What do you like about steam locomotives?

What's not to like?

A lot more happening than on a diesel.  It's just more fun for me to see a nice steamer roll by.

They smoked from the get go. It took a long while for diesels to start smoking, I guess they weren't of age. All the moving parts also make them artistically beautiful to the eyes.

Steam engines are alive. The sounds, the movement, the escaping steam. What's not to like about that? 

They were the norm when l grew up, and part of family heritage with railroad employees in ranks.  And then there was so much variety. From weird to monstrous, practically infinite, as once were the number of lines they ran on.  Nothing generic about them... 

gunrunnerjohn posted:

A lot more happening than on a diesel.  It's just more fun for me to see a nice steamer roll by.

I agree with that.

Well it look like I not the only one who like them.

Actually what I like is the variety in appearance of locomotives of the transition era. Late steam locomotives ooze power in their appearance. The variety of creative appearance and colors of first generation diesels is unparalleled.

I like the coexistence of both.

Steamers appeal to me for so many reasons.  The sounds of the drama: The working machinery at rest, compressors, steam releases, the bell, the whistle, the squealing brakes, the thunder as the giants move the track and ties at speed.

Then there is the architecture.  Everything is Huge.  Functional yes, but with personality I don't have the right words to adequately explain.  Certain elements just grab me.  I'm a fan of PRR because I like the belpaire fire box.  On other steamers I am drawn to the elesco feedwater heater on the top front of the smokebox. Exposed tubes, pipes, resevoirs, drive rods and so forth.

But I also am fond of some diesels. S-2 switchers and EMD F units.

The steam locomotive is the closest man has ever come to creating life.

The site, the sounds, the smell of a coal fired steamer, the feeling when it rolls by.....the people that built them and bring them to life.

Steam is, cool. So to speak.  LOL

I have been interested in steam propulsion since I was a kid. Born in '63 I never saw a steam loco, steam roller, or traction engine in revenue service, but all hold an attraction to me. Even steam cars. It's fun to watch videos of Jay Leno driving his steam vehicles around on modern city streets.

As a steam nut and a train nut, steam locomotives are the ultimate for me though. The sight of them working, the sounds... as some have said they seem to be alive. There must be something captivating about steam locos that affects non-train people too. What is the first thing most people say to a baby to describe a train, "Choo Choo." Thomas the Tank Engine has entertained countless numbers of kids over the years. And kid's toy trains? I've never seen a Play School SD45.  I guess Chuggington is the first diesel-centric kids program/merchandise I've seen, but even the name evokes steam power!   LOL

Regarding steam locomotives, I especially like their mechanisms and I am in awe of the power (enthalpy) of steam. I read somewhere that the energy in the expanding steam of the J3 Hudson at 275 psig boiler pressure was so immense that it bent the side rods.

Unlike a diesel, when a steam locomotive moves, there is lots to see. Do you notice that when a steam locomotive passes by, onlookers backup in fear of the mighty engine? Not so with diesels.

A lot of things. So much more interesting than a diesel or electric. Side rods churning, the smokestack (Lionel knew diesels didn't smoke in the 50's and I learned from them), the size, the weight of the die cast model, and lots of other stuff.

And then the beautiful styling on the streamlined art deco steamers of the late 30's. The Dreyfus Hudson, the Daylight, Southern Tennessean, Empire State Express, Blue Goose, B&O Cincinnatian, Reading Crusader, etc.

And lastly, the realization that they really changed the game. Think about the alternatives to the early steamers for transportation. Horse and buggy. And then the Model A on quasi-roads. And when Berkshires, etc. were first being run, cars and trucks went from stoplight to stoplight on the highways (no interstates), with nothing near the speed or capabilities of the trains.

And then came the interstates and airplanes and...........

Gerry

A diesel is kind of like a great big truck. All shiny, with a cool paint job, and it is there to do a job. Make no mistake, I do love trucks.

 A steam locomotive is more like a living, breathing entity. There is just so much going on, so much personality.

Not to say I don't have plenty of diesels, it's just that steam is where the action is.

My chest shaking from the sound, the ground vibrating of my feet, the visual enormity of an approaching monster. the esthetic rhythm of it's smooth passing, the tears on my cheeks, the 1 1/2" pennies it yields.  It's alive!!

All of the above...but as a kid back in the late '40s-early '50s, it was a wave. Standing at the Hollis, Long Island station platform for hours on end, most if not all steam engineers or firemen would return my wave. After diesels took over, maybe half. 

Although it nice to see "tourist RR" steam today, it's not the same as seeing it roaring past at 80 mph with a "Limited" in tow.

It's like asking "What do you like about Miss America"?

Everything???????????

"Deep within the heart of every man lies a steam locomotive."

A quote from a poster I once saw in the 60's.

Rusty

Everything about them.

I have only owned 3 steamers: an MTH railking 2-8-2 and now 2 tin-plate "O" gauge steamers (no diesels that I know of in tin-plate).  I have owned 9 RK diesels.

Not saying I don't like steamers but on my Christmas layout the diesels tracked much more reliably than my steam engines.  The front 2-wheel truck seems to be the occassional culprit.  My diesels glide thru switches, my steamers 'bump' thru them.

BUT.... I love watching my steam engines so much more!!!  Sounds, Smoke, Side-rods, sentiment for me (I;m 70) plays a roll in it too!

- walt

Steam engines are ALIVE!!!

Matt Makens posted:

Steam engines are ALIVE!!!

Very well put Matt. I'll agree, these are living, breathing works of engineering masterpieces for the technology of the times. I often wonder if I were an old steam crewman from the past. Seeing these engines moving down the tracks brings tears to my eyes, knowing we'll never go back to those days. One of my earliest pictures of me at about 8-10 months, was with a windup clock works train set at my grandmas.

The late steam era in the USA is when we were at our best. We had high speed rail back then, many of the late steam era engines routinely ran 100mph or more. When you stand next to one of them today it seems impossible.

Unfortunately I never saw a steam engine in service, I was born in 1963 so watching a NYC Hudson or Northern run on my layout let’s me relive that time.

When you ask kids to draw a train, they will nearly always draw a steam engine, even those who've never seen a real steamer. Nothing else more represents a train.

Guys so many great answers.

the smell of burning coal...

They are regal in stature and a masterpiece of engineering from the fitst engine to the last.  

Yeah, I'm going through a phase right now where diesels bore me, despite their bright colors. Just a motor with a pretty box around it. I don't see myself adding any more diesels or electrics beyond what I have.

Steam Engines are ALIVE - They breathe - hiss - steam - drip 

A diesel engine is an elephant, a steam engine is a DRAGON!

.....because they seem ALIVE.......

Peter

This thread is great and it poses a great question that I myself have wondered. I grew up in the diesel era and they were my introduction to trains. I have begun to add steam to my roster and too am fascinated by them for many of the reasons already stated.

Dave

They exude a visceral power that inspires awe. Especially when you consider that they are powered by fire. 

Steam engines have a personality  each has its own smells sounds and noise 

Hissing of steam the smell of smoke and oil , clang of the rods spinning of the drivers

Always appreciated the side trips to visit steam on our yearly summer vacations to visit family in western Pennsylvania Used to drive my folks crazy if  saw a billboard advertising penn view mountain,wannamaker kempton and sounthern and of course Strasburg 

Everything that has been said so far is the reason I like steam.  Just one more thought, if I may.  To me, just the fact of placing a steam boiler on wheels and engineering it to move.  And then the skill it must have taken to be in the engineer's seat and control this huge moving boiler.  

Pennysnut said it well.

Steam locomotives need water, coal or oil fuel, a wye or turntable to turn them, a roundhouse to service or repair them, frequent stops to water or fuel, and more.  All provide more things to model and operate when running.  When running more valve gear and rods moving, smoke and noise, steam whistles beautiful sounds, coal tenders and trains in their era needed cabooses !
In the age of steam, millions were employed.  It took thousands to repair and service the engines at the roundhouse.  Every 200 miles or so were facilities to water and fuel the trains or provide food for riders of passengers trains or to room the passengers at hotels.  Railroads were the largest employers of the time and almost everyone had a family member working for the railroad or knew someone working for the railroad.

Charlie

Why do I like steam locos?  Because they're big and bad and scary as hell and you know when they were coming..  You could hear the roar, see the steam & smoke and feel the ground shake.  That's how I remember them as an 8 year old kid back in the 50's sitting next to the tracks fishing for catfish.

Steam was unique because many railroads had engines built for a specific task like the Big Boys to tame Sherman Hill and Y6b's to haul the long cool drags to their destinations.

Mikey

Look at photographs of locomotives being built.  The pictures I've seen of diesel locomotives being built show technicians bolting together sub-assemblies.  The pictures of steam locomotives being built show craftsmen fabricating each and every component needed to build the locomotive.  There is something about a handcrafted item that draws one to it.

Tom

Many great answers to this great question. I'm in agreement with most everyone.

 Every time I see a live steam locomotive coming down the track, I can't help but to smile from ear to ear.  It's an absolutely awesome experience!!  All that machinery in perfect synchronization is like a 100 piece symphony orchestra performing a great symphony.  The music pours forth out of the cylinders, smoke stack, clanging bell, whistle, the whine of the dynamo, pounding percussion of the steel wheels against the rails, the chugging rhythm, staccato bursts of air and steam.  

As a matter of fact the composer Arthur Honneger  ( sp ) captured the sounds of a steam locomotive in his music notation as he composed the piece Pacific 2-3-1- ( using the European steam locomotive wheel arrangement classification which equals the Whyte classification system of Pacific 2 - 6 - 4 ).  Check out the recording!  Honnegar is able to get an entire symphony orchestra to sound like a steam locomotive.  Very cool!!  

What isn't their to like? Steam engines help build this country!

Bobby Ogage posted:

Regarding steam locomotives, I especially like their mechanisms and I am in awe of the power (enthalpy) of steam. I read somewhere that the energy in the expanding steam of the J3 Hudson at 275 psig boiler pressure was so immense that it bent the side rods.

Unlike a diesel, when a steam locomotive moves, there is lots to see. Do you notice that when a steam locomotive passes by, onlookers backup in fear of the mighty engine? Not so with diesels.

I read some where that nyc northern could crank out 6000 hp.I think the steam locomotives of the 1930 to the 1950s.Had their own kind of charm.And a lot people who where kids back then.Have the memories of these big machines.

TM Terry posted:

Actually what I like is the variety in appearance of locomotives of the transition era. Late steam locomotives ooze power in their appearance. The variety of creative appearance and colors of first generation diesels is unparalleled.

I like the coexistence of both.

Funny you should mention that about the diesels.Because when I was a kid I got to see the gp9 and gp7s .Some time their would be as many as 6 or 7 of them pulling a fast freight.The name of the railroad was seaboard coast line.That went by my first school.

Another thing I like about steam locomotives is.Each railroad had their own thing.Such as headlight placement or  the sound of whistles and some even had air horns.

Hard to pile to so many great responses.  One thing I will add is the wonderful infrastructure it took to feed and maintain them.  Roundhouses, turntables, coal docks, and water towers all ooze steam railroading.  All very modelgenic and it's a treat to see remnants of these great structures today.  I wish I was around to see them in action.    

Steam Locomotives connected the USA after a war divided it and it grew to become the world's greatest country. Then stinking diesels were invented

Growing up in the 50s and living in Philly where everything was electric (think GG1), I really never saw many working steam engines. My trains were diesel (Santa Fe) and GG1. Steam was passe. Diesel was the future. Jet airplanes ruled and Popular Science has fusion reactors on its cover. It wasn't until I got back in trains in 1995 when 3rd Rail and MTH had digital sound systems that I fell totally in love with steam and went everything monster that represented steam in the 1940s including S1, Q2, T1 and J1 from Pennsy and H-8 from C&O. I read everything there was about steam development. All of this with the backdrop of an uncle who was a mechanical engineer at Baldwin and actually took part in the design of the famous 60000 on display at the Franklin Institute. 

Steam wears their insides on their outsides. It's one of the few machines in existence which has some much of what makes it work visible to a layman. I went to college to be an industrial designer. ID's purpose was to hide the working stuff behind art, so the movement appeared magical. Even streamlining the steamers by the famous designers of the age (Dreyfuss, Lowey) was to hid the guts. The maintenance guys thought otherwise and denuded them as soon as they could since all those guts needed constant tending.

So… I am a steam convert.

I like the songs like Wabash Cannonball that were inspired by steam engines.  

" Listen to the jingle, the rumble and the roar"

Putnam Division posted:

.....because they seem ALIVE.......

Peter

A local DVD video producer did a 3 disk set called Rubber City Rails; films of the Akron/Kent area when there was plenty of steam to see.  Two B&O 4-8-2's were sitting waiting for a signal in Kent in below zero weather.  The quote from the narrator was.....

"There is no greater sight of man's invention than a that of a steam locomotive in the dead of winter."

Lou N

In talking with friends in the railroad fraternity, many of us noted that as little kids, steam locomotives frightened us.  I think that power display caused our undeveloped brains to latch on to steam locomotives.......perhaps in the same manner as "strong" dictators mesmerize large crowds.

You know, the movie Some Like It Hot really had some great steam scenes which really made me fall in love with steam. I have been searching quite some time over the years to find out what engine the used for the movie but no such luck. Marilyn Monroe coming  down past the engine and a little toot as she goes by if I recall.

EVERYTHING! Next question?

Trainman2001 posted:

 

Steam wears their insides on their outsides. It's one of the few machines in existence which has some much of what makes it work visible to a layman. 

 

Amen!

The motion of the siderods and the valve gear is sheer poetry in motion. And the external combustion and the steam/smoke exhaust adds to the visual spectacle. I have not even mentioned the sounds of these machines and their various appliances. What is there not to love?

No computers, no electronics--very little electrical.

YES!

Merle Haggard sang. 

"First thing I remember knowin, was a lonesome whistle blowin, and a youngins dream of growing up to ride."

I would have to imagine he was speaking of a steam engine.   With a whistle and not a horn.    Steam evokes dreams in some and memories in others of a time long gone.  Drivers flashing, valve gear flying, steam a rollin, and smoke a pourin!   

Jim 

The Looks of a Big Northern Steam Locomotive like a N&W J611 bring back all kinds of Memories when my father took me as a small kid to the Suburban B&O Train Station in Winton Place, Cincinnati, Ohio.  Some times we would get out of the car and walk across to the north bound track and wait for a NYC or B&O steam freight to pass by.  I use to grab onto my fathers leg and hide because those steam locos vibrated the earth beneath my feet.  Several times, I experienced the N&W J's stopping at the station to pick up passengers.  The station was located between Clifton Avenue and 700 feet to the North was Mitchell Avenue.  When that "J" started moving his passenger train, it was traveling around 40 to 45 miles per hour in just 700 feet when it crossed over Mitchell Avenue.  It would give me goose bumps from the whistle and the sound of that engine.  One unique thing in my owning several J Locomotives by MTH was that MTH took a chance on introducing an Unshrouded J Locomotive and I only bought one of them.  It was not a great seller and the price dropped rather quickly to $600 dollars from $900 dollars.  I wish I had bought several of them as you never see them advertised today.     Sincerely yours   railbear601 

I was 14 when Some Like it Hot came out. What I learned was how cool Marilyn Monroe was. Still one of the most sensual women that ever lived. And yes, the steam engines were cool too.

Good evening, the steam engine was one of the only machines that would make any housewife run to the clothesline in the back yard and get her clean cloths of the line even before they where dry.

After the steam engine went by with it's train and the cloths where left out on the line it was back to washer or washboard for Mom !!!!

When I was born in Roanoke, in 1950, I would have no way of knowing the significance of that location, it's importance in the building of the nation, and how many years later I would learn "the rest of the story." Norfolk and Western was all about steam! Built in Roanoke over all those years, Norfolk & Western was the last railroad to finally go to diesel. I've learned since them that my G.G. Grampa and all his "get", right down to me, my brother and my sisters, lived in Roanoke. My mothers side of the family all did the same.

There's just something about that time, the look, and the lonesome whistle, you just gotta like! The great new diesel engines are beautiful, powerful and have all the "bells and whistles", but for me.... forgive the smudge of coal dust on my face, there ain't nothing like the old steam locomotives!

...and to each his...or her... own!

Lion L

Tom Densel posted:

Look at photographs of locomotives being built.  The pictures I've seen of diesel locomotives being built show technicians bolting together sub-assemblies.  The pictures of steam locomotives being built show craftsmen fabricating each and every component needed to build the locomotive.  There is something about a handcrafted item that draws one to it.

Tom

And who do you think built the sub-assemblies on diesels?  Not every Tom, Dick or Harry could do this job, either...

Rusty

railbear601 posted:

The Looks of a Big Northern Steam Locomotive like a N&W J611 bring back all kinds of Memories when my father took me as a small kid to the Suburban B&O Train Station in Winton Place, Cincinnati, Ohio.  Some times we would get out of the car and walk across to the north bound track and wait for a NYC or B&O steam freight to pass by.  I use to grab onto my fathers leg and hide because those steam locos vibrated the earth beneath my feet.  Several times, I experienced the N&W J's stopping at the station to pick up passengers.  The station was located between Clifton Avenue and 700 feet to the North was Mitchell Avenue.  When that "J" started moving his passenger train, it was traveling around 40 to 45 miles per hour in just 700 feet when it crossed over Mitchell Avenue.  It would give me goose bumps from the whistle and the sound of that engine.  One unique thing in my owning several J Locomotives by MTH was that MTH took a chance on introducing an Unshrouded J Locomotive and I only bought one of them.  It was not a great seller and the price dropped rather quickly to $600 dollars from $900 dollars.  I wish I had bought several of them as you never see them advertised today.     Sincerely yours   railbear601 

 

Loved those unshrouded J's. You are quite right about the pricing. I was fortunate enough to pick up 2 of them from Vince in the Orange Hall years ago and had them repainted as a "Trooper engine" and a "Fire engine". They've been on the Forum and at the NJ HiRailers. 

Gerry

Steam is alive, diesel is not. Most steam is better looking than diesels IMO. 

Nothing like seeing all the moving parts, the billowing smoke, the grime and filth, the whistle, steam let off, chuffing........

My thing about steam es back to WWII.  A couple of times my Dad took my Grandfather and me to the PRR Crestline roundhouse (we could just walk in!) and I have a vivid memory of the gigantic beasts and the smell of steam & oil & grease.

I model, mostly, PRR in the Fifties, so my roster includes some first gen diesels, but my pets are the Pennsy steamers (and B&O, and N&W, and C&O, and Reading...)