This gauge perplexes me quite a good deal. Its here in Denmark, and likely came over with one of the locomotives built by Baldwin for a shortline road called Syd Fynsk Jernbane. Being as all the locomotives Baldwin built for Denmark were either steam brake, or vacuum equipped, I doubt this was used in an air brake application.

History aside, did NYABC produce components for steam brake systems back in the day? (1890's). If so, this definitely narrows the origin of this gauge down to three locomotives. If not, it adds quite a bit more confusion and mystery to the history of this gauge.

They did. According to Wikipedia, "New York Air Brake was established on July 1, 1890 acquiring all of the property and business of Eames Vacuum Brake Company."

Regards,
Bob Milhaupt

NYAB also built brake valves and compressors to the Westinghouse designs, I assume after the patents ran out. I have seen many 6ET brake valves and even cross compound air compressor cylinders with NYAB cast in them.

According to the Wikipedia article on New York Air Brake Co (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Air_Brake), in the second paragraph of subheading "Expansion and a new plant 1900-1914",

This R&D sharing agreement led to common implementations. For example, Westinghouse produced the 6ET schedule, while NYAB produced the 6LT schedule. They were approximately equivalent implementations.

It is my understanding is that newer brake schedules tended to have comparable implementations from both vendors, with similar schedule numbers/names.

Regards,
Bob Milhaupt

Stuart,

I think I mis-interpreted your post. I focused on "brake components" for steam locos, as opposed to "steam brake components" for (steam) locos. (I love the ambiguity of the English language!)

I do not have any specific knowledge or information at hand which speaks to the "steam brake component" question.

Regards,
Bob Milhaupt

I would expect a gauge showing form zero to fourteen would be for a vacuum brake system.

Does that help narrow down the original provenience?

Brian

And the units of measurements are kilograms per centimeter squared. Interesting...... approximately 200 PSI. That's a shitload of vacuum.

Regarding the gauge. How about atmospheres of pressure for a power brake system?

1 atmosphere = 14.69 psi

Dave wrote:


I confirm that conversion from kg/cm^2.

Dave then wrote:


I do not believe that you can get 200 PSI of vacuum. If I recall high-school physics class correctly, the highest vacuum possible is equivalent to all the weight of the matter in the column above the vacuum. This would limit the vacuum to be the equivalent of the "absolute" pressure of that column of air. For scientific convenience, such work is done at "sea level", where the absolute pressure is something like 14.6 PSI. This gives a maximum equivalent vaccum "pressure" of 14.6 PSI. So the idea of a vaccum gauge going to 200 PSI Vacuum is, effectively, bogus.

As such, I believe that the gauge in question is not a Vacuum gage, but is instead an old-style metric equivalent of a standard 0-200 PSI pressure gauge.

Regards,
Bob Milhaupt

It’s a metric gauge. The unit is BAR.

Wikipedia page: Bar (unit)

Read the face of the gauge - small print directly above the Ashton logo.

And I do like the way they indicated Kilos per square centimeter with the small square stamped in with the rest of the type........mld

I've seen that on a number of gauges as well (an actual square to indicate "square")

Well, we know that the gage was built by the Ashton Valve company. If you post the serial number on the face it might be possible to figure out what year it was made. That particular logo was used from the 1870's to the 1930's. The Ashton Valve company had representatives all over Europe around the turn of the century and they also would add any imprints a customer wanted on the dial at no charge. I've never seen an Ashton gage in Kilos before but it wouldn't have been too difficult for them to customize it. It looks in great shape. Did you have it restored?