Acela turbines

No, it's not. The ST-40's thermodynamic efficiency is in the realm of 33%. Most rail diesels are closer to, or over, 40%. The JetTrain died because it wasn't any better than a P-42 at anything but sucking fuel. Bombardier tried selling it everywhere and couldn't even unload it to their own government, who generally buys anything with their name on it.

Thats on paper what are the real figures, we dont know , theres no real way to measure it for Methodology on this measurement is not standardise. Overall the bottom line comes down to which uses less fuel . But some of these F59's prime movers beet the P42 in concerns of fuel consumption they possibly even beet the turbine. Your right Canada's government usually Buys anything with there name on it, but VIA reluctance to invest in the jet train was not because of unreliability. It was because the Canadian government has repeatedly been cutting VIAs funding for years. More than the US cuts Amtrak. They just didn't have the money to invest in it. A P42 or F59 cant do 150 mph with its prime mover, so whatever could, would be great investment diesel or turbine. ( I prefer electric myself)

Why bother? It's been proven, repeatedly, by everyone, that gas turbines are fundamentally unsuited for rail use. There's never been a truly successful use of them as a rail prime mover. The closest 'success' was the UP turbos, which worked until someone figured out all that waste oil could be used to make plastics, at which point the UP turbos went to the scrapper, since they no longer burned an effectively free waste byproduct of the oil refining process.

key point GAS turbine. unlike previous train turbines the new p&w ( st40 or pw150) use the same diesel fuel as locomotives prime movers, for the first time in rail application. Turbines are considerably lighter, and have less maintenance intervals. giving this factor as we know gasoline burns quicker than we need to recalculate fuel consumption for the diesel equivalent.

Let P&W and GE modify it, takeout the diesel and drop in a ST40 and demonstrate it as the P50 run it on some Illinois route hard for 6mths to a year and see how well it performs.

Why bother? Anyone who's followed the industry knows the outcome. The single, only proponent of gas turbines for rail use in the world, is the US department of transportation. Even the French, who made very limited use of them (I think 5 or 10 sets in intermittent service), gave up long ago.

Look at it this way - We just came out of one of the most oil-friendly administrations and eras in recent history. If the turbine had any chance, it was within the last 15 years. And it went nowhere.

True the past 15 where the most fuel consumed years in history and in the same 15 years the technology was put on hold because there where no new break through developments. Yes, the US is the only 1st rate country still dependent on oil as most other countries have taken the smart approach and gone electric. Amtrak continues to try using the Rohr turbos all the way into the 2000, but where unsuccessful. I would have waited for something new instead of trying to fix what I know has issues.
IM not sure as to who has the most FUEL efficient Locomotive (prime mover) to date but if you know Id love to see the specs on it..

look At computers for that fact ( Im in IT by the way Im a MCSE).
There were so much hurdles that were said can't be over come as in the Pentium 4 processors going over 3.2 ghz and the amount of power it used, heat dispersed, and how large the heat sink and fan would be for anything in the 4, 5 6ghz range, etc. So instead of trying to fix something they know would be trouble some from that point, they used that and started a new platform, Dual core processors and now Quad core processors. and there a tremendous improvement over single core processors and can pass the 3.2ghz hurdle. The same can be said here.

I love the quote " ITS NOT WORTH NOT TRYING" if the wright brothers would have gave up after all there failed attempted flights, benefits: we would have more US trains YEAH, drawbacks: we would still be taking Ships to travel over seas!

buddah wrote:Thats on paper what are the real figures, we dont know , theres no real way to measure it for Methodology on this measurement is not standardise.

Yes, it IS standardized. Turbines are all measured to the same standard, since the commercial jet engine field is so competitive - a few % will make or break and engine (look at PW6000 or V2500 sales, Vs the CFM 56 - take a wild guess which one of those three is the most efficient).

Overall the bottom line comes down to which uses less fuel . But some of these F59's prime movers beet the P42 in concerns of fuel consumption they possibly even beet the turbine.

Everything beats turbines. They only succeed in aircraft because there's simply no other engine that offers the performance for the weight, and they can get close enough on economy, usually.

A P42 or F59 cant do 150 mph with its prime mover, so whatever could, would be great investment diesel or turbine. ( I prefer electric myself)

Once you get over 125, the investment in track, signaling, equipment, makes electrification a tiny part of the equation. And since blowing a few million a mile for one train a day isn't worth it, you're looking at high frequencies (a few an hour - JR has a few 2 track lines running 10+ an hour), which makes electrification worth it. And since going 150's pointless when 186 or 200 is old hat, you NEED electrification because the power requirements are so high and the need to keep weight down so great.

key point GAS turbine. unlike previous train turbines the new p&w ( st40 or pw150) use the same diesel fuel as locomotives prime movers, for the first time in rail application.

You don't understand what a gas turbine is. Gas turbine doesn't refer to the fuel source, it refers to the fact that air is the working fluid, as opposed to steam, or water. So far, there have been turbines fueled by diesel, bunker C, Jet A, and I think a few LNG experiments, used in rail applications. All have failed.

True the past 15 where the most fuel consumed years in history and in the same 15 years the technology was put on hold because there where no new break through developments.

There ARE no breakthroughs in the basic gas turbine design. There's a few % here an there from better combustion chambers and better airfoils and better controls, but the 50% improvement that you need to get a turboshaft engine even remotely competitive with a diesel in rail applications just isn't happening. If it could, it would have happened in helicopters years ago...

I love the quote " ITS NOT WORTH NOT TRYING" if the wright brothers would have gave up after all there failed attempted flights, benefits: we would have more US trains YEAH, drawbacks: we would still be taking Ships to travel over seas!

If you have any practical ways of violating the laws of thermodynamics, feel free to write Pratt & Whitney, GE and Rolls Royce about it. I'm sure they'd love to hear about it. The ST-40's derived from an aircraft engine (like all but the largest land based gas turbines). If there was a magic way to increase the efficiency that much, it would have been found years ago - ever look at the hourly operational costs on gas turbine helicopter?

And there's a very good reason that our simple cycle combustion turbine electric generators are only used on peak load days a few times a year.

Ken W2KB wrote:And there's a very good reason that our simple cycle combustion turbine electric generators are only used on peak load days a few times a year.

Heh, I wish There's a pair of 44 MW GE ones (Derived from the CF-6, I think), by my parents that are running 24/7 in the summer. Can barely hear them at the site boundry - you can see the heat off the stack, and hear a slight gearbox whine - that's it.

No doubt - the gas turbine is an amazing device. But it's just not right for moving trains.

Nasadowsk wrote:Why bother? It's been proven, repeatedly, by everyone, that gas turbines are fundamentally unsuited for rail use. There's never been a truly successful use of them as a rail prime mover. The closest 'success' was the UP turbos, which worked until someone figured out all that waste oil could be used to make plastics, at which point the UP turbos went to the scrapper, since they no longer burned an effectively free waste byproduct of the oil refining process.

Whether you view them as a success or not, I've wondered how the Rohr Turboliners lasted for 20+ years if they were such fuel hogs. Were their diesel counterparts of the day (FL-9's, primarily) just as fuel hungry?

Matt Johnson wrote: Whether you view them as a success or not, I've wondered how the Rohr Turboliners lasted for 20+ years if they were such fuel hogs. Were their diesel counterparts of the day (FL-9's, primarily) just as fuel hungry?

Who knows how they lasted (the RTGs, out west, didn't). IIRC, only one RTL was even running by the end. As for the FL-9s? Who knows how they held on so long, they weren't that great either...

I remember the Budd turbo electric test car(GT-2) that operated on LIRR during the 1960's.It may have been the original Pioneer III body recycled into a powered car. It sat outside the shop during the 70's and 80's essentialy gutted. It ran on DC in third rail territory and the turbo-generator elsewhere. The high operating cost and noise were a few reasons it didn't succede. In the soft cover book "Illustrated History Of BUDD Railway Passenger Cars" ther are two photos of the turbine car as built. Third rail pick-ups were added to enable run throughs to Grand Central. I found some great color pictures of the GT-1 and GT-2 on google.

Matt Johnson wrote:Whether you view them as a success or not, I've wondered how the Rohr Turboliners lasted for 20+ years if they were such fuel hogs. Were their diesel counterparts of the day (FL-9's, primarily) just as fuel hungry?

Simply Matt, they got replaced by something more economical, just like horses got replaced by car, the steam engine replaced after 65 years of succesfull operation replaced by diesels.
The Turboliners were ok, in a time when labor and fuel were cheap, now the entire Turboliner idea is replaced by Locomotives, that run cheaper, cleaner and with way less manpower for operation and maintenance.
Gas Turbines are getting to be absolete, other than for power generation and navy use, note that both have plenty of manpower and deep pockets.

and no the FL-9 was not as fuel hungry but only reason it sustained was nobody built a locomotive that would fit into GCT, finaly GE did and very succesfull to.

I've read the reason turbines are so fuel-hungry is that they aren't designed to rev up/down like railroad locomotives do so much. Would it work better in a rail application if it was a hybrid situation where the turbine spins at a constant optimum RPM, and either charges batteries or is augmented by batteries when decel/accelerating? Sort of like a Prius? Except the turbine would be constant speed, and a Prius has the gas engine on/off.

I have little depth here. And we might want to consider moving this as we are straying from Amtrak...

you have any idea, on how many 10 thousands of Lbs these batteries would weigh.

Tadman wrote:I've read the reason turbines are so fuel-hungry is that they aren't designed to rev up/down like railroad locomotives do so much. Would it work better in a rail application if it was a hybrid situation where the turbine spins at a constant optimum RPM, and either charges batteries or is augmented by batteries when decel/accelerating? Sort of like a Prius? Except the turbine would be constant speed, and a Prius has the gas engine on/off.

This is the same reason steam turbines failed on railroads, constant speed changes. Fuel economy went down the tubes, water tube boilers couldn't handle constant changes of temperature from changes in throttle demand. Diesel or electric seem to be the only viable power source available at this time.

Dutch, I've got no argument there - batteries are still a primative technology. A prius only goes 120k miles before needing new a new battery pack. Most cars can at least top 200k on an engine, and I can only imagine what a 645 prime mover can do.

There's a comment made above that below 110 mph, the standard P42 is just fine, and much greater than that requires such expenditures on track and roadbed that electrification is just a fraction of the cost. I think until batteries are much further developed, the turbine hybrid has no future on the rails, and thus no future with Amtrak under the current paradigm of shared Class-I routes outside of NEC.

Tadman wrote:Dutch, I've got no argument there - batteries are still a primative technology. A prius only goes 120k miles before needing new a new battery pack. Most cars can at least top 200k on an engine, and I can only imagine what a 645 prime mover can do.

Sorry to join you off topic Mr. Moderator, but I'm nearly certain this is false. A taxi agency in Canada someplace was running some number of Prius Taxis -- they had run something like 250,000 mi with no problems. I had heard that this current generation of Prius has had no age-related failures to date, even on high-mileage vehicles.

ryanov wrote:

Tadman wrote:Dutch, I've got no argument there - batteries are still a primative technology. A prius only goes 120k miles before needing new a new battery pack. Most cars can at least top 200k on an engine, and I can only imagine what a 645 prime mover can do.

Sorry to join you off topic Mr. Moderator, but I'm nearly certain this is false. A taxi agency in Canada someplace was running some number of Prius Taxis -- they had run something like 250,000 mi with no problems. I had heard that this current generation of Prius has had no age-related failures to date, even on high-mileage vehicles.

I have been reading this site for some time, and find it interesting, trains were my first love as a yout, but this car related thing forced me to register.

The batteries on the Prius, are EXPECTED to have a five year, a five year, plus or minus, depending on situation, life cycle.
A gent my cousin works with has one, it is in its sixth year, and his battery pack is shot. He has the decision of what to do; sell a worthless car, or spend the 5,000 some dollars he has been quoted, for replacement.
250,000 miles sounds like someone is selling horse apples.

I studied auto mechanics and yes, SOME batteries defy physics. I have personally experienced one that ran for ten plus years before it was shot; at the same time I have seen five year batteries go stone cold in a little over three years.
These are batteries that are used for starting only which is not even closely related to one that is under constant drain daily.

If ANYONE thinks they can buy a hybrid and get 250,000 miles without several battery pack changes-- I have a bridge in Broolyn I would like to sell you.

RpR wrote:

ryanov wrote:

Tadman wrote:Dutch, I've got no argument there - batteries are still a primative technology. A prius only goes 120k miles before needing new a new battery pack. Most cars can at least top 200k on an engine, and I can only imagine what a 645 prime mover can do.

Sorry to join you off topic Mr. Moderator, but I'm nearly certain this is false. A taxi agency in Canada someplace was running some number of Prius Taxis -- they had run something like 250,000 mi with no problems. I had heard that this current generation of Prius has had no age-related failures to date, even on high-mileage vehicles.

I have been reading this site for some time, and find it interesting, trains were my first love as a yout, but this car related thing forced me to register.

The batteries on the Prius, are EXPECTED to have a five year, a five year, plus or minus, depending on situation, life cycle.
A gent my cousin works with has one, it is in its sixth year, and his battery pack is shot. He has the decision of what to do; sell a worthless car, or spend the 5,000 some dollars he has been quoted, for replacement.
250,000 miles sounds like someone is selling horse apples.

I studied auto mechanics and yes, SOME batteries defy physics. I have personally experienced one that ran for ten plus years before it was shot; at the same time I have seen five year batteries go stone cold in a little over three years.
These are batteries that are used for starting only which is not even closely related to one that is under constant drain daily.

If ANYONE thinks they can buy a hybrid and get 250,000 miles without several battery pack changes-- I have a bridge in Broolyn I would like to sell you.

Did you actually read the linked story? It was published by the Vancouver Sun which I presume is a reputable newspaper.

By the way, the warranty on the Prius battery is 100,000 miles or eight years (150,000 miles / 10 years in California). Maybe this "gent my cousin works with" should contact Toyota. Also, I heard that Toyota has not had to replace one Ni-metal-hydride battery under warranty in the USA (yet).