NEW ZEALAND RAILWAY STEAM 2




At five months from start I was tested on signals and signalling and promoted to acting fireman on the station yard-shunting engine. Four months on the shunt engine took me to nine months service when I was put through the fireman's exam. This was a one day paper on signals, signalling, locomotive boilers and engine running gear and lubrication. Also, oral questions around a locomotive. I was allocated to duties as a main line fireman on goods and mixed passenger trains from Taihape south to Marton Junction and Taihape north to National Park with some trips as far as Raurimu and Oio.

In the beginning I found this an interesting learning curve. One learned the road, the up and down grades and not to be occupied with stoking while rounding curves to the fireman's side. One became attuned to the engine's demands for fuel and water, learned to see the condition of the fire through the brilliance of the furnace and developed night vision. One learned the locations of the signals, tunnels, and road crossings, turnout points at station sidings, tablet exchangers and the idiosyncrasies of the different engine drivers. An outstanding memory of a driver for whom I fired for some weeks was the late Charles Parker who was to go to his untimely death in the Tangiwai bridge disaster. He was a very alert and helpful engine-man. Something must have diverted his attention on that ill-fated night. Another bright star in my memory was Jas. Evans. He handled his engines with panache and liked to bowl them along reveling in their power. He was reputed to be at one with the phases of the moon and certainly displayed exuberance on bright moonlit nights.

Of the locomotives based upon the Taihape depot were four of the “K” class 4-8-4 tender engines that wheeled the Auckland-Wellington expresses and through freight trains over the Taumarunui-Palmerston North section. Three “Wab” class 4-6-4 tank engines worked mainly mixed goods and passenger trains between Ohakune and Palmerston North. Two “Ab” class Pacific types performed similar work. Five “X” class 4-8-2 tender engines worked goods between Ohakune and Marton Junction. One class “Wg” 4-6-4 tank engine shunted the Taihape station yard. Locomotives from Taumarunui in the north and Palmerston North in the south were turned and serviced for their return workings.

The actual work of firing any of these locomotives was not difficult or hard apart from the vibration and noise. The killer was the night work and irregular working hours. Most of the central north island consists of about ten or twelve mile sections of steep grades that test the locomotives but they are loaded accordingly and for every up-grade there is a down grade so power demand is not continuous. It is well known that no two engines perform identically but in general they responded in predictable ways. The “Ks” were the newest engines then having been built in the 1930s. They weighed 140 tons and had 47.7 square feet of grate area that was easily manageable. The boiler pressure was 200 PSI and the cylinders were 20” x 26”. The driving wheels were 4’-6” diameter. The tractive effort was 32,740 pounds. They ran smoothly enough when new or fresh after overhaul but soon developed wear in their driving axle-boxes, connecting rod big ends and coupling rod bearings so spent most of their working lives clanking monstrously. A person could be forgiven for thinking that they had square wheels. The preceding heavy haulers in the central North Island were the “X” class that were 4-8-2 De Glen compounds built between 1907 and 1915. The HP cylinders 13½” X 22” were inside the frames and drove the leading axle that was cranked. The outside LP 22” x 22” drove the second axle via the conventional crankpins. The driving wheels were 45” diameter and they were restricted to a maximum speed of 30 miles per hour. Anything over that the crew got a rough vertical ride that gave these engines the appellation “Buck Xs”. The rear section of the fire grate was flat immediately above the fourth drivers while the front half sloped steeply down between the third and fourth drivers. A line of site projected from the sloping section aligned with the top edge of the fire hole so the fireman had to be canny in judging the condition of the fire on that section and usually resorted to feeling it with the rake.