BR 4MT tanks on Parcels & Goods ?

[The Johnster]

IIRC the original intention was that all of the standard locos were to be mixed traffic machines, and the 9F was an anomaly in that sense.  Duke of Gloucester should not really be considered with the standards as it was a one off to replace an 8P, 46202 Princess Anne destroyed in the Harrow accident.  

[LMS2968]

6 hours ago, The Johnster said:

IIRC the original intention was that all of the standard locos were to be mixed traffic machines, and the 9F was an anomaly in that sense.  Duke of Gloucester should not really be considered with the standards as it was a one off to replace an 8P, 46202 Princess Anne destroyed in the Harrow accident.  

This is one of my pet theories, but 71000 wasn't built to replace 6202 but was the hoped for prototype of a new class of express loco, and built without authority, and 6202 was withdrawn to make space for it when none of the regions wanted it. 6202 was withdrawn 18 months after Harrow - rather a long time - and only a week before 71000 entered traffic.

 

Sorry, completely off topic, but it had to be said!

[RedgateModels]

1 minute ago, LMS2968 said:

 6202 was withdrawn 18 months after Harrow - rather a long time - and only a week before 71000 entered traffic.

 

and was considerably less damaged that City of Glasgow that got a full rebuild ....

[RLBH]

On 16/07/2019 at 01:20, The Johnster said:

IIRC the original intention was that all of the standard locos were to be mixed traffic machines, and the 9F was an anomaly in that sense.  Duke of Gloucester should not really be considered with the standards as it was a one off to replace an 8P, 46202 Princess Anne destroyed in the Harrow accident.  

Technically, Duke of Gloucester is an 8MT, if you crunch the numbers. Most of the big Pacifics were; freight rating in BR days was based purely on adhesive weight and tractive effort, of which express passenger locomotives had plenty.

 

On 16/07/2019 at 07:38, LMS2968 said:

This is one of my pet theories, but 71000 wasn't built to replace 6202 but was the hoped for prototype of a new class of express loco, and built without authority, and 6202 was withdrawn to make space for it when none of the regions wanted it. 6202 was withdrawn 18 months after Harrow - rather a long time - and only a week before 71000 entered traffic.

 

I have seen a theory that someone was envisaging thirty-odd sisters to Duke of Gloucester to replace the Kings. Makes sense on the face of it, they must have been the oldest top-line express passenger locomotives on BR at the time.

[Nearholmer]

Also makes sense if you assume that some people had their heads firmly stuck in a “steam paradigm” when they probably ought to have moved-on to be firmly diesel/electric oriented.

[Wickham Green]

27 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Also makes sense if you assume that some people had their heads firmly stuck in a “steam paradigm” when they probably ought to have moved-on to be firmly diesel/electric oriented.

Electric maybe - but the British loco manufacturers were struggling to come up with reliable disiesel machines ..... and, of course, nobody had dreamt that oil would be found on ( or rather under ) our doorstep in the not that distant future ...............................

[The Johnster]

Pre 1955, when a major rethink coincided with a re-organisation that effectively ended Riddles' tenure, the idea was that steam would be needed for about another 20 years pending the provision of overhead electrification, with diesels performing a secondary role in the form of shunters and dmus, and possibly hauling trains on secondary main lines (the 'European model'; steam lasted another 3 decades in some places there).  It made sense at the time; a war during which oil supplies had been disrupted by the U boats was fresh in everyone's minds, we had a large coal industry that needed to be supported, and steam locos were cheap to build and maintain on a capital starved railway.  The Kings were the oldest 8P rated locos, but by that time were undergoing rebuilds with double chimneys and other improvements that uprated their power.  I suspect the WR would have resisted 8P pacifics (having tried to avoid the Britannias, palming their first, Iron Duke, off on to the Southern), citing the South Devon banks as a reason, but it's an interesting possibility.  Assuming Swindon would have made them steam properly, they'd have been capable of cutting a good bit of time on the South Wales trains.  Incidentally, I've never heard that the Britannias were any more, or less, use than anything else on the South Devon banks; they slogged well enough from the bottom of the Severn Tunnel up to Badminton, though...

 

Big pacifics were certainly used on freight jobs, especially the express goods and fish trains on the ECML, but are hampered with heavy trains by adhesion on starting.  The Bulleid light pacifics and Britannias were conceived and used as mixed traffic machines from the outset, as were the Clans, and the Merchant Navies were claimed to be such in order to get permission to build them during the war.  For many years the record for the heaviest train ever hauled in the UK by a single locomotive was held by The Great Bear, which must have been able to get it moving.  Mixed traffic was the general requirement for all locos after the war, including such diesels and electrics as were built prior to 1955, and was a specified requirement of the modernisation plan locos.

 

The much criticised and badly implemented 1955 Modernisation Plan was a sea change in traffic policy as well as locomotive, and whatever it's failings and the failings of some of the locos that came of it, was the foundation of the railway we still know and sometimes try to love today.  It was in some ways the result of the realisation that steam was never going to be completely replaced on main line work by overhead electric in 2 decades because the money was never going to be forthcoming; 64 years later electric trains run from London to Cardiff, but get here under diesel power.  The wires are not yet planned to extend beyond Bristol and Cardiff, and the Midland, North Wales, North to West, anywhere north of the central belt in Scotland, Newcastle-Carlisle, and Bristol/Cardiff-Leeds routes are going to have to wait for who knows how long.  The diesels we still have were in that sense a stop gap alternative, and still are, really.

[Steamport Southport]

On 16/07/2019 at 07:38, LMS2968 said:

This is one of my pet theories, but 71000 wasn't built to replace 6202 but was the hoped for prototype of a new class of express loco, and built without authority, and 6202 was withdrawn to make space for it when none of the regions wanted it. 6202 was withdrawn 18 months after Harrow - rather a long time - and only a week before 71000 entered traffic.

 

Sorry, completely off topic, but it had to be said!

 

I have read it somewhere that they wanted the boiler as a spare for the other Princesses and that was more of a priority than repairing it. So it was cannibalised for spares and Riddles got "his" engine as well.

 

 

 

Jason

[LMS2968]

The boiler, No. 9236, was used on other engines at times when 6202 was laid up,  i.e. 6210 (21-10-43); 6204 (13-09-50. Post Harrow, it went to 6212 (25-02-54 and 6208 (13-01-60, so using it like that wasn't unusual..

 

Information from the RCTS book on the Stanier Pacifics.

 

As a turbine engine, 6202 needed higher superheat temperature that the normal 32 element Class 1 boiler could provide. Once converted to a normal reciprocating type, that requirement disappeared and there was no reason for this boiler to be reserved for 6202, which could then take any of the standard boilers.

Edited July 18, 2019 by LMS2968

[jim.snowdon]

As a turbine driven locomotive, 6202 was given a higher superheat boiler than its contemporaries, 6200 and 6201. That difference largely disappeared as Stanier's design team worked out, and persuaded their boss, that the low superheat premise of the Western was flawed. Why Swindon didn't follow up on that at the time is an open question, although they did eventually catch up in the 50s. 

 

Jim

[Evertrainz]

https://flic.kr/p/XncC2V

https://flic.kr/p/YkYEV3

 

Some WCML shots of 80095 on what looks like a fitted freight.

 

Ron

[SRman]

Parcels stock was categorised as Non-Passenger Carrying Coaching Stock (NPCCS). As such, it is not considered to be freight stock at all, but more as passenger stock without passengers. A

 

There is no reason whatsoever that the 4MT tanks could not be allocated to a parcels train, with the possible proviso of the distances involved, with a tank engine obviously having a smaller range than a tender locomotive.

[Nearholmer]

80095 has what I take to be an SR route disc, so I’m guessing it is fulfilling the old ‘W’ role on a transfer from Feltham.

[johnlambert]

Here's a link to a photo of  BR 2-6-4t 80072 on parcels:

 

https://www.warwickshirerailways.com/gwr/gwrls2032.htm

[The Johnster]

13 hours ago, SRman said:

Parcels stock was categorised as Non-Passenger Carrying Coaching Stock (NPCCS). As such, it is not considered to be freight stock at all, but more as passenger stock without passengers. A

 

There is no reason whatsoever that the 4MT tanks could not be allocated to a parcels train, with the possible proviso of the distances involved, with a tank engine obviously having a smaller range than a tender locomotive.

The ‘range’ issue is more restricted by the smaller capacity of the coal bunker than the tank capacity; unless we are talking about a long non stop run it is easy to replenish water supplies wherever a water crane is provided, and from troughs except on the Southern.

 

There is no reason that a BR Standard 4MT tank could not be allocated to any working, subject to any route availability or loading gauge issues and within the permitted load for the loco over the route.  The relevant Sectional Appendix would contain this information, and timings for specific loads over crertain sections.  Practical experience at sheds meant that certain locos were preferred for specific jobs, of course. 

[Caledonian]

If I can find it there was a two part article in Model Rail in about 2008 looking at the evolution of parcels trains, which included a photie of a Fairbairn or a Standard 4MT sitting at Wakefield Westgate with a single BG, which was reckoned to be a scheduled parcels service to Leeds.

 

 

[DCB]

On 18/07/2019 at 10:21, RLBH said:

Technically, Duke of Gloucester is an 8MT, if you crunch the numbers. Most of the big Pacifics were; freight rating in BR days was based purely on adhesive weight and tractive effort, of which express passenger locomotives had plenty.

 

I have seen a theory that someone was envisaging thirty-odd sisters to Duke of Gloucester to replace the Kings. Makes sense on the face of it, they must have been the oldest top-line express passenger locomotives on BR at the time.

i suspect that the BR left hand (HQ) did not know what the right hand (Swindon, Doncaster etc) was doing.  By 1954 there were 30 kings with new boilers and new front end frames at work, they had lost a bit of top speed perhaps but were very capable of any turns facing them. The SR had 100 more pacifics than it could usefully employ and the LMS had pacifics mainly doing jobs which would have made more sense to be rostered to pairs of Black 5s.  The only real opening for the 71000s was the ER where there were 4 A4s and an A3 with double chimneys which were good locos, and 30 A4 and lots of A3s which didn't steam to well and were generally kept close to home due to unreliability so replacing could usefully have been replaced, but after Thompsons attempts to do just that with his awful pacifics  there was no way that was going to happen.   Meanwhile in the real world EE were building the Deltic.  Quite why they built 22 instead of the 500 or so which would have transformed BR must remain a mystery /scandal 

 

[Nearholmer]

“Meanwhile in the real world EE were building the Deltic.  Quite why they built 22 instead of the 500 or so which would have transformed BR must remain a mystery /scandal “

 

Because nobody would be daft enough to buy 500 race-horses, when most of the jobs could be done by less expensive-to-keep animals.

 

Barely any of the infrastructure was fit to exploit the speed capability of 3300hp locos, let alone ones with about nine-trillion moving parts, and when it was upgraded to a suitable level, as on WCML, the better option was electric.

 

The Deltics were an expensive stop-gap, and were followed by a far better stopgap, in the form of HST.

 

I would suggest that a better question might be whether or not it was wise to build even 22 of them, or whether transit times on ECML could have been cut by alternative measures, but it was a very difficult stage in diesel loco development, when a loco with a single, reasonably simple, engine could probably only have achieved the timings needed with an unviable short formation.

 

[johnofwessex]

While range may be an issue with Tank Loco's, the Fowler versions did a lot of work on the Central Wales & the 'Freight Only' W's were a Southern Railway version of the same thing

[pH]

3 hours ago, Caledonian said:

If I can find it there was a two part article in Model Rail in about 2008 looking at the evolution of parcels trains, which included a photie of a Fairbairn or a Standard 4MT sitting at Wakefield Westgate with a single BG, which was reckoned to be a scheduled parcels service to Leeds.

 

W.A.C. Smith took a very nice picture of a Fairburn pulling a single parcels van on the bridge over the Clyde between Newton and Carmyle. The caption says it was coming from Hamilton, but doesn't say where it was going to.

[LMS2968]

1 hour ago, DavidCBroad said:

. . .  and the LMS had pacifics mainly doing jobs which would have made more sense to be rostered to pairs of Black 5s. 

Would you care to explain that please? Why would it make more sense to employ two sets of men, use two lots of coal and incur two lots of maintenance instead of using one larger engine and the economies that brings, or should the LMS / LMR reverted to Midland Railway ideology from pre-1923?

[TheSignalEngineer]

2 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

I would suggest that a better question might be whether or not it was wise to build even 22 of them, or whether transit times on ECML could have been cut by alternative measures, but it was a very difficult stage in diesel loco development, when a loco with a single, reasonably simple, engine could probably only have achieved the timings needed with an unviable short formation.

So the WR used pairs of 37s instead to get the same power as a Deltic. 

[Phil Bullock]

23 minutes ago, TheSignalEngineer said:

So the WR used pairs of 37s instead to get the same power as a Deltic. 

 

Indeed - and pretty soon found out the resulting issues didnt justify the gains!

 

[Nearholmer]

"So the WR used pairs of 37s instead to get the same power as a Deltic."

 

Which got them back to several zillion moving parts, by a different route, although at least it didn't create a micro-fleet.

 

I do wonder whether there was a "paradigm problem", which caused everyone to default to run long trains infrequently, when they might have been better running shorter trains more frequently, though. Classically, more frequent services generate greater custom, but perhaps pathing on an old-style railway, and crewing costs, were such that this wasn't economically viable.

 

The BR(S) solution was the deeply unglamorous, but highly effective, 4-REP, although that was a bit later.

 

Going the other way in time, a few years earlier rather than later, the GWR attack on the problem of getting to c2500hp (not even 3300hp at that stage) in one unit was, of course, gas turbine, an option which rumbled around for many years in Europe and the US, and which has resurfaced in Russia.

Edited July 20, 2019 by Nearholmer

[PenrithBeacon]

2 hours ago, LMS2968 said:

Would you care to explain that please? Why would it make more sense to employ two sets of men, use two lots of coal and incur two lots of maintenance instead of using one larger engine and the economies that brings, or should the LMS / LMR reverted to Midland Railway ideology from pre-1923?

I agree with this sentiment, but the LMS wasn't entirely consistent, for example  using double headed Black 5s over the Highland/S&DJR when a 5'-3" 2-8-0 balanced for 55mph would have done all that was needed. Sometimes standardisation can be taken too far and I think it was taken too far.