Smoke deflectors

Deflectors are items of equipment of vehicles of the railway.

Steam locomotives

Function

They are used in steam locomotives to influence the wind so that the smoke stack from the front ejected smoke and exhaust ( the steam engine of the locomotive ) is directed away from the windows of the cab. To this end, the deflector plates are mounted on both sides of the stack parallel to the long boiler. The use of smoke deflectors makes sense, especially at higher speeds because especially at speeds above 80 km / h, distance view of locomotive personnel through smoke and exhaust otherwise could be severely hampered.

Use

The spread of smoke deflectors of steam locomotives was different depending on the train company. They have been widely used since the mid- 1920s at the German Reichsbahn locomotives and the French SNCF. Later, the German Federal Railways, as well as the German Reichsbahn in the GDR maintained deflectors for steam locomotives.

For the locomotives of some railway companies were skirting and their specific expression to a distinctive appearance. For example, had the steam locomotives of the pre-war Reichsbahn large sheets, which towered above the wheels from the boiler circulation to below the stack height at the bottom and had a kink, so that they follow the gauge. These large, so characteristic of most standard locomotives Windleitblechbauart a distinction was at the time still in a small, medium and large sub- type. Later they were after many years of construction councilors responsible for the Reichsbahn, Richard Paul Wagner than Wagner smoke deflectors called.

Friedrich Witte led in 1943 with Professor Mölbert of the University of Hannover wind tunnel tests with the 52 by 2328. Their result was the smaller Witte - wind guide, which no longer reached down to the boiler circulation or even to the front buffer beam. The new deflector saved considerable material at the same time improved action with respect to the distance view of locomotive personnel. Skirting of this type were installed after the war in the DR and DB often instead of the larger Wagner smoke deflectors for brand new or rebuilt steam locomotives.

Special skirting should the steam locomotives of the series 01.5 obtained which pointed zuliefen forward and upward. The so-called " bat ears " but not proven and it baffles instead were grown that were similar to the Witte smoke deflectors.

In several Eastern European countries (Poland, Bulgaria) the smoke deflectors were mounted on the boiler right next to the chimney, as for example in the PKP series TKt48. The same is true for many streamlined clad steam locomotives, such as the DR- series 01.10.

Gallery

DR 52 with Witte smoke deflectors

Streamlined disguised series 01.10 with side skirting on the boiler, right next to the chimney

French SNCF 242 A 1 with smoke deflectors

Polish TKT 48 with side skirting on the non- streamlined clad boiler

• Schienenfahrzeugtechnik