WHY do DIESEL LOCOMOTIVES SPIT FIRE? 

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Because short term profits are more important to the freight companies than maintaining their equipment or infrastructure.

Buddy thinks he’s a steam engine 😭

They call it "deferred maintenance": a long and beloved tradition in railroad management.

I've was a diesel mechanic for 23 years and I've *NEVER* heard of a turbo with a rubber seal. There's no rubber in existence that could handle the task.

A lot of railfans call these locomotives that have the burned paint and other damage from blown turbos "toasters." The broken turbos have been replaced but the cosmetic damage hasn't been repaired yet.

Hi cool video. Im a turbocharger engineer and its true the oil ignites when seals go bad. However the seals that keep the exhaust gas and oil seperate are cast iron labyrinth seals. On the cold side of the turbo its a bronze labyrinth type seal. Most often the root cause failure of oil out the stack is a rotor imbalance which destroys the bearings and seals. Typically this happens from foreign object damage into the turbine side. Typically pieces of a dropped valve from a power assembly.

when the locomotive is running like hell

Because GE’s are called General Exploders

Note that most the locomotives shown are GEs

"Nah, it's fine. I don't see the problem with these" Said the freight company chairman calmy.

As far as I know, turbochargers do not have rubber seals. Any rubber seal would almost instantly melt under the obscene temperatures and pressures that turbochargers undergo. They simply use a very tight tolerance to prevent too much oil leaking out. At least this is the case on semi truck engines, locomotive engines I imagine are even more intense

Blud really turned into a steam locomotive

Non of these seals your talking about are make of rubber, they are made of brass or bronze against harden steel, they do wear out, but there's usually a power loss before they eat their own oil

Not to mention, the management of class 1 railroads are mostly businessmen and putting short term profits above every fricken thing. And for another, turbocharger failures are common GE locomotives, and GE is number 1 in the American locomotive market, a feat it’s always had since it toppled EMD as no 1 on the early 1980s. So since GE locomotives are more common as a result, they make up a higher percent of active American diesel locomotives than of EMD’s which only further increases the risk of us witnessing a GE locomotive blow its turbocharger. Although GE has tried to mitigate this issue with their turbochargers over the years and have gotten better, but are nowhere near the progress EMD had long finished in averting turbocharger failures. Finally turbocharger failures become common when a locomotive ages.

To add: A runaway diesel is when the exhaust turbine fails, and oil is sent into the hot side of the turbo, combusting from the heat, and forcing it to spool out of control. The extra rush of air into the intake from the cold side of the turbo causes the engine to throttle up without input from the driver(or in this case, the engineer). When the engine loses control and revs up, that’s what we call a runaway diesel. In many cases of runaway’s, there’s no way to stop it. Since diesel engines mostly rely on compression and a continuous hot temperature to combust, and not on spark plugs like a gas engine, simply tuning the key to “off” won’t stop it. In most cases, they continue to redline until either they jump timing and seize, or the block gives up and busts wide open(or a piston decides it wants to identify as a cruise missile).

I cant lie, it is kinda cool seeing a diesel train spit fire like a dragon on wheels and rail but also kinda scary lol

The GE Toasters 😂

Guess ghost rider now uses a train

Ngl the music+the smoking trains goes pretty hard lol

The locomotives bars are just fire 🔥

Yo this episode of Thomas wicked as fuck

Wow i always wonder why this happen to the diesels, now know it, thank you for this information!

Yes, make an ALCO proud!

Diesel: hey! Why are you spitting out smoke? Modern Diesel Engine: i need to work hard Duck: oh dear, diesels are turning into steamies

That’s the scientific reason, the real reason is that your videos are fire, and they’re trying to copy you! :]

You have a good explination, now here's mine. Hear me out: Hell Trains.

It was at this time that Diesel realized that he was in fact not as revolutionary as he previously believed

Nah the Norfolk Southern engine rolling coal looks badass lol

i hereby pronounce these locomotives honorary ALCOs

Turbochargers are too hot and spin too fast to use oil seals made of rubber, lookup "Dynamic, Differential Pressure Sealing System". I have rebuilt turbos and the oil lubricates the bearings and is slung off at speed to keep oil consumption down.

Diesels: we are revolutionary Steam: says the one that always catches fire

I lost a turbo on our gp 35. It blew fire and shards of metal out the exhaust. The new turbo was 35k so the boss said they would de turbo it but that cost over 100k so I got a new turbo.

Remember, trains still produce less pollution than cars

Yeah. No...those seals are 100 percent not rubber. The turbos get very very hot. Rubber would be melted, and burned in seconds

Super. A long time ago, I remember the Alco switchers would be left to idle for long periods of time, and when they were called on to work hard, you could see flames coming from the stack, and an acrid choking smoke screen filled the yard. Good memories. 💙 T.E.N.

Because it looks cool. Going back to its roots. Steam power.

it can be a real issue even before the turbos go because it can cause an oil fuel runaway diesel which is the one of the worst types of runaway diesel situations. It can also bleed the oil reservoir dry leading to insufficient lubrication in the engine.

What’s the background music?

Any of you RR engineers will know the particular characteristics of diesel /electric locomotive engines. I’ve worked in the west Texas oilfield and seen 2 mile long trains daily for 12+ years and have never see smoke or fire at the diesel exhaust. My experience is in large oil/gas generators and gas compression units used in remote oil/gas locations. These gen sets and compressors are huge but may not be directly comparable to locomotives. The following are observations I have made on the job. The turbo is located at the intake of the diesel motor & increases the Intake Manifold Air Pressure with fresh intake air. Turbo failures commonly cause the turbo housing to split open and the vanes are usually destroyed, so the pressure to the intake manifold drops severely and fuel can back-flow into the turbo housing. The unburned fuel can now escape out of a breech in the turbo housing appearing as a white or light-grey gas vapor cloud. I’ve never seen a fire at the turbo and the engine will die anyway from low manifold air pressure or any number of other engine/intake sensors. The exhaust of these diesel engines, on the other hand, will more commonly emit dark black smoke if the cylinders are blowing-by fuel to the exhaust manifold, which can also include burnt engine oil. Blown seals, cracked cylinders, cylinder heads, cracked pistons, etc can push fuel and engine oil to the exhaust manifold. It could certainly ignite these hydrocarbons and flames could exit the exhaust. But I’ve never seen an exhaust fire or flame thrower effect because engine/exhaust sensors will shut the engine down long before this happens.

"How often do your locomotives catch on fire?" GE: *yes*

Nah fam thats just EMD and GE tryin to make modern steam locomotives

Looks like we need caboose again to watch these long trains.

Honestly, these look badass with fire coming out the stacks.

I once worked on a ship powered by two Colt Pielstick diesels, it was perfectly "normal" for the stack to look like a roman candle at night. Definitely a different cause, but was still a dramatic show!

It means it's working hard.

Look up ruaway diesels -the engine runs off its own crank case oil and blows up

Ah yes the blown turbo light show. I've had many of these in my consists over the years, best thing you can do is skin it back to notch 8 and let it burn so it'll have to be repaired.

About a month ago we had one sitting in our railyard for repair. One day they started it to move it, and it smoked out the whole downtown core!

They can do this in the locomotive industry but my 250cc motorcycle needs 4 cats to be compliant??

ahhh... that's where my mixtape went. I've been longer all over for it.

Volkswagen punching air after getting fined and then seeing this.

I love how every soundtrack on these shorts is just phonk

Also, if locomotives only switch in yards and never get used on the road, oil and soot builds up in the turbo screen and exhaust. Especially noticeable during the winter. They’ll spit sparks like a Roman candle.

trucks: BOOM goes the diesel!

That's how a diesel runs away too so that's really nuts that they wouldn't jump on it straight away.

Im just saying. BECAUSE IT LOOKS COOL

Seen this in person when I worked graveyard. Coworker called the rail station and they stopped a few miles in nowhere

Its the soul of all the old steam engines trying to possess these newer trains

This song gets stuck in my head every time I watch your videos.

Damn and the loop is crazy

Bluds spitting fiyah 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🗣️🗣️🔊🔊🗣️🗣️🗣️

Their trying too hard becoming a steam engine lol

Cool

When the diesel choo choo becomes a steam one on a charter

Everybody gangsta till the train lights on fire.

Ah yes, finally, the actual crazy train

Simple because it looks badass

Holy sh*t you weren't kidding. O.o

At this point they might as well run steam locomotives in place of the damaged diesel Could be around the same, if not less emissions of smoke or fire

I think I remember seeing one of these happen to a Santa Fe SD40-2 it's actually rare to see one actually spit fire or something

“ Can you make it to the Shop track?” - Supervisor Mechanical Dept.

The prius is based off a locamotive artitecture if you think about it. A generator tied to an engine and a high power converter system and traction motor.

“Lit it up up up, lit it up up up, I’m on FIRE!”

Because sometimes the diesel mixes with the other stuff in the train to make it burn like gas

The music on this makes it go so hard

"Turbo" engines laughs the 11 year freight conductor 😂😂

idk but it looks sick

Amtrak station behind my job. Working early, early shift. Took a smoke outside when the Amtrak train rolled in on fire. They unhooked it from the passenger cars and pulled it fwd and then unhooked it from the main engine and pulled the main fwd.

In Indonesia, this is commonly called KOBONG on GE-U18C locomotives, the driver will not hesitate if there are rail fans who ask for kobong, aka fire out.

Diesel Runaway In Indonesia called is Indonesia Lokomotive Kobong The train with the Kobong Fire that emits thick smoke in Indonesia, just try searching on RU-vid, Indonesian Kobong train

Nono little Jimmy, you can’t be like the steam engines! 😂

That is from a engineer putting his hamburger to cook by the turbo and the 20% fat caught fire.

The 'seals' in a turbo are not made of rubber. They don't use traditional lip seals like you might find on a engine or transmission. They instead use a seal simerlar to a piston ring as well as shielding and oil slingers.

That CN was brutal

They spit fire because secretly they are dragons! Rawr!!!!!!!

Oil burn white/blue. What you see from exhaust is soot from excessive fuel. The amount we see is because turbo is gone but the fuel is still injected in amounts as everything was working. That create way too rich mixture that generate a lot of soot. Rich mixture in diesel engine cause excessive high exhaust temperatures that lead to self ignition of soot.

You know games became realistic when i literally question reality

bros spitting straight fire 🔥🔥🔥

The train doesn't tell them oil pressure dropped😂😂 what if that fire hits a overhanging treebranch. You gotta be kidding me.

You know , that’s f¥€ked up and awesome all at once.

Aw yis... them tanky bois got that sigma energy

Man, that’s loco! 😂

You’ll note all of these clips are GEs. This is because EMD turbos actually work as intended, instead of burning out your whole prime mover.

The first one took rolling coal to a whole other level 😂

That looks awesome!

Looks badass ngl

Besides of solving this kind of mess, car dealers decided to having the euro5 standard, just so hilarious

there is no gaskets or rubber in those or any turbochargers. The only thing keeping the oil in is a set of metal rings on the turbine shaft. What causes the failure is usually overheating (for example, a failed fuel injector creating excessive exhaust temperatures). As it leaks, oil is consumed by the engine and burned, making more heat, causing the turbo failure to worsen. Also a worn/damaged piston(s) can cause thus as well.

Bro felt that Dr. Livesey Energy