HELP!!!

This is rather embarrassing coming from somebody who fires the real thing (note, a big beautiful super-heated oil burner). So bare with me here.

So here i am, trying my hand again at manually firing in MSTS. Not because im unsatisfied with Amus over there in the left seat, but because darn it im bored!! So up the hill i go with a big ole fire going, shoveling coal like a mad man , injector running, water in the .95 range ( seems real high to me...figure since thats where the sim keeps the water, i would follow suit), and the thing is priming and i loose all power and stall? Whats this crap? I have a full head of steam!! Its not foaming, cause i have plenty of water in the glass, and there is no way i have enough water to send it down the dry pipe. Am I so ignorant about slobbery non-super heated tea kettles that I am missing something?


P.S. Is there a fix for the shay sounds in reverse? Something aint right when you start out and it sounds like its going full speed ahead and as you pick up speed the sound slows...hmmmm.

Thanks!!!


Jeff

Hi Jeff!

Some of the MSTS crazies like to hand fire, perhaps they'll step in and offer suggestions on "how".

As for me, Otto Phiremun is assigned to my hogs that I am called upon to run.

As for it becoming a bit too easy... hey... if your hogger skills have improved THAT much... then tell your Yardmaster to throw on some more tonnage behind you... that ought to perk things up!

The Shay:

I haven't run a Shay in a while. Don't recall those issues when I did. I'll have to check that out.

However, it won't be today and likely not tomorrow: Leaving to go run a passenger train in about an hour... won't be back until about 11 PM tonight... tomorrow will be a very full day and won't return to the house until about 7 PM. So, it might be Monday evening? We'll see.

Anyhoo... have fun!

I've been runnin' the Shay pretty regularly in, 'Working the Mines', and haven't noticed any issues.
Not sure just what the problem is.

Dont know what to say about the shay then.

About the firing. I think i finally figured it out. Made it up the hill from Turners Bend to Fly Gap a couple of times with a couple of different lokies and it was just a learning curve with where to keep the water in the sim to make the sim happy as well as myself. Im also proud to say i managed to get a good enough fire going to not loose to much steam pressure thanks to cold steam injector water. Just did the Helper 1 activity and is she'd drop below 188lbs the train would almost stall. was able to hold 196 for most of the trip up, only popped the safeties once apon arrival at Fly Gap and managed to keep her down after that.

Jeff:

Sounds like you're on it.

For most of Andre's activities, the locomotives are run at or close to their ratings. Apart from MSTS quirks, small saturated steam from the turn of the 19th Century run close to capacity doesn't allow much of a margin of error.

On the majority of mileage trips over unfamiliar trackage at speed and/or close to capacity that I've been on, I've seen rote-trained firemen get into trouble. The ones like yourself who think about what's going on will eventually get the upper hand.

Good luck! Not many attempt it or would know where to start.

Talk about margin of error!

I guest fired at Roaring Camp near Santa Cruz here in California about a year ago thanks to a friend of mine who is a fireman there. Uphill was no big deal, leave the oil valve near wide open and get that lifting injector going from time to time to make sure the water still bounces out the TOP of the glass. Downhill was some real pucker factor for me. Going down 8% grades boiler first watching the water dip WAY out of the glass. I got so enamored with making sure i got some water in the glass from time to time that i didnt notice my fire go out...until the engineer spoke up seconds before BOOM fire relit from the hot gasses and i almost (expletived) my pants.

Hah! That's rich! I like coal 'cause it doesn't go out - unless, of course it does.