Re: Durango & Silverton 480 Oil Conversion

dtenney Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> All,
>
> just wondering...
>
> the engines had a certain smell to them when
> burning coal...do engines like 493 that burn oil
> smell different? does the smoke smell like oil?
>
>
> just curious.
>
> Dave

Perhaps it depends on the "brew" that they're burning, but more than once, I have nearly been fooled by the smell of an oil-burner, into thinking that they were burning coal. Yes, it is different, but not hugely so. Coal smoke is a little more pungent, perhaps because it has more particles in it that stick in your nose, so you smell the sulphur more strongly.

Most oil-burners these days are burning waste motor oil, and I suspect there may be some minor variations in that....as noted, "the brew." On the Grand Canyon Railway, they burn a different sort of brew that includes recycled vegetable oil, which some people claim smells like french fries. I have been on a couple of charters there, and I could not tell the difference between that stuff and regular waste oil. To me, it did not smell like french fries at all. Perhaps I was there on days when they were mixing it with something else, which I am told does happen. The only other fuel I have seen was at White Pass in 2011, and they were still burning Bunker-C, which produced incredibly black smoke, but didn't smell a lot different than waste oil.

/Kevin Madore



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/17/2020 07:40AM by KevinM.