Mr. Loco112 and Mr. Sobczynski,
First off I'm going to tell you that your behavior is most upsetting to me. As a person that has worked with Steve Butler and Marin Uhrich on many locomotive related projects I can tell you that nether of you know what you're talking about. First off Loco112, let me tell you something about locomotive smoke-boxes. For one, most all the Baldwin locomotives that I have worked on have what is called a reamed fit bolt from the saddle to the smoke-box, and therefore it would make no difference what you put in, and when you are operating on a fixed bid and a time schedule regular bolts will do just fine. The only locomotives that I have worked on in my experience that have had a taper fit bolt in the smoke-box seat area is the Union Pacific Big Boys and the Rio Grande Mountain class, but that type of bolt was not seemingly very common in narrow gauge practice near as I can tell. I would also love to see the "Iron Worker" that you could use to punch holes in a 60"+ diameter, 5/8th thick smoke box shell, and what super man is going to hold it up there while you do it...come on! New locomotive smoke-boxes are first put on the saddle and the holes are then marked and then it is taken to some type of milling machine or horizontal boring mill and machined out or they are (as in normal operating railroad practices) torched through....By the way, I have seen Mr. Butler "blow" holes in plate and let me tell you what, a drill could not do much better!
Now that having been said, Mr. Sobczynski I have a little question to ask you about packing certain pins and bearings with machine chips, so they will un-doubtfully run hot. I find this funny because you have been let go of at least two jobs because of such behavior. I think you should shut-up and learn from those of us that have "worked in the business" because the steam world has too many little punks like you that "know everything." I started out IN the fire box on the D&RGW 346 and was taught by three of the best locomotive men in the world! They all three were locomotive engineers in the days of steam, and all of them knew their stuff because they did it all of their lives, and supported their families with it, not because they needed bragging rights, which is what your after! Now, all but one of those men are gone, and so is there knowledge, and it is people like you that let us lose that resource. These men feel that for them to teach us the skills they learned over many years would be of no use, because they think we wouldn't listen, and pin heads like you bolster that mind set and let it slip through our fingers. So if you're not going to listen, or be willing to take some criticism, pack up your @#$%& and go home, because we don't need you going off and getting yourself killed and then us having to clean up your splattered ass off our rails!
~Mike Spera
Great Grandson of Union Pacific "Big Boy" Engineer Austin Jones
Taught by Pennsylvania Engineer Hank C. Townsend
And Southern Pacific Engineer Neil Vodden
