Imaginary Locomotives

[JimC]

I suspect a lot is down to ownership. All the various different parties involved had to be prepared to make the investment at the same time for any progress to be made.

 

[DenysW]

"I suspect a lot is down to ownership"

 

LMS introduced 40 tons (net) wagons for Stonebridge Park in the late 1920's where, as customer, they were much more in control.

 

I suspect as much is down to "What's in it for me, gov'nor?"

[The Johnster]

Mining is a highly speculative and high risk (in the capitalisation sense) business and mine owners do not like investing any more than the bare mimimum that is absolutely necessary, even if they have been nationalised in 1947, as the industry's appalling safety history shows.  Asking them to spend money on new loading equipemnt in the form of screens capable of handling bigger wagons is going to get you a short answer, even if you offer to reduce your carriage rates, and it was not until the MGR era that much progress was made in the UK, even then retaining the 4-wheel format, and traditional buffers and couplings.

[Compound2632]

1 hour ago, Flying Pig said:

This has all been discussed numerous times on RMweb though.

 

Quite, but here's a new (to me) point:

 

1 hour ago, The Johnster said:

The length of the wagons had an impact on the loading machinery and hoppers in the screens at the collieries, which were spaced to cope with 7-plankers

 

But the ordinary mineral wagon had grown in length over the years, from 12 ft - 14 ft in the earlies, through 15 ft over headstocks in the RCH 1887 specification, with 16 ft becoming common from the beginning of the last century and finally 16'6" over headstocks in the RCH 1923 specification - the 16 ton steel wagons being this length too I think? So there must have been some rebuilding of screens?

[DenysW]

On the imaginary LMS Garratts we tend to focus on the axle boxes. But the whole thing was Midlandised, including having the short travel valves that weren't that successful on the 4F 0-6-0s. Then boiler had less surface area (tubes & firebox, superheater) and was lower pressure than a BR Standard 9F. It did have a bigger grate. It just looks likely to have been limited by one d*mn thing after another.

 

It does come back to telling Beyer Peacock what to build, not what you want it to do.

[whart57]

In a different direction. What if Colonel Stephens had experimented fitting a diesel motor onto a Terrier chassis?

 

 

There were examples on narrow gauge lines of an old steam engine having the boiler and other steam gubbings removed and replaced by an internal combustion engine fitted to the frame and driving the original wheels. I've imagined a jack shaft here as that would not require suspension.

[Johnson044]

I seem to remember reading somewhere that the remains of a 3" gauge (or thereabouts) conversion of a Manning Wardle loco could still be found in Cuba until recently - May even have been an outside cylinder tender loco similar to the Pentewan Railway ones- but I can't immediately find any info to help jog my memory. A quick web search for "Manning Wardle Conversion Cuba" came up with this rather brutally treated standard gauge specimen however. Not too far removed from the Terrier conversion but boy oh boy what a horrid thing to do.

[Johnson044]

Actually I'm completely wrong - the photo isn't standard gauge at all! May well be the 3" loco I referred to- but the only image I've ever seen of that just showed the mortal remains, which consisted of not much more than the frames and wheels.

 

[DK123GWR]

2 hours ago, whart57 said:

In a different direction. What if Colonel Stephens had experimented fitting a diesel motor onto a Terrier chassis?

 

 

There were examples on narrow gauge lines of an old steam engine having the boiler and other steam gubbings removed and replaced by an internal combustion engine fitted to the frame and driving the original wheels. I've imagined a jack shaft here as that would not require suspension.

I know the Terriers weren't heavy, and I have no idea how the weight of the diesel bits would compare to the steam ones, but would the axle loadings still be suitable for a light railway on this design?

[DenysW]

The first LMS diesel shunter was done in this exact way, although Wikipedia reports that puzzlingly few bits of the old steam loco were actually used. Accountancy reasons, such as revenue vs. capital budgets? Errors in budget predictions that meant that written-off wheels were the way forward?

[PhilJ W]

One locomotive maker made diesel conversions of Sentinel VBT's, IIRC it was Hudson.

[298]

2 hours ago, Johnson044 said:

I seem to remember reading somewhere that the remains of a 3" gauge (or thereabouts) conversion of a Manning Wardle loco could still be found in Cuba until recently - May even have been an outside cylinder tender loco similar to the Pentewan Railway ones- but I can't immediately find any info to help jog my memory. A quick web search for "Manning Wardle Conversion Cuba" came up with this rather brutally treated standard gauge specimen however. Not too far removed from the Terrier conversion but boy oh boy what a horrid thing to do.

 

There were at least 20 steam to diesel conversions, with the one on your photo reported elsewhere to indeed have origins from a Manning Wardle steam engine and has since been converted back to an approximation of its original condition and is at Christina Museum in Havana.

[rodent279]

8 hours ago, whart57 said:

It does point at one of the things we can agree is wrong with this country. The actual solution to the problems of unbraked freight trains was to fit brakes to freight vehicles. It's what everyone else did, and we did eventually. It just takes forever for those in charge to admit to themselves some unglamorous investment is required.

Long term planning blight. It's one of those things we excel at.

I work in radio communications. We're no better, we have our own equivalent of unfitted freights. It's holding us back, and will cost a lot to address.

[Compound2632]

8 hours ago, whart57 said:

The actual solution to the problems of unbraked freight trains was to fit brakes to freight vehicles. 

 

They weren't unbraked, just lacking in continuous brakes. The brakes could be applied by hand, when travelling very slowly, as was done at the top of many inclines.

 

There's a logistical problem in fitting vacuum brakes to a mineral wagon with bottom doors. Firstly, a cross-shaft connecting the brake gear on either side would not survive the battering as coal was unloaded through the bottom doors and, secondly, there's no room to fit the vacuum cylinder. So replacement by fitted wagons without bottom doors was the only, and more expensive, solution.

[JimC]

16 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

There's a logistical problem in fitting vacuum brakes to a mineral wagon with bottom doors. Firstly, a cross-shaft connecting the brake gear on either side would not survive the battering as coal was unloaded through the bottom doors and, secondly, there's no room to fit the vacuum cylinder. 

Surely not insoluble if the will was there though. Yes, I imagine pretty much impractical on 9ft wheelbase minerals, but the GWR had 20T 13ft wheelbase vacuum fitted coal hopper wagons for their internal power station and gas works traffic.

[Compound2632]

Just now, JimC said:

Surely not insoluble if the will was there though. Yes, I imagine pretty much impractical on 9ft wheelbase minerals, 

 

But the point is that there were vast numbers of wooden 9 ft wheelbase mineral wagons with bottom doors - half a million or so at nationalisation. There's not much to be gained by fitting vacuum brakes to the handful of non-standard types, except for dedicated flows of just those wagons, which wouldn't address the general problem.

[Northmoor]

5 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

 

But the point is that there were vast numbers of wooden 9 ft wheelbase mineral wagons with bottom doors - half a million or so at nationalisation. There's not much to be gained by fitting vacuum brakes to the handful of non-standard types, except for dedicated flows of just those wagons, which wouldn't address the general problem.

Well no, but a few dedicated flows where it was implemented would quickly demonstrate the advantages.  No different to how DMUs replaced steam on local services, they didn't do it nationwide overnight!

It might also have persuaded BR to build the far more of the 16t/21t/24.5t minerals with vacuum brakes, which could be progressively introduced onto other flows, in declining order of rate of return.

[Michael Edge]

10 hours ago, DenysW said:

The first LMS diesel shunter was done in this exact way, although Wikipedia reports that puzzlingly few bits of the old steam loco were actually used. Accountancy reasons, such as revenue vs. capital budgets? Errors in budget predictions that meant that written-off wheels were the way forward?

There wasn't much left of the steam loco in 1831 apart from the frames and they had to be "cut and shut" to extend the wheelbase at one end. Other than that t could only have used two of the wheelsets and possibly the sandboxes and brakes.

Sentinel/Thomas Hill did plenty of steam to diesel conversions though, mostly 4w but including the first two 0-6-0DH.

[Mol_PMB]

There were also steam to overhead electric conversions, including Coalition and Eclipse. They used proper electric motors not the crazy immersion heater idea...

Either concept would be a good basis for some imaginary locos though!

[DenysW]

Wagons. There's an anecdote in rmweb that Stanier, once in Derby, asked to be talked through every drawing that was to be issued, so that he could learn the Derby way of doing things. He then exploded - on the very first one - when the reason for many of the details was "because we've always done it this way, Mr. Stanier." He could apparently accept disagreement, but not doing things by rote without thinking or understanding. In the 1920s LMS built 30-50,000 new wagons, of which only 30 were the 40 ton (net) coal wagons for Stonebridge Park copied from a German example and built in Crewe. Lots of inertia, and no trickle-out-effect of a better way of doing things when you change to power-station quantities of coal. We focus on the rational reasons in favour of change (and that are barriers to it) and forget that no-one likes change or to be told they must do it.

[Compound2632]

21 minutes ago, DenysW said:

There's an anecdote in rmweb that Stanier, 

 

That sets the credulity alarm bells ringing. What is the source of this anecdote?

 

21 minutes ago, DenysW said:

In the 1920s LMS built 30-50,000 new wagons.

 

Something of an underestimate. There were 66,000 D1666 and D1667 5-plank merchandise wagons alone, built 1923-1930, replacing many smaller old wagons of 19th century origin. These were 12 ton capacity, 17'6" over headstocks, split oil axleboxes, all conforming to the latest RCH specification. The drawing for the wood-underframe version can be seen on the Midland Railway Study Centre website here. I wonder what feature it was that young Bill objected to? He could hardly complain about lack of Great Western influence in the Derby Carriage & Wagon Works, since the whole place had been built by Thomas Clayton fresh from building the Swindon Carriage & Wagon Works.

Edited November 17, 2021 by Compound2632

[DenysW]

The complete post by 'Rifleman', and you'll understand why I flagged it as an 'anecdote' not a 'fact' :

 

 

Posted May 10, 2014 (edited)

A couple of stories may shed a bit of light on Derby's small engine policy, and their engineering design work.

 

Some years back, I visited the Churnet Valley Railway, shortly after reading a biography of Sir William Stanier. I got into a discussion with one of their loco staff about a section in the book dealing with Anderson's iron grip on loco design, and what happened at a meeting between Stanier, Anderson and Stamp. According to the book, it was agreed between them that, in future, all design and engineering decisions would be left up to the CME, and that the Operating Dept. would simply advise on what sort of train loads and timings the engines were required to be handle.

 

Now, having dealt with characters like Anderson in my own experience in engineering, I found the biographer's suggestion that "Anderson had agreed to this" very hard to believe. After all those years of giving orders to the CME, that he would just quetly let go of that power? No chance! I strongly suspected that Stanier was well aware of the internal politics in the LMS, and - knowing that Stamp was hard-pressed to find someone who could take on the job - Stanier gave Stamp an ultimatum; "keep Anderson out from under my feet or find someone else as your new CME."

 

As I was discussing the 4F, and its failings, with the CVR man, I mentioned reading this account, and my doubts about it. The CVR man, smiled, and said:

 

"Funny you saying this; we had a visitor last week who came in for a chat - a very old guy, who was working as an apprentice in Derby drawing office when Stanier took over."

 

And the story he told me was this. Stanier was brought into the D/O one day, and introduced himself to the staff in a very courteous manner. He explained that, as he was from Swindon, he only had limited knowledge of the way Derby worked, and said that - for the time being - he wanted to see every drawing before it was issued to the works, and go through it with the relevant man, in order to learn about their engines.

 

Two days later, one of the draughtsmen knocked on his door, and went in to show Stanier a set of drawings he had completed. The draughtsman later told his colleagues that Stanier started going through the drawing with him, noticed a certain aspect of the job, and asked the draughtsman why he had chosen to do it that way, rather than two or three other ways he could have done it. The man told his colleagues he was taken flat aback by this question, and - when he'd got over his shock - said:

 

"Well - we've always done it that way, Mr Stanier!"

 

Stanier looked at him a bit thoughtfully, then carried on looking over the drawing. Coming to another feature of the design, he asked the same question - and received the same reply. After the same thing happened about half a dozen times or more, Stanier decided he'd heard enough.

 

Picture the scene in Derby D/O, in January, 1932. The draughtsmen quietly working away, slide rules slithering, pencils scratching over the paper - despite the Great Depression, they still had their 'jobs for life' at Derby, God was in his heaven, and all was right in the world. And then the lid blew off Hell!

 

According to the way the old Derby apprentice told the story, there was a near explosion in Stanier's office, and he erupted into the D/O with the horrified draughtsman in tow. Calling all the staff together, he read them the Riot Act - if any of them so much as DARED to tell him that they had designed anything in a particular way because "we've always done it that way, Mr Stanier" he should ensure that he brought with him his letter of resignation "which I WILL accept on the spot!"

 

The CVR man said his impression was that, on a quiet day in Derby, you might still be able to hear the echoes! 

 

Can you imagine any threat more dire, to a staff member on the railways in 1932, to be threatened with dismissal? Mind, in fairness to Stanier, the old boy said that, if you told him you'd decided to do a job in this way, for thios reason, and not in that way, for that reason, Stanier was perfectly happy with that - and, if he did decide to over-rule you, and tell you to do the job another way, he would always do you the courtesy of explaining his reasons for doing so. He didn't mind a draughtsman making a judgement with which he disagreed, as long as the man showed that he was using his judgement, and his brains - and not simply blindly copying what had been done before - but, even so, it was four weeks before another drawing left the D/O!

 

As regards the effects of Anderson's interference, the Garratt never lived up to expectations for the reason that Anderson, against all the advice from Beyer-Peacock, pig-headedly insisted it being built with the same strangling 'short travel, short lap' valve gear that hampered the 4F - and with the same hopelessly under-sized axle-boxes, too.

 

Another example of Derby's policy of the blind following the blind was in the 4F's smokebox. Terry Essery told me that he once went to visit the Keighley & Worth Valley Rly, on a day they were running a 4F. The loco crew asked him if he would like to have a go on the shovel, and he said:

 

"I should have known they were up to something - their faces were so deadpan!"

 

They were, indeed! Terry told me that, even on the hard pull out of Keighley, the engine kept blowing off, and he said he'd never known a 4F steam like it before. At the end of the run, he asked the crew:

 

"Right - what have you done to this 4F?"

 

Grinning like Cheshire Cats, they took him to the front of the engine and opened the smokebox door - to reveal a petticoat pipe! A feature that was never in any 4F. Terry asked them how they had worked out the dimensions, angles, and so on - and they laughed and said that all they'd done was to borrow the petticoat pipe from another engine having a full rebuild:

 

" . . and we just rigged up some brackets and put it in, just to see what would happen; works a treat, doesn't it?"

 

They'd got the idea from comparing the 4F smokebox with that of a Jinty. The Jinty, with its slide valves, has the boiler quite low, allowing for a decent depth of chimney, with only a short distance between the blast pipe and the bottom of the chimney; result, a good draught on the fire and a free-steaming engine.

(having fired a Jinty on the Kent & E Sussex Rly, I know that to be a fact!)

 

The 4F, with inside piston valve gear, has to have the boiler mounted much higher, and only has room for a very short chimney - made worse because the gap between the blast pipe and the chimney is much greater; result, a lot of the exhaust steam misses the chimney completely, and goes bouncing round inside the smokebox - so the draughting is poor, with steaming to match.

 

As Terry said to me:

 

"Think of all the needless labour they could have saved the firemen - and the tonnage of coal they wasted - all for the lack of a petticoat pipe. And they built over 800 of those 4Fs, without ever bothering to try what those lads at Keighley worked out in a couple of days!"

 

[Compound2632]

Stories grow in the telling but those are good ones. I do think, though, that more recent research has demonstrated that Anderson's traditional role as the pantomime villain of the pre-Stanier LMS Locomotive Department is a convenient caricature perpetuated by some who were there at the time and subsequently had their own axes to grind. See, for example, D. Hunt, J. Jennison and R.J. Essery, LMS Locomotive Profiles No. 15 The ‘Royal Scots’ (Wild Swan, 2019); J. Jennison, A detailed history of the Patriot Class 4-6-0s (RCTS, 2018).

[whart57]

11 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

 

They weren't unbraked, just lacking in continuous brakes. The brakes could be applied by hand, when travelling very slowly, as was done at the top of many inclines.

 

Thus slowing down progress even more. We should really regard the brakes on unfitted wagons as parking brakes, not as ones that could really be used to manage a train's progress.

[Compound2632]

1 minute ago, whart57 said:

Thus slowing down progress even more. We should really regard the brakes on unfitted wagons as parking brakes, not as ones that could really be used to manage a train's progress.

 

I don't understand your use of the present tense. They were used to manage a train's progress; to regard them as having been solely parking brakes is to overlook the historical evidence. Relevant topic here, including period footage: