Re: C&S Long Distance Tenders?

Posted by Derrell Poole on Feb 10, 2015; 8:06am
URL: http://c-sng-discussion-forum.254.s1.nabble.com/C-S-Long-Distance-Tenders-tp694p914.html

I don't know the purpose of the flair. Flairs on tenders go way back and probably for the reasons you've suggested - because they aided stacking of wood on the tank deck. Maybe someone knows more about the flairs purpose.

Flairs began coming off of the ng engines perhaps as early as 1917 with the second rebuild of the B-3Cs but certainly by the summer of 1918. The portion of the Flair behind the coal bunker was trimmed down to a few inches. Very quickly thereafter the bunkers were built up with sheet metal and the flair bent upward vertical next to the bunker. It was trimmed off completely behind the bunker. Finally the flair was removed altogether in the early '20s.

But this was not the first time a C&S engine had the flair removed completely behind the bunker. Some 16 years earlier at least one engine had a tender with no flair behind the bunker. What engine was that anyone?

Perhaps one reason for removing the flair was the water hazard during the winter when it would freeze on the tank deck around the fill hatch. We see that this was an issue in that weep holes were placed in the rear corners of the flair for drainage.

The rear course of the flair was painted with 3 lines of data and the engine number. The data included weight limit, water capacity and coal capacity. The engine number separated the nomenclature from the amount thus "WEIGHT LIMIT" 69 "XXXlbs". Of course with the flair gone the number moved to the reservoir mounted on the back of the tender and the capacities simply not applied.