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

[Zomboid]

I like the "what if?" thought experiment of not having nationalisation before dieselisation. Would the GWR have still gone with DH, and without it being "non standard" would they have persevered? Would the LMS have developed the twins (and wasn't The Wonder Loco an LMS design too?), and what would they have ended up with. I highly doubt the Southern would have ended up with malachite green 33s, but what would they have done?

 

The idea of how their branding would have evolved over the years of interesting too. For example I doubt that by the 1980s the GWR would have lined green copper topped diesels pulling chocolate & cream carriages, they'd have updated their image throughout the 50s, 60s and 70s like BR did.

Edited November 2, 2021 by Zomboid

[rodent279]

28 minutes ago, Zomboid said:

I like the "what if?" thought experiment of not having nationalisation before dieselisation. Would the GWR have still gone with DH, and without it being "non standard" would they have persevered? Would the LMS have developed the twins (and wasn't The Wonder Loco an LMS design too?), and what would they have ended up with. I highly doubt the Southern would have ended up with malachite green 33s, but what would they have done?

 

The idea of how their branding would have evolved over the years of interesting too. For example I doubt that by the 1980s the GWR would have lined green copper topped diesels pulling chocolate & cream carriages, they'd have updated their image throughout the 50s, 60s and 70s like BR did.

I reckon the big 4 would have co-operated together a lot more than they did pre-war. Maybe not to the extent of pooling all traction, but maybe there could have been collaboration on  some common user diesels to take advantage of the ability to run further without changing locos. I certainly think there would have been a common pool of "go anywhere" stock that would probably not have been much different to the mk1.

Maybe the SR would have still gone for ED's, and maybe the 33's would have been given an EE engine-something like a class 31 engine?

[Traintresta]

42 minutes ago, jcm@gwr said:

 

Why would you need to 'reconcile the two', they could/should be considered as additions,

not alternatives, or replacements

Because as a modelling venture I would feel the need to commit to one or the other versions of history.

[Zomboid]

9 minutes ago, rodent279 said:

Maybe the SR would have still gone for ED's, and maybe the 33's would have been given an EE engine-something like a class 31 engine?

Was the Southern's use of 33s down to the Exeter line being transferred to the WR. If they'd remained independent then presumably that wouldn't have happened and they'd instead have needed type 4 power for that. Probably more stuff based on the Bulleid diesels, with a lighter class for going beyond Exeter.

 

Of course, without nationalisation chances are Bulleid would have stayed in post for longer, so who knows what madness might have ensued.

[Nearholmer]

The SR was, like the LMS, postulating four broad classes of diesel:

 

- unit passenger trains, for branch line use in the SR case, and definitely DEMU. The 2H/3H/3D that emerged was pretty much what they had in mind, with high interchangeability of parts with EMUs;

 

- shunters;

 

- a light road loco that could replace 0-6-0 and Mogul. The Bulleid 0-6-0D was a bash, but they had sketched out Bo-Bo DE of better power rating, and my bet is that they would have bought either a proto-Class  20 from EE, or a baby Sulzer like the first Irish pair, at about 600-800hp. The latter would naturally have evolved into the Class 33. 

- a beefy express passenger loco, which would have flowed from what they did build.

 

Its difficult to guess whether the ED would have emerged, because their Plan A was to put tramway wire up over reception sidings at yards for the big electric locos, and their overall electrification plan was much more aggressive than BR managed. Everything from the Bournemouth Line eastwards, bar some small branches, was going to be electric by c1960, so the diesel fleet would have been focused in the west.

 

I don’t buy the idea of motive power pooling between the Big 4, but they were already sharing knowledge very freely, both directly, and through the loco builders and the engineering institutions, so I can envisage standard specifications emerging (BS nnnn:1954 “Diesel Electric Railway Locomotives”), as a way of helping loco builders avoid inefficient multi-versity of designs and as a platform for exporting. A BS, containing a set of standard duty cycles and tests would have been mega-useful to everybody. There was precedent in the form of the Indian Standards for steam locos. Doubtless the problem would have been Swindon!

 

PS: I just remembered this 1947 poster, the diesel loco in which may owe more to the artist’s imagination than anything else, but does look rather good!

 

 

 

 

Edited November 2, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Zomboid]

Looks like it's what they hoped the Bulleid diesels would look like. They hadn't actually built them by 1947 so the true appearance was still something of an unknown.

 

Does look pretty good for a British late 40s design, though the LMS locos were more aesthetically pleasing... (The Americans on the other hand had F units and Alco PA/FAs around that time, which knock everything we've ever come up with into a cocked hat, aesthetically speaking).

Edited November 2, 2021 by Zomboid

[Nearholmer]

10 hours ago, Zomboid said:

Looks like it's what they hoped the Bulleid diesels would look like. They hadn't actually built them by 1947 so the true appearance was still something of an unknown

You’re probably right. I think it’s meant to be a double-heading pair. It’s not that dissimilar to what emerged, I suppose, and it seems to have the right number of wheels.

 

Whenever to the topic drifts towards the SR postwar plans, I do get awfully tempted to create a “what if not nationalised” layout based on what they did put in writing, plus educated guesswork. Worting Junction c1958 I think, with the Southampton/Bournemouth route already electrified, the Salisbury route in transition steam-diesel, and the odd (bound to be odd) through working headed by GWR modern traction. This would need to be the size of a badminton court, even in old-fashioned 0, and tin-bashing the stock would take a lifetime, so it ain’t gonna happen, of course!

[Pandora]

LMS 10000/1 were Ivatt locos but far-sighted Fairburn, who died in office  at only 58 years of age had made the proposals,  LMS 10000/1 were far closer to the mark than the Bulleid diesels,  10000/1 were "almost" a class 37 which had 12 cylinders and 1750 bhp  under the bonnet and 15 tons lighter.  It is a pity the BTC did not buy a fleet based on 10000/1. Again another "botch" at 222 Marylebone Road

Edited November 3, 2021 by Pandora

[BernardTPM]

11 hours ago, Zomboid said:

Looks like it's what they hoped the Bulleid diesels would look like. They hadn't actually built them by 1947 so the true appearance was still something of an unknown.

 

44 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

You’re probably right. I think it’s meant to be a double-heading pair. It’s not that dissimilar to what emerged, I suppose, and it seems to have the right number of wheels.

The biggest difference seems to be putting in the narrow door which made the windows smaller and squarer. Looks better with the wider windows though. Given how little these connections were ever used they seem to have been quite an obsession up to the late '50s.

[Nearholmer]

 

49 minutes ago, Pandora said:

LMS 10000/1 were far closer to the mark than the Bulleid diesels

You do need to factor axle-loadings and other track-force issues into all this. I’m not sure how much of the p.way of Britain’s main-lines was up to the forces of the LMS twins, although it does look with hindsight as if the Bulleid 1-Co bogie, which was thought jolly clever at the time (it is actually jolly clever!) was sort-of self-defeating in weight terms.

 

It does all spin inexorably back towards power/weight ratio, and the added weight of steam heating kit, though. Everybody was struggling to get a British express train’s worth of power into a single package, and the operating model of having a few, hugely heavy, premium trains on each main route everyday, rather than more, but lighter, ones with super-swift turnarounds, was very deep-rooted.

 

No question that, taken in the round, the LMS team were very good on diesels, though. Their whole programme was well-structured, and appropriately resourced. right from the early 1930s, their only real miss-step being the engine in 10800, which may have been a commercial/political

one. A logical thing for the Ivatt diesel society to do would be to name their replica “Tommy Hornbuckle”, because he was the engineer who actually led most of it (he was theoretically retired, and acting as a consultant, post -WW2).

 

By comparison, the Southern was very heavily electrification focused through the 1930s (The LMS were no slouches there either - the Wirral scheme was very good!), and Bulleid seems to have been a sort of “Jack in the box genius”, at a time when maybe that wasn’t quite what was needed. Maybe the SR division of M from E at senior engineering level didn’t help, by very slightly impeding integration of design, too.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited November 3, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Zomboid]

28 minutes ago, BernardTPM said:

 

The biggest difference seems to be putting in the narrow door which made the windows smaller and squarer. Looks better with the wider windows though. Given how little these connections were ever used they seem to have been quite an obsession up to the late '50s.

It seems that 10203 didn't have the door, and looks a lot neater as a result. Though they didn't fully take advantage of that, styling-wise.

[russ p]

14 minutes ago, Zomboid said:

It seems that 10203 didn't have the door, and looks a lot neater as a result. Though they didn't fully take advantage of that, styling-wise.

 

I'm not sure 10203 had multi working equipment. I believe it had an air operated throttle similar to blue star 

[Nearholmer]

Wasn’t it only 10201 that had the door? Or were the doors welded-up at some stage?

 

Anyway, Herge liked the doors, and seems to have used 10201 as the archetypal modern British loco in “L’ile Noire”.

 

 

Edited November 3, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Zomboid]

8 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Wasn’t it only 10201 that had the door?

How pointless would that be if not even 10202 had it... So you're probably right.

[Mike_Walker]

Just looked at photos in my collection.  10201 and 10202 both had doors throughout their lives, 10203 never did.

[rodent279]

1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

 

You do need to factor axle-loadings and other track-force issues into all this. I’m not sure how much of the p.way of Britain’s main-lines was up to the forces of the LMS twins, although it does look with hindsight as if the Bulleid 1-Co bogie, which was thought jolly clever at the time (it is actually jolly clever!) was sort-of self-defeating in weight terms.

 

It does all spin inexorably back towards power/weight ratio, and the added weight of steam heating kit, though. Everybody was struggling to get a British express train’s worth of power into a single package, and the operating model of having a few, hugely heavy, premium trains on each main route everyday, rather than more, but lighter, ones with super-swift turnarounds, was very deep-rooted.

 

No question that, taken in the round, the LMS team were very good on diesels, though. Their whole programme was well-structured, and appropriately resourced. right from the early 1930s, their only real miss-step being the engine in 10800, which may have been a commercial/political

one. A logical thing for the Ivatt diesel society to do would be to name their replica “Tommy Hornbuckle”, because he was the engineer who actually led most of it (he was theoretically retired, and acting as a consultant, post -WW2).

 

By comparison, the Southern was very heavily electrification focused through the 1930s (The LMS were no slouches there either - the Wirral scheme was very good!), and Bulleid seems to have been a sort of “Jack in the box genius”, at a time when maybe that wasn’t quite what was needed. Maybe the SR division of M from E at senior engineering level didn’t help, by very slightly impeding integration of design, too.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I thought 10800 was deemed reasonably successful - it lasted 10 years?

[Nearholmer]

It was, it did, and it led to series builds, but even the “next generation” version of the engine used in the latter was probably over-complex and expensive to maintain, which I think is why the 15/16 got junked, and the 20s survived for so much longer.

[russ p]

52 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Wasn’t it only 10201 that had the door? Or were the doors welded-up at some stage?

 

Anyway, Herge liked the doors, and seems to have used 10201 as the archetypal modern British loco in “L’ile Noire”.

 

 

 

Oh it was dual braked ....... not! Shunter wants a form one for using wrong coupling. 

 

Getting back to it ,the doors on 1 and 2 seem to have been messed around with over the years.  Some pictures they seem to have quite bulky doors and others fairly flush fitting 

[Zomboid]

9 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

It was, it did, and it led to series builds, but even the “next generation” version of the engine used in the latter was probably over-complex and expensive to maintain, which I think is why the 15/16 got junked, and the 20s survived for so much longer.

I always thought those had an awful lot of cylinders for not very much power.

 

If have liked to see a 10800/ 15/ 16 style loco with a 6LDA though. A bit more power, and the geep style hood body, and a 25 sounds great when working hard. Such a machine could probably have housed an 8LDA, too, since there seems to be enough room to have a party inside the engine room of a 33 (I'm more used to the cramped interior of a 45 with that big wide engine).

[mdvle]

On 02/11/2021 at 08:38, Nearholmer said:

I don’t buy the idea of motive power pooling between the Big 4, but they were already sharing knowledge very freely, both directly, and through the loco builders and the engineering institutions, so I can envisage standard specifications emerging (BS nnnn:1954 “Diesel Electric Railway Locomotives”), as a way of helping loco builders avoid inefficient multi-versity of designs and as a platform for exporting. A BS, containing a set of standard duty cycles and tests would have been mega-useful to everybody. There was precedent in the form of the Indian Standards for steam locos. Doubtless the problem would have been Swindon!

 

I agree motive power pooling would seem unlikely, but I think things would still have followed what happened elsewhere in the world - the shift of power from railways to the loco sellers - resulting in an enforced standardization even if they still paid for unique shells.

 

But there would have been changes - perhaps as noted by someone else an equivalent to the Mk1 coming along anyway - simply because the biggest threat to the railways in the bus/car/lorry and the road network would have still happened - and this in turn would have forced cooperation between them and a search for cost efficiencies.

[62613]

On 31/10/2021 at 08:20, rockershovel said:

An interesting thought. No 2 Son has recently changed jobs, going from a job with an established motor manufacturer to a start-up company which is aiming for a significantly different model - essentially developing and supplying transmission and running-gear modules to assembler-manufacturers producing specialised vehicles. I await the outcome with considerable interest. It's instructive, if not necessarily encouraging that their finance comes from outside the UK. 

 

British management practices simply don't work, and ceased to do so a long time ago. The collapse of North British was followed by the motorcycle sector. The collapse of the motor industry was certain once it committed to a programme of "old wine in new bottles" in the 1970s.

 

I've seen it in the oil and gas sector, where companies like Statoil prospered mightily from the North Sea. Where's OUR Statoil? 

 

I've just started a new job, which has had the unforeseen effect of bringing me into a staff role for a British civil engineering contractor. I've been through an extended programme (best part of two weeks) of induction, most of it consisting of virtue-signalling and halo-polishing, plus various things I really don't need to know or be involved in at my level. As for things I actually need to know to do my job, I've largely been left to my own devices. It's clear that the department I've joined, have a lot to do catching up things which should have been part of the original plan. Ho hum, plus ca change...

Wasn't it called Britoil, and wasn't it privatised in 1980 or 1981?

[rockershovel]

1 hour ago, 62613 said:

Wasn't it called Britoil, and wasn't it privatised in 1980 or 1981?

Originally BNOC (British National Oil Company), it was subdivided so that the profitable, trading part could be sold off and the taxpayer left with the exploration and development costs.

 

Plus ca change... the government partly privatised THAT in the early 80s, then sold their controlling stake as soon as the ink was dry on the promise not to do any such thing. 

 

Lord Browne, much caressed by the politicians then and since, was installed at BP with a brief to drive a policy of growth by acquisition; however the oil price collapse of the mid-80s detailed that little game...

 

 

[Nearholmer]

5 hours ago, mdvle said:

would still have followed what happened elsewhere in the world - the shift of power from railways to the loco sellers -

It’s worth considering that electric traction, and the associated infrastructure, has always been “manufacturer led”.
 

Even the railways that electrified most enthusiastically, the various bits of the underground, and the southern, had no real in-house electrical manufacturing capability, and all electric railways everywhere (someone will now disprove that) have formed what amount to symbiotic relationships with external industry.

 

And, that works fine.

 

So, buying “modern traction” from external industry wasn’t such a leap. The leap (in the dark) was drawing into that process external suppliers who had no real grounding in diesel traction, something which fortunately never really happened with electric traction, although I have been party to attempting to ‘grow a new supplier’ for the associated infrastructure, and that was bl@@dy hard work, and a lot of grief, all the way for customer and new supplier!

 

 

[Traintresta]

I was discussing this topic with my old man, who suggested BR would have done better to design and build its own locos in house, using the best bits of what was available, in much the same way they did with the class 56 and HST. 
 

I countered that they were able to do that with the benefit of a lot of hindsight and experience and that BR’s early homebuilt locos were no better than the rest of the assorted collection, except that the 37 seems to have been sound in every respect except that BR didn’t like nose ends. 

min fact it was BR insistence on the 1Co bogies that hindered the early type 4’s. 

 

[Pandora]

On 26/10/2021 at 22:34, Zomboid said:

Which is why the early 30s & 40s American locos were heavy and big and not especially powerful (needing 4 or more units to replace one of their steam locos). The 1937 E units had 2x 900hp engines, which isn't a great return on 142000kg.

Those GM/EMD Art-Deco  or Streamline-Moderne  E and F units are one of my interests, E units were 1800 hp, "E for eighteen",  F units 1400hp  "F for fourteen", to work heavy trains over their famous  gradients ,  ascents for up to 2 hours at a stretch, certain railroads allocated  4 F units over 3 E units for the benefit of 16 weight bearing motored axles over 12.

Edited November 7, 2021 by Pandora