Information/photos wanted on MW petrol locomotives

[Nearholmer]

It was an idea but hat periodically resurfaced, having been thought about, and possibly tried, in the very early years of internal combustion locos c1880. At that stage, it was a sort of confusion with steam and electric thinking, where the engine is, of course, reversed. But, once transmissions suitable for pairing with an engine to make a loco had been developed, it was generally dismissed, and when periodically tried it seems to have been found wanting and not been perpetuated.

[Beatty 139]

RSH were long time perponents of the idea and Beryl at Tanfield was built as recently as 1953 and has a direct reversing Crossley engine.

[Nearholmer]

Yes, and it must have some advantages in simplifying the transmission. I honestly think that the downside is the time taken to engage reverse, but I’ve never seen Beryl in action, and there were repeat orders of the design by satisfied customers, so who knows.

 

Maybe once an electric or hydraulic transmission is fitted, for other good reasons, it’s so easy to reverse that the question of engine reverse ceases to arise.

[Osgood]

Pretty sure it was simply the ready availability of engines of suitable performance that dictated what was used.

The availability of direct-reversing marine engines in sizes suitable for rail traction made them an ideal early choice, the bonus being simplified transmission requirement.

In the era of these MW locos there was not a great choice of engines of suitable size, e.g. use of German marine U Boat engine in the first big Hudswell Clarke diesel.

 

That changed later, and in time final drives became pretty much standardised and were bought off-the -shelf by most loco makers (exceptions being Hunslet and Fowler?).

This makes their later choice for some locos as suggested above an odd choice, but they tended to all be slow speed and often /always (?) 2 stroke designs, making reversing almost instantaneous - certainly quicker than waiting for a heavy idling gearbox shaft to stop.

 

The use of a clutch brake was very common in heavy trucks to facilitate quicker gear changes by regulating the speed of the disconnected (from main clutch) gearbox input shaft.

It may be that early locos had a clutch brake (movement of clutch pedal caused disconnect of main clutch - further movement caused clutch plate and gearbox input shaft to be slowed / stopped.

 

The very popular 'SSS Powerflow' gearbox had an auxiliary clutch, engaged during gear shifting, to maintain positive at reduced tractive effort through main gear changes - doing away with a break in drive which caused loose couplings and snatch.

Edited March 11, 2018 by Osgood

[Beatty 139]

Fowler’s DM’s have clutch brakes, well my 80hp one does and getting it set up right is the key to easy gear changes, later Fowler DH use standard Wiseman final drives.

[Rob R]

Hi there. A bit late to the party but trawling through the AWM photos I found this :- https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C4048?image=2

 

"AN ARMOURED TRAIN AT MIT GHAMR RAILWAY STATION DURING THE NATIVE RIOTS."

 

Still looking for more...

 

Rob

 

https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C3361

THE ARMOURED TRAIN, USED BY GENERAL SIR ARCHIBALD MURRAY WHEN G.O.C. EGYPTIAN FORCES, IN EARLY 1916. 

 

 

And another https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C3470?image=2

WATER TANKS SAND-BAGGED AS A PROTECTION AGAINST BOMBS, AND AN ARMOURED TRAIN NEAR THE RAILHEAD AT ROMANI. 

 

And another one :- https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C987081

"An armoured train on the Sinai Desert."

Edited June 25, 2021 by Rob R
Another photo found and putting captions next to correct photo.

[Teuchter]

Maybe this picture will help with a scratch build.

Some context on the picture. My grandfather is standing on the right and he served with the Lovat Scouts in Gallipoli, Egypt and the Palestine then at some point he joined the Royal Engineers ( Corp of Rail and Waterways) on the Western front. After the War he stayed behind to work at the St Quentin Railway station until 1920. I believe from the notes in French that this picture was taken in Northern France after the war but have no evidence to back that up.

I summited the picture below to the folks at https://www.steamlocomotive.info/about.cfm who were kind enough to share pictures of the Manning Wardle armoured loco and a link that lead me to this thread.

 

Edited July 14, 2021 by Teuchter
added some notes for context