> A note from Marshal_Black
>
<Snip calculations on ghost rock for steam trains>
Wow, that's some amount of detail there.
Only thing I found of even semi interest was a source stating that in 1946 the average consumption was 1 mile per 2 ounces of coal. So for 1 mile it uses up an eighth of a pound of coal.
Cannot remember the ratio of power produced by ghost rock as opposed to coal - but your bracketed bit under B) leads me to think it is a factor of 50.
Hence if the book was saying 100 miles for 100 pounds of coal - there would be an improvement in efficiency of 8 times between 1876 and 1946.
If the book is saying 100 miles for 100 pounds of ghost rock (equivalent 5000 pounds of coal) - there would have to be an improvement in efficiency of 400 times between 1876 and 1946.
Technology is cool, but I feel 400 times in 70 years is stretching things a little.
This all assumes that my quick fag packet calcs are correct and that the source of the 1 mile to 2 ounces coal is correct.
My gut instinct though would be to go with option B)
Roy
> --If you skipped, here's the QUESTION.--
>
> This leads me finally to my question. Is the 100
> pounds of ghost rock per 100 miles of travel for a
> locomotive accurate? If not what is it and what does
> that "100" under the fuel for a locomotive mean?
> Is it...
> A)The amount of hours of operation a train
> maintains on a single pound of ghost rock? (meaning a
> train could travel 4000 miles on a single pound)
> B)The amount of coal fuel necessary for running a
> train 100 miles? (equivalent to 2 pounds of ghost rock
> fuel cores)
> C)Some other number I cannot for the life of me
> figure out? The excellent accumulated rulings offered
> no further clues.
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