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

[Traintresta]

On 21/10/2021 at 12:51, rodent279 said:

Certainly the railcar fleet was more successful on the whole than the loco fleet from the same era. As above, the biggest single issue was poor riding from bogies that didn't wear very well.

 

But going back to locos, what I was trying to get at in my earlier post about class 37 v class 40, was that possibly a batch of 200 class 37's would have been a better bet than 200 class 40's. Sounds like they'd have managed more or less as well on heavy freights, and on fast passenger trains as class 40's.

 

So let's imagine that the pilot scheme resulted in say 10 class 40's and (eventually) 500 class 37's. What about the type 1 & 2's?

 

A large batch of 20's would certainly have been sensible, but perhaps spilt into single cab 1000 bhp and double cab with the more powerful 8CVST engine fitted in the Portuguese 1400's. This would give a type 1 and a type 2 based on proven EE engine technology.

 

To avoid single sourcing, and to keep EE on their toes, a similar thing could be done with the Sulzer engine as a platform. After evaluating the class 24 & 26's, a large batch of what we know as class 27's would be built, instead of nearly 500 class 24/5 clones. These could be split into no heat 60mph freight, and boilered 80mph passenger versions. Add to that a batch of class 33's and you've got an alternative type 3, with ETH.

 

That then leaves the type 4/5 requirement, which could have been met with a common bodyshell & running gear based on what became the class 47, with a batch fitted with EE engines and transmission, and a batch with Sulzer engines & CP/Brush transmission.

 

This could certainly have been feasible, but even more so it's odd that EE didn't offer a 12CSVT rated at 2000hp in a 37 type body, as it's type 4 offering.  That sort of package was already available as evidenced by the LMS Twins and the prototype Deltic.  They could even have offered a 2400hp 16CSVT in the same sort of package and probably still had a much lighter and more powerful loco than the 1Co-Co1's.  I really like the class 40's, but can't help but wonder what could have been?  Had the LNER followed through on the order for 25 mainline diesels for the ECML, these may well have been in the format of the class 40 and we could have seen the newer designs afterall.

 

What really baffles me, is that BR insisted on taking de-rated EE engines but pushed the Sulzer beyond what turned out to be reasonable.  EE had a proven track record in export models and could have provided some really solid and powerful loco's for a fairly reasonable weight.  A lot of wasted time could have been avoided with the Class 47 saga if they had chosen the 16CSVTor a complete EE package instead of going around the houses and then going back to EE for the class 50 when they needed something similar.

 

With the EE products directed at the type 4 power range, we might have seen more of the Sulzer type 3 arrangements in both BR and BRCW locos.  What would have become of the BR/Sulzer type 4 though, perhaps they would have been forced to find a similar solution and the class 45, or probably 46 might have become something similar to what the 47 was?   I still feel the Brush type 2's should have received a 12LDA or 12LVA engine and become a type 4 instead of building the class 47.

 

As for the EE type 1, I think that would always have had to be re-packaged into a centre cab or more realistically a Baby Deltic style body.  I'm not sure you could mount the engine low enough to make an effective centre cab.  Given that the Baby Deltic body was made slightly heavier to compensate for the lower engine weight, I'm sure they could make it of standard construction and mount an 8CSVT for a similar loco with a much more reliable power source.  I do think there would still be Sulzer offerings in this power range, purely to meet the demand and keep BR workshops in work, particularly since the smaller Sulzer's seemed less prone to trouble.

 

 

Edited October 22, 2021 by Traintresta

[Steven B]

As much as I like them, the Type 1s were built for traffic that soon disappeared from the network - local pick-up freight. The only reason the class 20s hung on was that as a pair they provided a nice 2000hp for freight work - class 40 power but with better route availability.

 

With hindsight no Type 1s were really needed. The gap created by not building 200+ class 20s should have been filled with more class 25s, 33s & 37s.

 

Steven B.

[Titan]

2 hours ago, kevinlms said:

The main problem was that significant rust had set in during the sea voyage. Surely it ought to be possible to reduce the effects of rust - paint?

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victorian_Railways_R_class#Production

 

No, the main problem was they were built by North British, to quote the relevant part of the wiki article in full:

 

Further delays were experienced once the locomotives finally arrived from May 1951 onwards. Corrosion had already set in during their sea voyage as deck cargo from Scotland to Australia, and there were numerous manufacturing defects requiring rectification.

 

Whilst the rust was no doubt a problem,  many parts required extensive rework before the locos were put into service.  And most likely the rust was only a problem because NB did not paint or grease the parts properly.

[Titan]

36 minutes ago, Steven B said:

 

With hindsight no Type 1s were really needed. The gap created by not building 200+ class 20s should have been filled with more class 25s, 33s & 37s.

 

Steven B.

 

Whilst the first sentence is true,  the class 20 must have been the cheapest main line loco that BR purchased and certainly a lot cheaper than any type 2 having no steam heat boiler and just one cab.  They were undoubtably a more economic option both in purchase and maintenance, and being the most powerful type 1 handled freight traffic extremely well for what they were.  To quote the 1990 Toton Fleet Engineer "Class 20's will shift anything...  slowly!"

[johnofwessex]

My suggestion might be to keep on building the LMS twin design and dieselising by area, concentrating on areas where the greatest savings could be made, eg where double heading was needed for example GWR lines west of Taunton or the WCML beyond Preston

[Pandora]

Michael Bonavia , author of British Rail - The First 25 Years, Doctor Bonavia was Secretary to the Executive for many years, his knowledge of events as an insider  extensive , few were  closer to the Inner Temple   than Bonavia,   the book contains many insights into the formative years of the nationalised BR,  the chapter "Messing with Diesels" Bonavia laments, the Executive failing to develop a decisive  traction policy (7 years wasted, 1948 to 1955) , failing  to properly study the operation of  LMS 10000/1 and the Bulleid diesels for the case for dieselisation, specifically  he laments the shelving of the 1947 LNER fleet of 25  2000 bhp diesels  for the ECML ,  in particular he viewed the LNER fleet   as an  "oven-ready"   Pilot Scheme  in advance of the 1955 plan

Edited October 23, 2021 by Pandora

[kevinlms]

14 hours ago, johnofwessex said:

My suggestion might be to keep on building the LMS twin design and dieselising by area, concentrating on areas where the greatest savings could be made, eg where double heading was needed for example GWR lines west of Taunton or the WCML beyond Preston

The problem was that the LMS Twins were too heavy for the power. The Class 40s proved the weakness and they were better than the twins.

[kevinlms]

20 hours ago, Titan said:

 

No, the main problem was they were built by North British, to quote the relevant part of the wiki article in full:

 

Further delays were experienced once the locomotives finally arrived from May 1951 onwards. Corrosion had already set in during their sea voyage as deck cargo from Scotland to Australia, and there were numerous manufacturing defects requiring rectification.

 

Whilst the rust was no doubt a problem,  many parts required extensive rework before the locos were put into service.  And most likely the rust was only a problem because NB did not paint or grease the parts properly.

But generally poor quality from North British. Just as well the LMS Royal Scots or the W.D. locos had presumably built to a much better standard.

 

Added comments.

The Newport Railway workshops was a top quality organisation at the period and I suspect they would have been a bit disappointed with their purchases, but they would have made sure the job was done properly before they left.

 

Newport had built some of the Australian Standard Garratts during WW2 (which had admittedly been built in a hurry), but they were so unhappy with the end product, that they refused to fit works plates to their construction.

Edited October 23, 2021 by kevinlms
More info

[Nearholmer]

14 minutes ago, kevinlms said:

The problem was that the LMS Twins were too heavy for the power.

Power/weight ratio was central to the diesel question pretty much all the way through to the 1970s in the case of machines to haul the fastest heavy trains. This wasn’t a uniquely British challenge, but it seems to have dogged the whole subject in this country in a way that it didn’t quite seem to elsewhere. I’ve not quite got to the bottom of why. Clearly our tight loading gauge imposed physical size limits, but I’m not aware that our allowable axle loadings were significantly less than those elsewhere, or that our load/schedule combinations were more aggressive (they might have been, because of the closeness of cities) ……. I need to delve further into this.

[Titan]

1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

 but I’m not aware that our allowable axle loadings were significantly less than those elsewhere, or that our load/schedule combinations were more aggressive (they might have been, because of the closeness of cities) ……. I need to delve further into this.

 

I don't think anyone ran their diesel locomotives as hard or as fast as BR, most other countries had the sense to use electrics for high speed, or lightweight diesel railcars.  I have heard a story that the German Engineers were invited over to try and help with warship reliability issues, as their V200's did not have problems.  They were aghast at the weight of the trains, the high speeds and the schedules they were expected to keep, requiring continuous periods of full power, followed by a period of idling as the train slowed and stopped at a station.  The V200's never had such severe thermal cycling thrust upon them. The conclusion was that the V200's were more reliable because DB weren't thrashing the pants off them.  Unfortunately for BR they had to do more with fewer locos as BR could not afford to buy any more.  It is rather surprising the Deltics were as reliable as they were as they were thrashed more than any other, and whilst maintenance costs were high they somehow managed to do the job, at least most of the time.

[MarkC]

40 minutes ago, Titan said:

It is rather surprising the Deltics were as reliable as they were as they were thrashed more than any other, and whilst maintenance costs were high they somehow managed to do the job, at least most of the time.

That might have been due to the duty cycle suiting the 2-stroke engine - Deltics were usually running at very high power settings for prolonged periods of time, thus keeping the engines & exhausts clear of buildups of carbon deposits, unburnt fuel etc....

 

The opposite was true for the duty cycles of the Baby Deltics, being used, in the main, on frequently stopping services. No wonder they had engine issues.

[Titan]

58 minutes ago, MarkC said:

That might have been due to the duty cycle suiting the 2-stroke engine - Deltics were usually running at very high power settings for prolonged periods of time, thus keeping the engines & exhausts clear of buildups of carbon deposits, unburnt fuel etc....

 

The opposite was true for the duty cycles of the Baby Deltics, being used, in the main, on frequently stopping services. No wonder they had engine issues.

 

Unfortunately not.  One of the significant problems Deltics had was build up of oil and carbon in the exhaust, leading to the characteristic smoky exhaust and a high incidence of exhaust fires, probably worse than any other class, exactly the opposite of what you describe.  if they were kept at full power they would eventually run clear, but it would take a long time and as soon as the engines returned to idle the exhausts would fill up with oil again.

 

The biggest problem with the baby Deltics was not the engines, but the poor design of the auxiliaries which often led to engine problems - e.g. failure of radiator drives leading to severe overheating and seizure of the engine, so there were often engine failures which weren't the engines fault.  Once they were refurbished by EE to fix the issues,  they were very much better, despite there being very little in the way of engine modification or change of duty.  They then ended up being withdrawn due to being non-standard and a very small class, rather than any serious reliability issues.

Edited October 23, 2021 by Titan

[kevinlms]

3 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

Power/weight ratio was central to the diesel question pretty much all the way through to the 1970s in the case of machines to haul the fastest heavy trains. This wasn’t a uniquely British challenge, but it seems to have dogged the whole subject in this country in a way that it didn’t quite seem to elsewhere. I’ve not quite got to the bottom of why. Clearly our tight loading gauge imposed physical size limits, but I’m not aware that our allowable axle loadings were significantly less than those elsewhere, or that our load/schedule combinations were more aggressive (they might have been, because of the closeness of cities) ……. I need to delve further into this.

I suspect a lot to do with it, was mostly because the British had a long history of trying to do the task with the smallest, least powerful locomotive possible and at the lowest possible fuel cost.

 

Hence why the Midland had nothing bigger than 4-4-0s for it's passenger services. This continued into LMS days, where they avoided building the largest locos, only ever building 52 of them.

Whereas the LNER which ran trains over similar distances, built over 200 Pacific's.

 

This practice continued into BR modernisation days with 100s of Bo-Bos built of modest power.

[MarkC]

15 minutes ago, Titan said:

 

Unfortunately not.  One of the significant problems Deltics had was build up of oil and carbon in the exhaust, leading to the characteristic smoky exhaust and a high incidence of exhaust fires, probably worse than any other class, exactly the opposite of what you describe.  if they were kept at full power they would eventually run clear, but it would take a long time and as soon as the engines returned to idle the exhausts would fill up with oil again.

 

The biggest problem with the baby Deltics was not the engines, but the poor design of the auxiliaries which often led to engine problems - e.g. failure of radiator drives leading to severe overheating and seizure of the engine, so there were often engine failures which weren't the engines fault.  Once they were refurbished by EE to fix the issues,  they were very much better, despite there being very little in the way of engine modification or change of duty.  They then ended up being withdrawn due to being non-standard and a very small class, rather than any serious reliability issues.

The joys of 2-strokes - look at what happened to D9009 a few years ago. Ran down to London LE after some maintenance, straight on to a charter heading to Edinburgh (Tornado did the return leg), but came to a stand at Stevenage with a serious exhaust fire, thanks to unburnt fuel accumulating in the exhaust lines. In squadron service the big 'uns were on high power for long periods - that's what they were built for - but yes, even after only a few minutes idling, initial restarts were, well, "clagtastic"...

 

I spent several years with 1950s technology American marine 2-strokes. We had problems after periods of low load operation too. Awful things.

 

I understand that modern 2-strokes such as those fitted to the 66s compensate at low load by shutting off fuel to one bank of cylinders. Such a concept was unknown when the Deltic engines were designed.

[Titan]

1 hour ago, kevinlms said:

I suspect a lot to do with it, was mostly because the British had a long history of trying to do the task with the smallest, least powerful locomotive possible and at the lowest possible fuel cost.

 

Hence why the Midland had nothing bigger than 4-4-0s for it's passenger services. This continued into LMS days, where they avoided building the largest locos, only ever building 52 of them.

Whereas the LNER which ran trains over similar distances, built over 200 Pacific's.

 

This practice continued into BR modernisation days with 100s of Bo-Bos built of modest power.

 

I think the Midland small engine policy has been badly misunderstood,  the reasoning behind it was nothing to do with your first paragraph.  Instead of infrequent heavy trains, it was policy to run more frequent short trains.  The idea being that say instead of running at say hourly intervals, they could provide the same number of seats overall by running say a half hourly service instead of an hourly service, but with fewer carriages.  More frequent trains = better service for the passenger and running more trains than the competition meant you could pick up some of their passengers by having more convenient departure and arrival times.  Building big locos for short trains would not have made sense.  For the few long trains they may have run, they could double head rather than just building a small number of big locos to handle them on their own.  Of course when the policy changed the motive power was no longer appropriate.

Edited October 23, 2021 by Titan

[Pandora]

12 minutes ago, Titan said:

 

I think the Midland small engine policy has been badly misunderstood,  the reasoning behind it was nothing to do with your first paragraph.  Instead of infrequent heavy trains, it was policy to run more frequent short trains.  The idea being that say instead of running at say hourly intervals, they could provide the same number of seats overall by running say a half hourly service instead of an hourly service, but with fewer carriages.  More frequent trains = better service for the passenger and running more trains than the competition meant you could pick up some of their passengers by having more convenient departure and arrival times.  Building big locos for short trains would not have made sense.  For the few long trains they may have run, they could double head rather than just building a small number of big locos to handle them on their own.  Of course when the policy changed the motive power was no longer appropriate.

The grouping of the LNWR/L&Y and the Midland placed   cats and dogs in the same cage,  the Midland won the Boardroom and Midland thinking under Sir Guy Granet ran the LMSR show, Granet ( a Barrister) had a low opinion of engineers, the Granet policy of not approving infrastructure upgrades to  bridges etc was the reason behind the  lightweight trains and the urgent call for Stanier in the 1930s

[Allegheny1600]

5 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

Power/weight ratio was central to the diesel question pretty much all the way through to the 1970s in the case of machines to haul the fastest heavy trains. This wasn’t a uniquely British challenge, but it seems to have dogged the whole subject in this country in a way that it didn’t quite seem to elsewhere. I’ve not quite got to the bottom of why. Clearly our tight loading gauge imposed physical size limits, but I’m not aware that our allowable axle loadings were significantly less than those elsewhere, or that our load/schedule combinations were more aggressive (they might have been, because of the closeness of cities) ……. I need to delve further into this.

As far as I know, the usual British axle loading limit was 25 tons whereas in Europe it was typically 22.5 tons so that wasn’t the problem.

Both are a very far cry from some American roads though, they go over 35 tons!

[johnofwessex]

6 hours ago, kevinlms said:

The problem was that the LMS Twins were too heavy for the power. The Class 40s proved the weakness and they were better than the twins.

 

While they were not lightweights they weighed in about the same as a Black 5, and of course while not perfect in that respect at least the process would have started

[RJS1977]

17 hours ago, Titan said:

 

I think the Midland small engine policy has been badly misunderstood,  the reasoning behind it was nothing to do with your first paragraph.  Instead of infrequent heavy trains, it was policy to run more frequent short trains.  The idea being that say instead of running at say hourly intervals, they could provide the same number of seats overall by running say a half hourly service instead of an hourly service, but with fewer carriages.  More frequent trains = better service for the passenger and running more trains than the competition meant you could pick up some of their passengers by having more convenient departure and arrival times.  Building big locos for short trains would not have made sense.  For the few long trains they may have run, they could double head rather than just building a small number of big locos to handle them on their own.  Of course when the policy changed the motive power was no longer appropriate.

 

Which was pretty much the thought process behind Cross Country's "Operation Princess" a century later!

[Traintresta]

On 23/10/2021 at 09:31, Pandora said:

Michael Bonavia , author of British Rail - The First 25 Years, Doctor Bonavia was Secretary to the Executive for many years, his knowledge of events as an insider  extensive , few were  closer to the Inner Temple   than Bonavia,   the book contains many insights into the formative years of the nationalised BR,  the chapter "Messing with Diesels" Bonavia laments, the Executive failing to develop a decisive  traction policy (7 years wasted, 1948 to 1955) , failing  to properly study the operation of  LMS 10000/1 and the Bulleid diesels for the case for dieselisation, specifically  he laments the shelving of the 1947 LNER fleet of 25  2000 bhp diesels  for the ECML ,  in particular he viewed the LNER fleet   as an  "oven-ready"   Pilot Scheme  in advance of the 1955 plan

Sounds very much like what I was thinking.

 

On 23/10/2021 at 16:09, Titan said:

 

Unfortunately not.  One of the significant problems Deltics had was build up of oil and carbon in the exhaust, leading to the characteristic smoky exhaust and a high incidence of exhaust fires, probably worse than any other class, exactly the opposite of what you describe.  if they were kept at full power they would eventually run clear, but it would take a long time and as soon as the engines returned to idle the exhausts would fill up with oil again.

 

The biggest problem with the baby Deltics was not the engines, but the poor design of the auxiliaries which often led to engine problems - e.g. failure of radiator drives leading to severe overheating and seizure of the engine, so there were often engine failures which weren't the engines fault.  Once they were refurbished by EE to fix the issues,  they were very much better, despite there being very little in the way of engine modification or change of duty.  They then ended up being withdrawn due to being non-standard and a very small class, rather than any serious reliability issues.

It's a shame they weren't repeated.  It's also a shame the EE CSUT engine didn't get passed the development stage.

[Pandora]

On 23/10/2021 at 09:31, Pandora said:

Michael Bonavia , author of British Rail - The First 25 Years, Doctor Bonavia was Secretary to the Executive for many years, his knowledge of events as an insider  extensive , few were  closer to the Inner Temple   than Bonavia,   the book contains many insights into the formative years of the nationalised BR,  the chapter "Messing with Diesels" Bonavia laments, the Executive failing to develop a decisive  traction policy (7 years wasted, 1948 to 1955) , failing  to properly study the operation of  LMS 10000/1 and the Bulleid diesels for the case for dieselisation, specifically  he laments the shelving of the 1947 LNER fleet of 25  2000 bhp diesels  for the ECML ,  in particular he viewed the LNER fleet   as an  "oven-ready"   Pilot Scheme  in advance of the 1955 plan

It has taken a while , but I have tracked down a definitive statement concerning the 1947 LNER ECML diesel scheme.

The memorandum printed as appendix 2 of A History of the LNER Volume 3 The Last Years 1939-48 by Michael Bonavia is the "smoking gun", Appendix 2 is the Memorandum dated 24th July 1947 from the CMGO ( assumed to  be the Committee of General Managers Office) to the Joint Locomotive and Traffic Committees. Bonavia purposely reproduced the document as a lasting record so that it would be known  the scrapping of this well-thought out scheme were  the occupants of 222 Marylebone Road,  Bonavia described the pilot scheme of 1955 diesels as a "disorderly scramble", had the 1947 scheme not been confined to the Marylebone dustbin, a possible 10 to 12 million miles of passenger train diesel operation would have accrued  by the fleet between 1950 and 1955, the fleet would have worked  500 ton express passenger train diagrams over the mainlines  between London and Edinburgh and return, a small  number of turns extended  to Aberdeen, and  shorter turns between  London to Grantham or  Doncaster. Predicted annual mileage for the fleet as 2.46 million miles

Reading the comprehensive report, too much to reproduce here, it is indeed a major oversight of judgement by Marylebone Road, had the scheme gone ahead,  much of the "botch" may have been averted.

Judgement: 1955 Pilot Scheme "Botched".  Guilty as the Crime as Charged!

Edited October 25, 2021 by Pandora

[russ p]

8 minutes ago, Pandora said:

It has taken a while , but I have tracked down a definitive statement concerning the 1947 LNER ECML diesel scheme.

The memorandum printed as appendix 2 of A History of the LNER Volume 3 The Last Years 1939-48 by Michael Bonavia is the "smoking gun", Appendix 2 is the Memorandum dated 24th July 1947 from the CMGO ( assumed to  be the Committee of General Managers Office) to the Joint Locomotive and Traffic Committees. Bonavia purposely reproduced the document as a lasting record so that it would be known the the scrapping of this well-thought out scheme were  the occupants of 222 Marylebone Road,  Bonavia described the pilot scheme of 1955 diesels as a "disorderly scramble", had the 1947 scheme not been confined to the Marylebone dustbin, a possible 10 to 12 million miles of passenger train diesel operation would have accrued  by the fleet between 1950 and 1955, the fleet would have worked  500 ton express passenger train diagrams over the mainlines  between London and Edinburgh and return, a small  number of turns extended  to Aberdeen, and  shorter turns between  London to Grantham or  Doncaster. Predicted annual mileage for the fleet as 2.46 million miles

Reading the comprehensive report, too much to reproduce here, it is indeed a major oversight of judgement by Marylebone Road, had the scheme gone ahead,  much of the "botch" may have been averted.

Judgement: 1955 Pilot Scheme "Botched".  Guilty as the Crime as Charged!

 

I've read somewhere that the LNER diesels were to be single ended is there any drawings of them?

[Titan]

17 minutes ago, russ p said:

 

I've read somewhere that the LNER diesels were to be single ended is there any drawings of them?

 

I am sure I have seen some somewhere. IIRC they had 12 cylinder Sulzers, possibly an A1A-A1A wheel arrangement and were to be run in pairs on express passenger. 

[Pandora]

On 20/02/2018 at 15:50, Nearholmer said:

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

Bonavia :  A History of the LNER the Final Years 1939 to 45 reproduces in verbatim the LNER Report dated 24th  July 1947 for the 1947 LNER diesel scheme as an appendix to the volume.

[Pandora]

22 minutes ago, Titan said:

 

I am sure I have seen some somewhere. IIRC they had 12 cylinder Sulzers, possibly an A1A-A1A wheel arrangement and were to be run in pairs on express passenger. 

The  information in the memorandum tabulates   diesels of 1000 hp, 1600 hp, 2000 hp, but focuses on 6-axle 1600 hp of which   4 axles are powered, the memorandum mentions the  Ivatt LMS diesels  (10000/10001) of 1600hp,  perhaps the LNER planned to use the same English Electric engines as the LMS twins

Edited October 25, 2021 by Pandora