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Abstract:Train resistance varies not only with train speed, but also with the average weight of the cars of which the train is composed. At a given speed the tractive effort required for each ton of weight of the train will be greater, for example, for the train which is composed of cars of 20 tons average gross weight, than for the train composed of cars which weigh 50 tons each. While this fact has been known for some years, it has found inadequate expression and but little application. In the establishment of their tonnage ratings, many railroads have altogether ignored it. Existing train resistance formulas likewise fail in most cases to take into account these variations of resistance with car weight, and probably much of the divergence among them is properly ascribed to this fact. In view of the facts just stated, it has seemed desirable to make the tests whose results are recorded here. They were planned to determine the resistance of freight trains under the usual conditions of operation; and were designed to disclose at the same time, if possible, the relation existing, at any given speed, between train resistance and average car weight. The tests have been conducted by the Railway Engineering Department of the University of Illinois as between April, 1908 and May, 1909. All tests were made by means of Test Car No. 17, a dynamometer car, owned jointly by the University of Illinois and the Illinois Central Railroad, and were carried out on the Chicago division of that road. These tests have important historical significance since they were used by W. J. Davis as one of his primary data sources for calibrating the well-known “Davis equations” in his 1926 paper, The Tractive Resistance of Electric Locomotives and Cars.
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Content Notes:Schmidt, E. C., Freight Train Resistance: Its Relation to Car Weight, University of Illinois Engineering Experiment Station, Bulletin No. 43, Urbana, Illinois, May 1910. https://archive.org/details/freighttrainresi00schmrich
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