Stoker
The heater is part of the operating staff in a manually operated furnace . He is responsible for fanning and stoking the fire and feeding the fuel; in the case of furnaces that are used to heat a steam boiler , he usually also acts as a boiler attendant .
use
In the past, heaters were found in particular on steam locomotives or steam ships ( ship heaters ), but also in other, stationary combustion systems. Since the fire control and fuel supply are largely automated in modern incineration plants, the classic job description of the stoker has almost died out today. Nevertheless, the operating staff of furnaces is sometimes jokingly referred to as stokers.
On steam locomotives
The heater performs physical hard work by coal from the Tender (or the tank engine from the coal reservoir) on the grate shovels. In the case of the DR series 50 , 1 t was calculated over 50 km. In one shift that could be 13 tons for the stoker . Since the tender only took 8 t of coal (and 28 m 3 of water), new coal had to be taken in the meantime. This heavy work is no longer necessary on oil-fired , stoker, or pulverized coal- fired locomotives . Then the heater only has to regulate the amount of fuel and, in the case of lumpy solid fuels, stoke the embers on the grate . As unloved as it was ubiquitous on the Deutsche Reichsbahn (1945–1993) was the "Cossack gravel", inferior coal from the Donets Basin . Better lump coal from the Upper Silesian industrial area was only available for military transports .
In addition to the fire control, which has to be tailored to the energy requirements of the consumers to be supplied, the stoker, as boiler attendant, is also responsible for the water level in the steam locomotive boiler and for operating the numerous auxiliary equipment. The most important display instruments for the heater's work are the pressure gauge for the boiler pressure and the sight glass for the water level. The stoker of a steam locomotive is subordinate to the engine driver and has to carry out other tasks on his instruction that go beyond the loading of the fire box and boiler water monitoring. During the journey and when stopping at platforms, the stoker regularly has the task of observing the route and the train from the stoker's side .
Todays situation
With the discontinuation of the steam locomotive from rail traffic in the years 1960–1970, the heaters became superfluous. In Germany, however, the stokers were not dismissed, but instead were used as locomotive attendants (Beimann) on fast-moving trains to support the locomotive drivers . It was not until 1996 - in agreement with the railway unions - that the assistant was also abolished.
In Great Britain, in the 1950s, unions pushed for stokers to ride on electric locomotives . This regulation was abolished by the British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher during her reign (1979–1990) after she had significantly curtailed the power of the trade unions .
Trivia
The French word for “stoker” (“chauffeur”) has survived technological change. Today, a chauffeur is a professional driver, even in French-speaking countries.
Web links
- Stoker in the appointment of the Federal Employment Agency
- Professions in the mirror of statistics - stokers. Archived from the original on May 17, 2002 ; accessed on August 24, 2015 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ End of the season in the locomotive shed (dampflok-salzwedel.de)
- ^ Hermann Adam : Building blocks of politics. An introduction . Wiesbaden 2007, p. 265
- ↑ see also New York Times July 19, 1982: BRITISH RAILWAY STRIKE ENDED AS ENGINEERS ACQUIESCE