Question for SP gurus

I am an SP man, it still exists in my world. I have been thinking about something that I must have just taken for granted all my life. It is :

The cab forwards were just basically an engine turned around and the back of the cab closed in to make a front on the loco. Right? Well the engineer always had controls on the right side of a standard loco but with the loco turned 180* that would have the engineer sitting on the left side. Did the engineer operate from the left side or did they move him back to the normal right side and alter his controls to be on the right side as well?
just never gave it much thought and I have not found the answer on internet.

PS: I have never seen the CF in the museum in California.

 

That is a good question, Carl. I have always assumed that when the cab forwards were built the engineer’s controls were installed on the right side, but you know what happens when you assume.

 

Carl...
I sure ain't no SP Guru but...from the best pics of an SP CF could find... it looks like the controls are on the right side...

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/woec_VS0Jn0/maxresdefault.jpg

https://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1806/28493994307_f957c41fcb_b.jpg

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_aPtHw1L4m...o-nu/southernpacificac-12locomotive021610.jpg

https://i.pinimg.com/474x/56/47/f5/5647f5243fb5f651a3dbe08ddc15d42f--steam-engine-trens.jpg

 

Then again...are they ???

https://external-preview.redd.it/Or...bp&s=78995d0690d80cb2e423e32bcacacfa32d545884

 

Thanks to all for looking, I just proved to myself that my 83 year old noodle is a tad slower than it used to be. I answered my own question by surfing and found some images and article in "Trains" magazine.

Here is what I found :
1. SP moved controls around so the crew sat, as in a normal steamer.
2. Keep in mind that these images were shot towards the boiler backhead.

Here is the engineer's seat looking towards the boiler backhead, note the throttle, reverser, and other controls. I'll bet that seat got rather uncomfortable real quick :


Now this is looking out the front of cab windows, note the cab door side exit :


Here is the fireman's side looking towards the backhead :


Fireman's forward view, door closed :


No wonder these guys had hemorrhoids !

 

Obviously pictures from the cab forward in the CSRM! How about that view thru the windshield...no blind spots there. Looks like you're driving the train from the back seat with someone's head in the way.

As you have already said, you found the answer...engineer is still on the right side of the locomotive. This was done because of the snow sheds going over the Sierra's. By turning the locomotive around so the crew was in the front, the smokestack would be in the back and the crew could breath. Back in the day, the snow sheds went on for MILES (the town or Norton was mostly built under the snow sheds including a turn table for the engines). While the SP tried breathing masks, they just didn't work so this was the only answer that worked well.

 

Thank you for pointing out that throttle linkage. I never knew that. My Dad always said a man should learn something new each day!

 

Quite right , I can attest to that.
Years ago I got a cab ride in a conventional 2-8-2 ...... quite a lot smaller than a cab forward. On the trip there was a couple of tunnels. I learned how much the fireman has to be on the ball with any line that has a tunnel.
Prior to a tunnel there has to be sufficient coal in the fire to not require firing in the tunnel. Boiler pressure has to be not about to lift the safety valves while in the tunnel. Water level was set to allow a little more to be added to the boiler while in the tunnel.
The particular loco had a brand new boiler so it steamed very easily and just wanted to keep going right to maximum pressure. Upon entering the tunnel the fireman opened the firebox door to allow some cooler air and make a less intense fire and turned the injector on.
Within about 2 seconds the air temperature skyrocketed and you could feel the air was filled with tiny coal cinders. My glasses began to fog up a bit.
I had to squint to lessen the chances of cinders getting in my eyes and not breathe heavily so I didn't breathe in those tiny cinders also. The air swirls and accelerates from the moment the loco enters the tunnel ....... so many things you don't expect.
Ooooops forgot to say , the tunnels were uphill so coasting was not an option.
Arrival of the cab forwards must have been an incredible bonus to the SP crews and more amazing was other railroads not adopting the same layout that obviously worked. I guess the price of coal must have been so much lower than oil that the companies decided the crews could just suffer it day in day out.
Even a "short" boiler is quite an obstruction to seeing modern LED signals. I've had a look in 4294 at CRM and the distance from the drivers seat to to the front of the cab did seem a long way. Then again looking at photos of cab forwards running it nearly always shows crews leaning out of the windows in cab sides just like other conventional steamers.
When I hear rail fans saying "bring back steam locos" I know they have never been through a tunnel in a steam locomotive.

 

Russell,

Thanks for your posting and reminding me that I am getting olddddd. I have known about the throttle rod and valve for maaannnyyy years but forgot when I posted this tread. Also, as insult of myself, I remembered just one year ago when I bashed an EM-1 into a non SP cab forward. Guess what :





I remembered enough a year ago to move the throttle to other side of the EM-1 boiler.

D U H ! !

 

The left coast didn't have vast deposits of high quality coal...or hardly any pockets of coal. Mt. Diablo had a coal deposit, but it was low grade coal and the railroad found it didn't burn 'clean' enough or hot enough to run the locomotives on it. One thing that California did have was oil, so the SP began experimenting with it. It is oil that allowed the cab forwards to be built as there wouldn't have been any way to get coal from the tender to the cab of the locomotive. The oil that they used was very 'crude'...known as Bunker C, it was a thick, almost tar-like substance that had to be heated with steam so it would flow. It also meant that the tenders needed to be pressurized to keep the oil and water flowing while the engine was going uphill (which is why the oil tank had a screw type cover to keep the pressure in).

Due to the amount of snow that Donner Summit would receive (35-40 feet on average) the snow sheds on Donner Summit ended up covering 37 of the 40 miles of track at the summit. These sheds were built of wood until the 1990's which caused a big concern for fire (hence, the SP has a dedicated 'fire train' with spray nozzles on the locomotive and tank cars full of water that could be taken into the sheds to put out any fires). Of course, the passengers were less than happy about traveling through some of the most beautiful mountain scenery California has to offer in a dark, man made, smoke filled tunnel, but snow removal equipment wasn't nearly as good as it is today (ask the passengers of the City of San Francisco in January 1952). This is what eventually lead to the creation of the cab forwards...

Experimental mask that the SP tried first