Re: Gtown Loop #12

kwilcomb Wrote:
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> The Cylinder heads are made from a fairly soft
> iron and are designed to (*) break apart in the event
> of a crosshead wedge , wrist pin bearing or piston
> rod bolt failure. Any one of these will cause the
> piston to travel farther than it is intended
> understeam and strike the head. The cylinder heads
> are designed to (*) break apart so that the studs
> holding them to the cylinder and the cylinder
> itself are not damaged. It is far easier to mount
> a new head in place than to replace or repair a
> damaged cylinder casting.

I took the liberty of adding asterisks into the body of your message, where you might want to add the word “hopefully”. I have seen plenty of photos showing the end of the cylinder itself torn off when the cylinder head came off. That is what happened to the Western Maryland #734. They did repair her, but it required heroic effort.

The rear head, with the crosshead guide mount and piston rod packing gland is much more complicated than the front head, and would likely require a casting to replace, with the usual long lead time.

Is this the same side of the engine as the broken axle? If so, this failure may have been caused by damage from that event. Just a guess on my part, but possible.