BIG COAL EATERS

Dominion, Volume 37, Issue 119, 15 February 1944, Page 5

BIG COAL EATERS

Main Trunk Express Trains

The reimposition of travel restrictions through the coal shortage draws attention to the tonnages consumed by New Zealand’s principal trains. Inquiries made yesterday showed the large tonnage used every week to maintain. the regular passenger and freight services. Before the present cuts in the number of trains run, locomotives in the North Island were burning coal at the rate of 9000 tons a week. In the South Island the weekly tonnage was 4000. Though the amounts vary considerably, about 19 tons of coal are used nightly by each of the four Main Trunk expresses between Wellington and Auckland. The electrified section from Wellington to Packakariki means a saving of nearly one and a quarter tons on every through train. The engines at present employed in hauling express trains on the Main Trunk lin<? are the “K” and “Ka” classes. These have a coal capacity of seven and three-quarter tons. The express trains from Wellington to Auckland are usually hauled continuously from Paekakariki to Taihape by one engine, which on this part of the journey burns seven tons. On the next sections from Taihafie to Taumarunui and from Taumarunui to Auckland four and eight tons are burnt respectively. The tonnage used on these sections is almost the same in reverse, the quantity consumed depending bn. the weight of the train and the gradients. On the basis that the New Zealand railways, on the average, use coal at the rate of 1011 b. for every train mile, the approximate consumption on any journey csiu be easily reckoned.