If The Pilot Scheme Hadn't Been Botched..........

[GeoffAlan]

Had Riddles lived longer in the job and completed his Standard locomotive fleet and they'd run their natural service life, I suspect that we would have seen diesels introduced as the interim measure they were always supposed to be. Then electrification would have followed fairly quickly on all main lines. 

The fact that the steam fleet were scrapped early and the diesels were desperately needed meant mistakes were made and our hobby much more interesting.

[cheesysmith]

Serious question;

Back in the fifties modernisation plan et al - did the UK/British companies actually study how other countries railways had or were dieselising?

Or did we have to re-invent the wheel on the whole thing?

 

I ask because I find it very odd that our closest (WW2) ally, the USA had several railroads that had managed to eradicate steam by the very early fifties (The New Haven by 1952) and steam was entirely gone on almost all major roads by the late fifties.

Even West Germany was busy developing a successful 'pilot scheme' from the early fifties and their solution was to have a small range of locos/units, built by many different manufacturers but all completely compatible with each other so you could, in theory, take the engine from a VT11.5 and put it in a V200, or a V100!

I think about the only other European country that had such a mish-mash of different locos may have been Greece and even they started off buying American but eventually tried more or less everyone going.

TIA,

John.

BR did visit America, look at the idea of centralised hump shunting yards, with direct connections between them. Worked in the USA because of the distances involved. Then look at the use of multiple lower powered locos instead of single bigger HP locos. Then look at the best thing BR ever got from the USA, TOPS. If you are thinking why didn't the UK follow the USA loco fleet, they couldn't buy American because of the need for dollars to pay back war debt and the fact that would never have been allowed whilst we had domestic loco makers. How would it have looked to the export market if BR wouldn't buy EE locos, and try to sell them a product BR wouldn't buy.

 

The biggest failing of not following the pilot scheme plan and ordering large numbers of locos direct from the drawing board was the missed chance to weed out those builders and designs unsuitable, allowing concentration on fewer suppliers, a greater degree of standardisation, and a chance for BR to set up a proper maintenance infrastructure for its new diesel locos instead of steam and diesel side by side.

[Pandora]

Not only BR made the trip to the USA,  the LNER sent their electrification engineer to look at USA dieselisation during WW2,  the visit was made when travel was strictly controlled so strings were being pulled at high level.  The case was for a fleet of LNER diesels to replace LNER pacifics,  the trail went cold after WW2, quietly  dropped leaving BR to complete Woodhead and Liverpool St electrification, source:  Michael Bonavia

[Nearholmer]

Pandora

 

Which of Bonavia’s books is that covered in?

 

I ask, because I’ve read contemporary reports of the proposal/plan/idea, which was linked with an ECML electrification proposal that was to go in stages, rather as WCML eventually did, with the diesels working in pairs to complete the trip, but then morphed into ‘diesel all the way, until we can raise any capital for electrification’. The fleet size envisaged was similar to the eventual Deltic fleet, but working only the very top-flight trains.

 

I’d like to see what he has to say.

 

Kevin

Edited February 20, 2018 by Nearholmer

[adb968008]

Indeed , I always believed EE could have been the EMD of Europe , they had probably the best engine tech , comparable to Sulzer , but through ineptitude at corporate level , never delivered on its abilities.

 

This doesn't invalidate my point , what I was saying was that reliable medium to high power diesels were available from the early 60s from proven sources , rather then largely untried domestic manufacturers. But I fully accept the extigencies of the political decisions of the day , but British Railways paid a price for that thinking

 

As was said , the pilot programme wasn't really an attempt to evaluate diesels , rather domestic manufacturers , a different thing entirely

 

 

Where EE Went wrong was in sticking with the bespoke product, rather than a mass production business model. (This seems to be a British thing in general).

 

Deltic was a locomotive built for a global market.. it should have been sold as such.. with a catalog number/SKU. This is how GM etc dominated the market..they made set products in set designs and exported it catalog style.

 

The class 37 could have been a contender too.. offer limited options on configuration, and perhaps 1 or 2 body styles (one of which could have been wider/taller central body shell for generous loading gauges) and bogies for different gauges.

 

instead it looked inwards to sell to the British Government (BR) rather than selling overseas.

 

EE continued to build bespoke products for each customer internationally, The only catalog builds was for BR. Because of this there are no economies of scale and the product is more expensive.

 

Though you have to consider within Europe at least, each country was pretty much the same, with self sufficiency, market protection and avoiding purchasing internationally, and of course beyond Europe the river of money starts to become more of a stream.  What the US was able to do with the Marshall Plan was saddle the UK with debt repayments and servicing it's own internal market whilst allowing it's own US businesses to exploit the former Empire market without challenger, using Standard Off the shelf products which made the cost cheaper for those markets.

 

Its field in Electric locomotives was more successful.. with the PKP export of EU06 and subsequent licensing model for several hundreds of locos built being an example of course one wonders how good a deal this was..after all it wasn't manufacturing / exporting, just selling a permit, Given it's success with AC / DC electrics it was surprising his wasn't more heavily exploited internationally, especially the commonwealth, as there was a lack of a competing US product and the market was less well known to European competitors.

Edited February 20, 2018 by adb968008

[JeremyC]

Serious question;

Back in the fifties modernisation plan et al - did the UK/British companies actually study how other countries railways had or were dieselising?

Or did we have to re-invent the wheel on the whole thing?

 

..........

John.

When reading about proposals to use foreign ideas in Britain during this period one thing you frequently come across is the statement that while whatever it is is successful everywhere else it will need extensive testing to prove itself under British conditions. One gets a strong feeling of a 'Not Invented Here' syndrome.

Edited February 20, 2018 by JeremyC

[russ p]

Isn't there a CO-CO EE in Australia with similar bogies albeit narrow gauge and fitted with the 12CSVT from the 37 but a single cab hood body

[jim.snowdon]

When reading about proposals to use foreign ideas in Britain during this period one thing you frequently come across is the statement that while whatever it is is successful everywhere else it will need extensive testing to prove itself under British conditions. One gets a strong feeling of a 'Not Invented Here' syndrome.

Sadly, that sort of attitude still seems to be alive and well in the UK's railway industry.

 

Jim

[adb968008]

Whilst the reliability helped, it was not the reason they were kept. There were a lot of train workings that only a pair of 20's could do, as larger locos did not have RA5 route availability. So not only were they needed, they were absolutely essential right up until the 1990's. They only got retired once the collieries and power stations with unsuitable track were either closed, or got  their tracks upgraded to allow class 60 operation.

 

Again though, was the class 20 designed with this in mind, or was it a convenient locomotive that allowed unsuitable track to remain unsuitable for longer as there was a loco to run on it ?

 

I suspect the latter.. the class 20 was the accidental hero, not the designed solution for a specific problem. Because the class 20 was available, track that should have been upgraded years ago was allowed to fester for longer.

Edited February 20, 2018 by adb968008

[Nearholmer]

Ideal locos for a struggling railway in a post-colonial African country, where goods have to be shifted, but nobody can afford to maintain the 600km single track main line, and the big train of the day, the ‘Port Mail’, has an average speed of 20kph, and is preceded by a flat car with machine gun mounted on it. Or BR c1975.

Edited February 20, 2018 by Nearholmer

[Bob Reid]

You would think that back in post-war Britain they'd have had as many experts as we have on this topic and then the problems would not have arisen.  I am surprised that so many seem proud of declaring that Britain was/is crap, if not a little disappointed.  

[jjb1970]

Something that needs to be factored into our “modelling” of the c1950 mindset is that Britain believed (a) that it was good at engineering and technical matters, and (b) that it’s future lay in exporting high-end is ngineering products. So there was a want to develop a strong diesel loco industry, and sell lots abroad, to earn desperately needed foreign exchange.

 

As it turned out, our opinion of our own competence was just a tad at odds with the facts, and not just in locos, but in jet aircraft, cars, and a few other things. We seemed to be good at occasional flashes of brilliance, but rubbish at turning those into solid, dependable, value for money products. In short ‘Meccano Magazine’ was telling its readers a pack of fibs all through the 50s (and probably the 30s), although it’s writers probably didn’t know it.

 

 

 

I think the comment on technical competence is a bit unfair. The good British medium and high speed diesel engines were probably as good as any others in the 50's and 60's and we shouldn't delude ourselves that the US, German etc diesel engine builders didn't have a few designs they'd rather forget. Even in slow speed engines Doxford's were competitive with alternatives at that time. Similarly in other fields the VC10 gave the RAF several decades of excellent service and fighters like the Hunter and Harrier were excellent designs. In large power plants the large turbine generators built by Parsons and others were superb machines that gave the CEGB and then private operators many decades of reliable operation at competitive efficiency rates.

 

The problem wasn't with technical know how or competence. Explaining why British industry faded away somewhat (although its worth remembering that a decline in traditional heavy industries is hardly unique to this country) is complex and plenty of people have made careers out of writing books or academic treatise on the subject.

 

One major difference between US trains and British ones, or European ones until the late 80's when German builders re-invented the idea was that EMD and GE offered standard commercially driven designs. Their customers were also commercially driven enterprises who tended to take pragmatic and hard headed decisions because if they didn't they went to the wall. And it should be remembered that Alco, Baldwin and Fairbanks Morse all hit the wall and went down the pan. Over here nationalised industries seem to have been as much about political pork barrelling and social engineering as they were about being successful business enterprises (and that was hardly unique to the UK).

Edited February 20, 2018 by jjb1970

[Titan]

Again though, was the class 20 designed with this in mind, or was it a convenient locomotive that allowed unsuitable track to remain unsuitable for longer as there was a loco to run on it ?

 

I suspect the latter.. the class 20 was the accidental hero, not the designed solution for a specific problem. Because the class 20 was available, track that should have been upgraded years ago was allowed to fester for longer.

 

Indeed it was designed with that in mind. Type 1 locomotives had to be capable of running over tracks of lower weight capacity as there was at the time a perceived need for them to cater for picking up freight traffic on light branch lines, or indeed any other lines where bigger locos could not run. So right from the beginning, up until the 1990's they were needed to do what they were designed to do, and it was no accident. Not only that, but as the track in question in the later years was not BR owned or maintained, it took some persuading to get it upgraded for the class 60's.

Edited February 20, 2018 by Titan

[PM47079]

As a side note on the subject I have yet to drive a loco that has better ride characteristics than a 37 or 47. The Americans may be able to design a reliable loco but I haven’t encountered one that rides well. And you would think that a good 40+ years later that sort of thing would not have been an issue.

[Nearholmer]

JJB

 

I said simply “competence”, not “technical competence”. Competence in this context is, to my mind at least, about a lot more than being technically able, it involves being managerially, commercially etc able too.

 

You are right, of course about the broad tide of change away from heavy industry, and about the whole topic being very complex, but I do think that Britain had for a very long time, and perhaps still has, some “special factors” that made/make it very difficult for manufacturing and other technical industries to flourish here:

 

- an inadequate system of technical education;

 

- an unwillingness by individuals who had/have free capital to invest it in “hard” industries, preferring instead to invest in land, property, and financial speculation, or to disperse/disburse capital on ‘acting the landed gent’;

 

- a very real problem exploiting scientific and ‘first principles engineering’ innovations from within these shores, probably because of the other factors;

 

- An amateurish and class-ridden approach to managing businesses, which, among other things,caused the postponement of much-needed consolidation of the multiversity of competing companies in each sector that emerged up to, say, WW1, until it was far too late;

 

- over-reliance on the hope of Empire markets, long after it should have been apparent that Empire was unsustainable at multiple levels;

 

- just when we’d got really good at steam engines, and were feeling very proud of ourselves, “Johnny Foreigner” went and invented the practical internal combustion engine, electrical power distribution, and industrial chemistry, robbing us of our technological advantage;

 

- an astonishing inability to draw objective comparisons between the capability of British industry and that in the US, Germany, and elsewhere, leading to a huge bubble of complacency, which eventually burst very uncomfortably c1955-75 (a.k.a believing in our own myth for too long);

 

- the really tough challenge of having a small domestic market, so that any industry reliant solely upon it is condemned to be a “cottage industry” compared with those that have much larger domestic markets. You mentioned VC10, and that is a case in point of something that struggled to find a volume market overseas, so actually didn’t sell in huge numbers, good as it was [i just checked ..... 54 in total! One of my uncles worked on installation of electrical systems on them, and was forever in fear of his job disappearing because they weren’t selling, which it eventually did.]

 

This may all seem a bit far from the particulars of the diesel loco pilot programme, but our late lamented loco industry suffered from all of the above, I would argue.

 

Kevin

 

PS: this page is very good at showing what we do import and export (we are definitely good at making gas turbines, thanks to RR), but has so much data that it is a bit slow to run https://atlas.media.mit.edu/en/profile/country/gbr/

Edited February 20, 2018 by Nearholmer

[adb968008]

Indeed it was designed with that in mind. Type 1 locomotives had to be capable of running over tracks of lower weight capacity as there was at the time a perceived need for them to cater for picking up freight traffic on light branch lines, or indeed any other lines where bigger locos could not run. So right from the beginning, up until the 1990's they were needed to do what they were designed to do, and it was no accident. Not only that, but as the track in question in the later years was not BR owned or maintained, it took some persuading to get it upgraded for the class 60's.

 

I think your post proved my point...

 

The demise of the 20's forced the track to be upgraded for class 60's.

Had the Type 2 have been the smallest solution available in the 1960's.. what would have happened...

Edited February 20, 2018 by adb968008

[EddieB]

Isn't there a CO-CO EE in Australia with similar bogies albeit narrow gauge and fitted with the 12CSVT from the 37 but a single cab hood body

 

 

Where EE Went wrong was in sticking with the bespoke product, rather than a mass production business model. (This seems to be a British thing in general).

 

The class 37 could have been a contender too.. offer limited options on configuration, and perhaps 1 or 2 body styles

 

instead it looked inwards to sell to the British Government (BR) rather than selling overseas.

 

EE continued to build bespoke products for each customer internationally, The only catalog builds was for BR. Because of this there are no economies of scale and the product is more expensive.

I don’t think it is appreciated here how much the EE locomotives built for the British market owed to their wider export production. The 12CSVT was the latest in a line of development of earlier 12-cylinder models built for Queensland, and their predecessor models, and had first been used in locomotives for East Africa and the Sudan, prior to the BR class 37. It went on to further development and to be used in other successful export models, including some for Australia.

 

Sadly this narrow view is perpetuated where focus is concentrated upon the domestic scene. It explains my disappointment and criticism of the recent EE “bookazine” which fails to explain the technological development represented by their BR classes in that it fails to appreciate their context in overall EE production.

[Suzie]

...Had the Type 2 have been the smallest solution available in the 1960's.. what would have happened...

 

Road carriage of coal..

[Pandora]

Pandora

 

Which of Bonavia’s books is that covered in?

 

I ask, because I’ve read contemporary reports of the proposal/plan/idea, which was linked with an ECML electrification proposal that was to go in stages, rather as WCML eventually did, with the diesels working in pairs to complete the trip, but then morphed into ‘diesel all the way, until we can raise any capital for electrification’. The fleet size envisaged was similar to the eventual Deltic fleet, but working only the very top-flight trains.

 

I’d like to see what he has to say.

 

Kevin

 

Kevin,  please read these extracts: in effect,  if the Raiway Executive had not intervened,   a 25 strong  LNER diesel fleet could have been the pilot scheme for express passenger  dieselisation of British Railways-,  referring to electrification of the ECML in stages,  orders to erect the EM1 BoBo locos  as a fleet of 70 locos erected in batches of 10, the 7 orders to erect were cancelled in November 1939, the fleet of EM2 CoCo passenger locos was originally 30 in size by Arthur Peppercorn, reduced to 7 with the signature of Freddie Harrison on the paperwork.   perhaps the LNER intended the large fleet of EM2 and EM1 for the ECML as electification followed up dieselisation

 

#1):

"The Railway Executive declared its intention of completing the works which had already been started, but taking a fresh look at those authorised but not yet started, as well as others at various stages of planning in the New Works departments. Some of those that were shelved were of great importance. The Southern railway plans(for elimination of steam traction from all lines east of the Reading Portsmouth axis, with diesel traction on minor lines and branches) were put into abeyance for the time being. And the scheme that had been approved in outline by the Board of the LNER, for full conversion of the ECML EXPRESS PASSENGER SERVICES to diesel traction through the purchase of 25 large diesel electric locomotives was not merely shelved but consigned to the waste paper basket." Extract from "British Rail, the First 25 Years" by Michael Bonavia, Assist. to Miles Beevor, Acting Chief General Manager. Bonavia was in a position to know where the bodies were buried.

 

 

#2):

Extract of letter from Sir Cyril Hurcombe, Chairman British Transport Commission 13 April 1948

t0 Sir Eustace Missenden,Chairman Railway Executive.

 

You will remember that in the summer of 1947 the Board of the LNER announced that they had prepared a scheme for the dieselisation of the Anglo-Scottish East Coast services, involving the construction of 25 single units in replacement of 32 “Pacific” type express passenger engines. Maintenance facilities were to be provided at London and Edinburgh, entirely separate from the steam locomitive facilities.

 

The Commission would, I think, like to know whether it is the fact that this scheme has now been shelved and whether the Executive have come to conclusions which differ radically from those which were formed by the LNER Board last year. I cannot help feeling, however, that until a major scheme of the kind has been put into operation, we shall not have sufficient actual experience of the capabilities and costs of Diesel-electric traction in relation to steam and other forms of traction.

 

From Gourvish. Letter was drafted by Bonavia. There was no reply until December 1948, when the Executive reported that a committee on Types of Motive Power had been set up. This did not report until October 1951, when it recommended a trial Main Line diesel-electrc scheme involving the provision of 100 locomotives of the 2,000hp class. The Commission waited in vain for the Executive to take any action.

Edited February 20, 2018 by Pandora

[TheSignalEngineer]

 

 

Isn't there a CO-CO EE in Australia with similar bogies albeit narrow gauge and fitted with the 12CSVT from the 37 but a single cab hood body

The first mainline diesels in Egypt, ordered in 1945 and delivered in 1949, were powered by a 1600 HP 16SVT engine with EE823 Generator and EE801 Exciter. The wheel arrangement was somewhat different 1-A-DO-A-1

Egypt Railways - Egyptian State Railways Diesel Locomotive Diagram 140 - ESR class 3000 (English Electric, Vulcan Foundry) by Historical Railway Images, on Flickr

Edited February 21, 2018 by TheSignalEngineer

[Pandora]

referring to the LNER  diesel scheme of 1947,  is it possible the LNER board had in mind a fleet of a 2000hp version of the Egyptian State Railways diesel  with the very peculiar wheel arrangement  possibly as a  1- A -Do -A - 1 ?

note the end  bogies have a pony wheel and what may be a a traction motored axle, the adhesive weight of the loco is 97 tons of 123 total tons indicating 6 driven axles and 2 pony axles

Edited February 20, 2018 by Pandora

[rodent279]

You would think that back in post-war Britain they'd have had as many experts as we have on this topic and then the problems would not have arisen.  I am surprised that so many seem proud of declaring that Britain was/is crap, if not a little disappointed.  

 

I think we did, and still do, many things very well. Our engineers, and our engineering competence, is second to none in the world. Our engineering "products" can and do compete with the best. What we don't seem to be able to do as well, is to effectively project manage, and finance, large engineering projects, and products. We seem to be poor at integrating, at taking a long-term view, and at seeing the broader picture.

 

For me, the lesson of the Modernisation Plan/Pilot Scheme is not so much that Britain could/can not build quality diesel/electric traction, but that we did not really seem to know what we wanted to do with it, in which direction we wanted it to go, and we did not let the plan work through, and allow time for proper evaluation of different types. We seemed to lose the long-term strategy. Short term, narrow minded thinking, policy driven by knee-jerk reaction-that's what lets us down.

 

Earlier in the thread, I mentioned the Morris Minor & it's inability to compete with the Beetle in the US. It wasn't because the Minor is an inferior product-Beetles are pig to maintain, and not great to handle either- but because of "other" non-engineering/product factors. After sales service, supply of spare parts etc are what let it down, not the product.

Edited February 20, 2018 by rodent279

[Bob Reid]

A voice of reason there - unfortunately as is the case in many countries. including the USA, there was / still often is a gulf between the engineers who design and manage these projects and those that hold the purse strings - the engineers would perceive the compromises as short-sightedness and the money men financial prudence!  

[Titan]

The class 20 whilst operationally successful, did not meet the needs of BRs changing environment... 

 

 

 

The 20 was successful as a machine, but not required on the changing railway... 

 

 

I think your post proved my point...

 

The demise of the 20's forced the track to be upgraded for class 60's.

Had the Type 2 have been the smallest solution available in the 1960's.. what would have happened...

 

Just thought I would remind you what your point was since you seemed to have forgotten.

 

That was at least 30 years of 'BRs changing environment' that they not only met the needs of, they were in fact 'required on the changing railway'. Please explain how a post explaining how they were essential to BR for 30 + years proves your above points?

 

As for the strange type 2 comment, seeing as diesel locomotives have been built right down to 2ft gauge with 40hp or less, not to mention the hundreds of shunting locos, the idea that nothing could be built between the gap of a large shunter and type 2 is clearly a desperate clutching at straws...

Edited February 21, 2018 by Titan

[jjb1970]

I think there were some particular factors at play in the UK after WW2. Not least of which was Britain's squandering of the Marshall Aid plan windfall which was a double whammy of negativity as not only did we not use it to rebuild and modernise, competitors did. The nationalised industries were often subject to politicised top down decision making that was divorced from commercial realities and toxic labour relations as certain industries went into decline accelerated the fall. And at a certain level there are certain cultural issues in the UK, profit is seen as something akin to theft by large parts of the political establishment and society and there is a tendency to resent success rather than celebrate it. If that was limited to personal sentiment it might not matter, but politicians are very aware of these attitudes and feed off them which means that they do matter. You don't see either attribute to anything like the same degree in the countries we compete with, for example many British people seem to see Europe as some sort of lefty right-on-o-sphere yet if you spend much time in countries like Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands etc they're very driven countries with a hard headed and commercially focused attitude to industry as well as a better understanding that you have a welfare state because you can afford. I spent quite a few years working for a Danish company and they paid and treated me well, but they didn't carry passengers and they demanded a high level of performance. If you go to Germany, their government can be quite interventionist but it supports industry, their politicians and civil servants don't have quite the conceit as ours to think that they are the ones best placed to decide how to run industry. Japan has a similar attitude.