Martin Shaw

Not on the LBSCR at all but actually Sandling Junction on the SER main line to Folkestone. The branch diverging to the right went to Hythe (Kent). Regards Martin

Spikey An injector works by condensing the steam supply to it with the feed water, if the feed water is warm/hot the condensing is less or none and there will be insufficient energy to bridge the gap between the combining cone and the delivery cone so no boiler feed. Early injectors were notoriously unreliable so locos were fitted with a pump, usually driven from the crosshead but later on as an self driven item using an auxiliary steam supply from the boiler. There are two principal reasons why British practice moved away from pumps, the crosshead pump would only feed when the loco was moving, and third party pumps, Worthington, Weir etc would attract a royalty payment which railway companies avoided like the plague. This was also the most significant element that so delayed the introduction of air braking. The other benefit of injectors is that they have no moving parts and as such should be more reliable. Regards Martin

Spikey An Austerity tank holds 1200 gallons so weighs 12000 lbs, 5.3 Tons or 5454Kg, the empty tank maybe 2 tons which all sit on the boiler, in essence, and yes the boiler cladding goes right around. Martin

I don't think I would go as far as vastly more efficient, marginally better at releasing steam from boiling water but this is as much due to the distance betweeen the inner and outer firebox as it is the upper shape, and then there are such things as free gas area, tube dimensions, overall heating surface, it really is quite scientific, Consider for a moment both the LNER and the SR who largely used roundtop boilers without any apparent inability to pull trains, an A4 boiler, once the drafting was sorted in the late 50s, was as good a steam generator as anything else. Additionally a Belpaire boiler is greater in both capital cost and subsequent maintenance, so yes it is better but the contrast is marginal. Water sloshing about was one of the contributory factors in the Sevenoaks accident of 1927, a River class with side tanks. It's more to do with centre of gravity than any particular shape, the disadvantage of a saddle tank is that the contents are heated by the boiler rather more than in other shapes so potentially leading to an earlier injector failure, and I suspect the cost of manufacture might be a bit greater. Regards Marrtin

Thread forms and sizes are undoubtedly complex, and that's just the well known ones. As an aside, it is generally understood that the US uses imperial measurement. Last summer we were in a hotel for a few days and I met a retired man from Chicago, so I would guess well into his sixties, who it transpired had been a mechanical engineer, so we discussed engineering measurement, as you do. It turned out that he had worked with metric measurement for the whole of his working life and his opinion was that the majority of US technology industries that looked for or had any export trade would be similar. He also suggested that in the developed world, whatever that may mean, apart from the US, only the UK had a significant body of opinion that so misunderstood measurement and number systems that they thought imperial was better. I could only agree with that, so we had another pint. Martin

Jeff Modern engineering fabrication will almost exclusively use metric coarse fixings, although there is no engineering reason why you couldn't use UNC UNF Whitworth BA etc depending on application. They have been deemed non-preferred in engineering standards so inevitably as demand reduced, manufacturers stopped making them. The problem as I'm sure your aware is that restoring old steam locos requires fixings into existing castings which are ofted tapped whitworth hence stud especially are needed. It's possible to have whitworth screws and nuts made to order so they do cost and in non critical applications stainless metric fixings are readily available, inexpensive and will do the job just as well. My railway has an individual with many contacts which has enabled us to get redundant stock from factory closures so we do ok and I'm sure other railways are in a similar position. The talk of torque wrenches has amused me, technologically a 9F isn't much different from the Rocket, and it's all blacksmithing to a greater or lesser degree, so tightening up the nut with a correctly sized spanner should make it tight enough without stressing the fixing. If it leaks, still loose, tighten it a bit more. Of course materials technology wasn't so well understood in times past so often engineering was over engineered to compensate, 1/2" didn't work last time, we'd better use 5/8", which is of course why so many locomotives, bridges and a good deal of other Victorian/Edwardian engineering still exists which rather neatly takes us back to the NYMR. Regards Martin

Keith In practice pipework is usually bent to suit the components to be joined on site rather than following an existing locomotive purely because the (template) might be geographically distant. Fill up your pipe with dry sand, heat and bend, braze on unions and fit to loco, it is much easier to write about than do it. Pin holes in castings do happen but they mostly appear at the machining stage and if the casting can't be satisfactorily plugged then we would scrap it and get another. Regards Martin

Jeff Not amateurish at all, the process shown on the telly is the same at most, if not all heritage steam railways. The generally accepted way of fixing a steam leak on a pipe union is exactly how I do it, identify the hole, disassemble if necessary and fix it. Now the process shown is what I would call brazing, and it's nowhere near the melting point of copper, however I would fully respect that in the US workshop practices have different names which are largely accepted local terminology. As for pressure testing, what would be the difference between setting up a test rig or refitting the part to the engine, you might for a significant repair to a large component, eg a superheater element do a hydraulic, but for a repair as seen not necessary. I note you said earlier an involvement in the aerospace industry which has in the 100 or so years of existence developed a highly organised safety culture which is a model of how to do things, and quite rightly so, failure usually results in loss of life, however risk assessment is also necessary and whilst pressure vessels and steam are potentially dangerous, nothing I saw on the telly was outwith accepted practice or amateurish. Regards Martin

Farren I may have inadvertently misled you here. After posting the previous I looked at the SRS diagrams and where you have started is indeed what the SRS show. I also established that Rothley to Swithland is only 50 chains so it's more than likely that the distant arm under 34 is Swithland Sidings down distant, so ignore my ramblings above. I think probably that Rothley had a down starting signal at some point, there was some rationalisation in the 1940s onwards that may have removed it. Martin

Farren The answer to your question is, no its not. It is just an ordinary set of trap points to prevent stray vehicles fouling the down main. A further thing is that the dummies 22 and 23 should have yellow faces, the LNER were quite keen on this. The down line signals include under the down home signal 34, a distant arm which is currently unumbered, when it would have course worked. Therefore I think the numbering should be starter 33, home 34, inner distant 35, and outer distant 36, although in many GC locations with a similar arrangement the outer distant was often a 3 aspect auto which showed one or two yellows or green accordingly. Hope this is useful. Regards Martin

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There is some truth in what you say however the round of tender swapping between the D15,L11, and 700 classes was done for the specific reason of equipping the D15 with a 13ft wheelbase tender to fit on Fratton turntable. Besides the 6 wheel tenders held 3500 gallons when full, which is only 4.4 tons lighter than the 4500 gallon variety so not much difference really. I can't think of an instance where the tender weighed more than the loco, in the three classes above D15 loco 59T 15C tender 49T , L11 loco 46T 14C tender 39T 12C, 700 loco 42T 15C tender 37T 14C. These are the as built weights, superheating would add an amount to the loco in due course. Of course as a journey progressed and the water and coal was used the weight of the tender as a percentage of the total diminished and compared to the weight of the train a few tons here and there made little difference. Regards Martin

I had unintenionally overlooked the S11 and L12 class. As far as I can tell the S11's, a class of 10 locos retained the 8 wheel tenders until withdrawal, almost en-bloc in 1951. The L12's were built with 8 wheeel tenders until 1925 when half of the class (10) had 6 wheel tenders fitted and were transferred to the Eastern Division. It would seem that they kept these until withdrawal, again almost en-bloc in 1951. I've had a look at the SEMG info re K10's, it generally agrees with that I posted upthread but I can't find enough concinving evidence that would suggest that they migrated around the engines of the class although undoubtedly some differing couplings may well have occurred at works visits. There is no doubt that the LSWR and it's successor were able to vary types of tender with work according to need with some degree of success, but it does make tracking it all from mostly a century ago a haphazard affair. Regards Martin

In response to Wickham Green, the D15's had 8 wheel watercart tenders when new but were replaced by 13ft 6 wheeled ones in 1925/6. Six of the K10's received 8 wheel bogie tenders from T9's in the summer of 1928, there own short 6 wheeled tenders going to the T9's in a straight swap permitting their use on the Central Section. All of the pre T14 4-6-0 classes, F13, E14, G14, aand P14 had 8 wheel watercart tenders which they kept until withdrawal. additionally all Drummond's early stuff had them as well, T7, E10, the C8's gained 8 wheel tenders between 1902 and 1907. Regards Martin

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Hugh On your first point you are correct, It is the Stirling designed steam reverser that originated on the SER and was also used by the SECR and SR. Probably the most reliable steam reverser fitted to UK steam locos. On the second point, you have confused yourself, the upper picture is looking at the RH side of 757, the lower picture the LH side of 788. All the LI class had this pipe but it was in all cases on the RH side. It is the vacuum ejector exhaust pipe. Lastly please don't apologise for not knowing something, a polite question should get a polite reply, I hope mine is. Regards Martin

Thanks PT, I note that 10 and 12 are effectively selected by the position of 9, so your question is a very good one. I don't know enough about GWR/WR practice and whilst I have the recent book I have by no means read enough of it to have an opinion. Regards Martin

The relative displacement of 10 after 12 raises a potential issue. Does 10 precede 12 in the locking, if not then in theory 12 cleared leads to a stop signal 60 feet or so on. I realise custom and practice in the 1950s may well override modern considerations, but does anyone know if the locking table exists? Regards Martin

Looking at both diagrams I felt that the whole arrangement of 9,10,11,12 seemed a bit messy so I looked up Pryer. He states box was reframed c1920 so I think the SRS is probably near enough, going from 15 levers to 12. What I hadn't realised is that 9B points had a one hole FPL so the pull sequence is either 9, 10 or 11,12, BTW did the GWR differentiate point ends worked from the same lever, I think A,B is a BR thing. It would seem likely that a new diagram was provided with the new frame. From a cartographic point of view disc 10 should be the other side of 12. Regards Martin

Unfortunately the wording of the proposal doesn't fully explain the situation, it should have added "if the train has not been accepted by the box in advance and line clear given on the block instrument". The effect of the LC release overrides the berth track circuit occupation release on the home signal lock allowing it to be pulled before the starting signal. Given the propensity of the LMS for sequential locking it has to be this way. It was presumed that given a clear run a signalman would have no need to not pull off all the signals, which is the slight loop hole still present. One manufacturer of Lock and Block systems not mentioned was Tyers and although not as common as Sykes was much used by the Caledonian Rly especially in the Glasgow area. Regards Martin

Mike This was a practice introduced by the LNER, the E&G had a number of boxes with this function, Bo'ness Junction is one that springs to mind and there were no doubt many others. I can't bring to mind any Southern examples either. Regards Martin