Re: oil vs coal firing

It depends if you are crowding the fire to bring up steam quickly, or if you are starting cold, or if you are inside the roundhouse and need to move the locomotive to a different location.
Cold, early on in Central City and Georgetown we used a three-barrelled Propane burner that we put in the firebox door until the boiler reached about 70 lbs, which was enough to start the blower and the atomizer.
On the UP we used a air powered diesel fuel sprayer to ignite combustion material in the firebox. Now the Steam crew fills the boler with water and uses House steam to heat the water and bring the pressure up to a point where the appliances work. Then you back the locomotives out (house steam is about 120 lbs) and light them off outside the roundhouse using the existing boiler pressure. This was done in the coal-fired days, also and was done to prevent roundhouse fires from errant cinders.
On the road if you want to bild up steam quickly (not always a good thing on the boiler tube) you can "Force" the fire by overfiring it using a combination of the Blower, Atomizer and Oil. This will bring the heat and pressure up quickly, but some will say too quickly for the stress on the boiler plate.
Oil has lots of advantages over coal in this aspect.
But knowing about the blower is just a small part of it.
Just my obserbvations after 30 years of Railroading.
Rick Steele