars, the trains are much longer than — and in some cases more than double the size of — a typical 5,000- to 6,000-foot train.