The Rocket, is it really?

[sir douglas]

just found out something really interesting on the regency rails thread, apparently according to contemporary reports the Rocket that we have still surviving today in the science museum is most likely not the original one but a sister engine built at the same time or completed by scavenging from the sister engines

 

this image that Killian Keane posted on there shows a rocket rebuilt into a 0-4-0 as it was on the Leicester and Swannington railway on the opening say in 1832

 

the source is an issue of the Engineer in 1884 "Links in the history of the locomotive XVIII" starting on page 468, the image is on page 466

 

[Pete the Elaner]

Looks like speculation because they start by saying that if it is the original, it was heavily modified so that there was little of the original build left. This is quite obvious when you see it.

The article then gives no justification as to why this is not the original & if there had been a twin loco, surely it would have been well known?

 

Interesting to see that the sketch of Rocket's modifications suggested that it was modified into an 0-4-0, keeping its inclined cylinders. The preserved loco in the Science Museum retained its 0-2-2 configuration but with cylinders moved close to horizontal, which was documented to have been a fairly early modification.

Edited April 6, 2018 by Pete the Elaner

[woodenhead]

No worse than the NRM's own Flying Scotsman or is it.

 

Even Evening Star is questionable as there are stories of an identity swap after some front end damage.

 

Whether it is the real Rocket or a facsimile built from spares or another of it's brethren doesn't really matter that much, it is an example of where railways as we know the began.

[DCB]

Fascinating stuff, the text is on page 11 of my download, picture on page 9.  Just goes to show how fast and furious progress was in the 1820s and 30s.  The idea that the Kensington Rocket was cobbled up out of bits of scrap is brilliant.    The idea of an 0-4-0 Rocket sounds plausible, after all an 0-2-2 is hardly ideal as a ballast engine but how did the Kensington Rocket then end up with Horizontal cylinders?  Anyone remember? Probably not they would need to be about 200!

[LMS2968]

It's the genuine Rocket. albeit heavily modified, for a given value of original. The frames are original, and so too are the boiler, cylinders, slide bars, and some parts of the motion. Not original are the wheels, axles, axleguards, axleboxes, other motion parts, and side frames added when the cylinders were lowered. It has a proper smokebox instead of the smoke collector with which it was built. The firebox is missing, but the backplate is there, although this wasn't the one made with the engine but a later replacement incorporating a water jacket.

 

There was a survey carried out on the engine at the NRM. See 'The Engineering and History of Rocket' Michael R Bailey and John P Glithero (2000) NRM, York. ISBN 1 900747 18 9

[Vanders]

I'm not an expert on steamers by any stretch of the imagination, but if the frames are from Rocket then it's Rocket. The frames have always been the "identity" of the loco, which is why Flying Scotsman is a bit more tricky...

[brack]

The loco in the science museum is known to have been on Lord Carlisle's Railway from 1837 or so. It wasn't bought because it was 'the' rocket, it was just a loco going for a decent price secondhand. It turned out to be not much use (a 4 coupled version would've been a little bit better). So I don't see any incentive for the L&M to make a fake rocket or swap plates over, and once at tindale it wasn't a great deal of use and it's historical status wasn't made a fuss of until 1851 as far as I'm aware.

It seems most plausible that it is what it claims to be, whether a second rocket was supplied to Leicester or not, it seems daft that Stephenson would've sold someone else a customer's loco, particularly one of such significance and he'd have had to give it a pretty hefty rebuild first - it'd have been easier to build a new 4 coupled loco if one was required.

[LMS2968]

Remember that Rocket remained on the L&MR until 1836, by which time it was out of use and very obsolete. Although there were others built to Rocket's fundamental design, they were all 'upgrades', as it were. One of the upgrades was to increase the number of boiler tubes and reduce their diameter. The boiler currently on Rockets has no tubes, but the correct number of holes for them but opened out slightly due to the expanding process, making it Rocket's original boiler.

[Southern Steve]

This is the proverbial "Triggers Broom" from Only Fools and Horses paradox.

 

 

http://robertjackson.info/index/2014/07/triggers-broom-paradox/

[chaz]

Oh Dear, here we go again.

 

Both the Rocket and the Scotsman are machines, which would have been subjected throughout their period of use to replacement of parts. Steam locomotives were very likely to go into works for overhaul with major components needing attention. The sensible thing to do  was to have spares which would allow the machine back into service promptly, be they bearings, a set of frames, or a boiler. The replaced parts could be repaired or replaced and would then go back into a pool for later use. 

 

In my opinion it doesn't matter one jot if most, or all, of a preserved machine is not the stuff it was comprised of when it first rolled out of the works new. Why would it? We are lucky to have so many survivors to fill our museums or populate our preserved railways. 

 

Chaz

Edited April 6, 2018 by chaz

[brack]

In my opinion it doesn't matter one jot if most, or all, of a preserved machine is not the stuff it was comprised of when it first rolled out of the works new. Why would it?

 

Aside from a few cells in my eyes, central nervous system and other places, none of me is the same cells I had when I was born, or even 10 years ago ( most of it is much more recent but the skeleton and heart muscle renew at a rate of about 10% per year) yet I'm fairly sure I'm still me.

 

Unless theres a name/number swap (Bristol Castle?) or on one day the old loco gets melted down and a shiny new one with the same number but nothing else in common (eg. East German reko locos or the rheidol tanks) reappears then I'm happy to regard it as the same loco if there's been normal renewal, repair or rebuilding throughout its life. I'm happy to accept rocket for what it is.

[Butler Henderson]

And more importantly when are we going to get a decent OO model, come on NRM Locomotion....

[TheSignalEngineer]

According to C R Clinker in his work on the Leicester and Swannington Railway their first two engines were named Comet and Phoenix. Both were 0-4-0 locos delivered in May and August 1832 respectively. 

 

https://www.le.ac.uk/lahs/downloads/RailwaySmPagesfromsmvolumeXXX-4.pdf

[brack]

According to C R Clinker in his work on the Leicester and Swannington Railway their first two engines were named Comet and Phoenix. Both were 0-4-0 locos delivered in May and August 1832 respectively.

 

https://www.le.ac.uk/lahs/downloads/RailwaySmPagesfromsmvolumeXXX-4.pdf

Thanks for that - the engineer's 1884 query appears to be based upon someone putting the wrong name on a sketch then?

[Killian keane]

Oh crumbs! What have I started?!

To clarify, it is not a question of whether the engine in the science museum is largely original but whether it is the actual Rocket, there is a dubious theory that there were TWO engines named Rocket built for the L&M by Stephensons, and that the engine at Rainhill was not the same Rocket that pulled the first directors train, the theory states that the Rocket in Kensington is not the machine that participated in the Rainhill trials, this theory has been discarded by most (myself included) I believe it to be purely a case of mistaken identity, a sketch was once done of Northumbrian and mislabelled as Rocket, another 'Rocket' was supposedly employed doing stationary work in a Manchester brickworks, this was likely a Rocket class engine (Phoenix, meteor, comet etc) but not the original, as for what that 0-4-0 is, nobody seems to know, my guess is it's a Stephenson engine built shortly after Invicta hired to the Leicester and Swannington Rly temporarily, it being called Rocket only by coincidence

Edited April 6, 2018 by Killian keane

[PatB]

Without knowing much about the subject, I find it quite plausible that, following Rainhill, the Stephenson might well have undertaken extensive modification and replacement work on the original Rocket, in order to make good wear and tear from the trial and to incorporate lessons learned. So it wouldn't surprise me to learn that there wasn't much of the Rainhill Rocket left in the Opening Day Rocket, even if their appearance was broadly similar.

[wiggoforgold]

And more importantly when are we going to get a decent OO model, come on NRM Locomotion....

Presumably when they have worked out how to get it to haul 14 coaches around first radius curves. Of course, if it was in P4......

[sandwich station]

Here is a similar design by Stephenson built in 1829 called Invicta which first ran in 1830 on the Canterbury To Whitstable Railway (Crab and Winkle Line).

 

She was infact his 20th locomotive, being built immediately after Rocket.

 

[Compound2632]

Well, I thought the interesting point was that the Stephensons built a second Rocket, of the Northumbrian type with enclosed firebox, and that this engine, rapidly become obsolete itself, was provided in an emergency for the opening of the Leicester & Swannington, that being where the sketch was made. Although the tale as told is a bit circumstantial and at second hand, those railwaymen writing to The Engineer in 1884 did have the advantage of being very much closer in time to events than are we.

 

The identity of a locomotive? Frames were certainly renewed or exchanged, cylinders and crank axles renewed - I don't think there's any component that might not be replaced. A locomotive's identity is on paper - the Engine Record Card or similar document, or even the company accountant's records.

[rockershovel]

So....

 

Is it correct to say that Rocket, as originally constructed had inclined cylinders, a tube boiler, water-jacket firebox, a blastpipe but no separate smokebox

 

 

It was subsequently developed into a class of locomotives with near-horizontal cylinders, tube boilers including water-jacket fireboxes and smoke boxes the full diameter of the boiler, and plate frames

 

 

... and a locomotive generally reckoned to be the eventual form of the original locomotive, is displayed in the Science Museum

 

Edited April 7, 2018 by rockershovel

[tractionman]

They really are such magnificent-looking machines those early locomotives.

 

cheers,

 

Keith

[rodent279]

Where is the replica Rocket nowadays? Does it ever make an appearance on preserved lines?

[Clearwater]

Where is the replica Rocket nowadays? Does it ever make an appearance on preserved lines?

There’s a replica one in pieces in the NRM workshop.

 

David

[Killian keane]

Ok, I was up until late last night (early this morning) mulling over the multiple Rockets theory, what I fail to understand is why the 1884 document should suggest the Kensington Rocket is put together from scrap parts, the Rainhill Rocket staying on the L&M and thence going to the Brampton Railway and onwards to preservation from 1851, what they don't explain is what is supposed to have happened to the 0-4-0 Rocket after the Leicester and Swannington Railway opening, it was supposedly renamed Comet, but the L&SR Comet was a Samson class engine,

[Ravenser]

I simply don't accept the claim that having lowered Rocket's cylinders for stability Robert Stephenson & Co then raised them again.... Or that rebuilding a loco of this type from 0-2-2 to 0-4-0 was a minor alteration.

 

The Engineer drawing is of a loco closely akin to Invicta - not of a rebuilt form of Rocket . It doesn't shake the claim that the Science Museum's loco is the original Rocket. There is no "provenance" taking the locomotive in the Science Museum from the Leicester & Swinnington to the Brampton Railway.

 

The theory that the L&MR had two locomotives called Rocket at the same time is extremely questionable - at that stage a name was the locomotive's identity , and I don't think there's another case in British railway history of a railway having two locos with the same name at the same time?

 

To be honest the Engineer article suggests to me that "conspiracy theory" thinking isn't an invention of the internet.