X-12 (locomotive)
| X-12 | |
|---|---|
| Manufacturer: | EMD , ComEd , Trane , Babcock & Wilcox , GE , Westinghouse and others |
| Axis formula : | (Co'Co ') (Co'Co') 3 ' |
| Length over coupling: | 48.8 m |
| Service mass: | 360 t |
| Friction mass: | 327 t |
| Wheel set mass : | 27 t |
| Traction power: | permanent: 7200 hp short-term: 9000–12,000 hp |
| Starting tractive effort: | 715 kN |
| Power transmission: | Direct current |
| Number of traction motors: | 12 |
X-12 was the name of a project for a US nuclear- powered locomotive in the 1950s.
history
The X-12, which would have looked similar to diesel locomotives at the time , was developed in the early 1950s by a research group from the University of Utah with the participation of the five railway companies Southern Pacific , Union Pacific , Western Pacific , Denver & Rio Grande Western and New York Central , as well as nine Industrial companies (including EMD , ComEd , Trane , Babcock & Wilcox , GE and Westinghouse). The management was incumbent on the professor of physics Lyle Benjamin Borst , who had previously designed nuclear reactors for the Atomic Energy Commission . It was one of many, today seemingly adventurous projects for the civil use of nuclear energy at the beginning of the atomic age (see Atoms for Peace ). The failure of the project before a prototype was built is attributed to the high costs.
construction
The X-12 was to consist of the actual locomotive and a cooling tender , whereby the two units would not have been operationally connected to each other with a Jakobs bogie . The locomotive would have had twelve traction motors , which would have been arranged in four three-axle bogies . The bogies would have been connected in pairs with a bridge to form six-axle units with the Co'Co ' wheel arrangement. The first of these units would have been arranged under the front part of the locomotive, while the second would have formed the Jakobs bogie under the locomotive and cooling tender. The other end of the cooling tender would have been based on a non-powered three-axle bogie.
Inside the locomotive would have been the driver's cab , the nuclear reactor , the steam turbine and the four Basset- type direct current generators ; The cooling unit for the reactor water cooling would have been housed in the tender . The nuclear reactor should have a circumference of approx. 90 × 90 × 30 cm and be made of stainless steel. It should be enclosed by a jacket filled with water and run through 10,000 pencil-thin tubes containing the same water. The intended fuel was 242 liters of an aqueous uranyl sulfate solution (approx. 8 kg of uranium-235 ). This solution should reach a temperature of 230 ° C during operation, whereby boiling should be prevented by a prevailing pressure of 16 atü . The water contained would have been exposed to constant splitting into hydrogen and oxygen due to the radiation , 10% in thirteen minutes. A resulting water shortage within the solution should be counteracted by feeding both gases into a reunification chamber and recombining them to water there using a catalyst . That water, in turn, that used in the form of water vapor through the shell and the tubes for steam turbine and there using a capacitor again condensed should be would be cooled by another, the cooling system by running water system before it headed back to the shell and the tubes would. The radiation shielding should be done using a 3 × 4.5 × 4.5 m, 1.20 m thick block made of various metal layers and a neutron - inhibiting hydrogen - containing material such as water, paraffin or plastic.
Data
The average power of the vehicle should be 7,200 hp, with the possibility of a short-term increase to up to 12,000 hp. A train weighing 5,000 t should be able to accelerate from 0 to 100 km / h in 3:32 minutes, which would have roughly corresponded to the traction performance of four EMD F7s . The locomotive itself should weigh at least 360 tons with a length of 49 meters. The uranium consumption per year would have been around five kilograms.
Safety precautions
In addition to the shielding block as the primary safety device, the control rods , whose withdrawal from the uranyl sulfate solution should start the chain reaction in the reactor, should be provided with shear bolts or predetermined breaking points . An impact that would have exceeded a fifth of the normal force of gravity would have broken off these bars, which were attached at a 60 ° angle, which would have fallen back into the solution and prevented nuclear fission .
trouble
The uranyl sulfate solution would probably have had to be reprocessed three to six times a year in order to compensate for the approximately 10% loss of uranium-235 and to remove the chain reaction-inhibiting nuclear fission products, which would probably have taken two to three days at a time. The maintenance of the (contaminated) steam turbine would have presented an additional problem. An overhaul of the reactor itself was not planned.
swell
- Hobby or on platform 3 - Atom express train. ( castor.de ).
- The nuclear locomotive X-12. ( mmiwakoh.de )
- LIFE Magazine or The Atomic Locomotive. ( books.google.de ).
- Railway Age or X-12 ( bbs.stardestroyer.net ).
- Ron Miller: The Days of Atomic Locomotives in America. Retrieved April 24, 2014 .
literature
- GK Abel, LB Borst, DM Bowie, KW Petty, BJ Stover, MA Van Dilla: An Atomic Locomotive. A feasibility study . Ed .: Department of Physics, University of Utah . Salt Lake City January 1954 ( hdl.handle.net ).
- Patent US3127321A : Nuclear Reactor for a Railway Vehicle. Published April 7, 1955 , inventor: Lyie B. Borst.