Was the GWR really so conservative?

[The Johnster]

On 23/11/2019 at 21:29, Ohmisterporter said:

 

Why would anyone want to own shares in a company that paid no, or very little, dividends?

Because you get a vote per share at the AGM, which is something to consider if you have a business of your own that has dealings with the company.  For the same reason, if you are a landowner whose land is crossed by a railway, you may want to influence the decisions of that company, and your only chance is the AGM.  Or it may even be simply that you use that company's trains in your own business or private life, and want to influence decision making.  

 

Making money isn't just about making money, you know...

[The Johnster]

On 23/11/2019 at 16:57, rogerzilla said:

Collett is unfairly pilloried; he did improve a lot on Churchward's designs and gave us the Castle, a design so right that they were still knocking out new ones in BR days

The question is whether anybody should have been building a 1922 multi-cylindered design in the 1950s, even a worked up version of it, for a railway suffering staff shortages and recruitment issues.  How many oiling points were there between the frames on a Castle?  The Britannia sounds to me like a very good option for 7P, in fact 7MT, work in the 50s.

 

 

 

 

 

 

On 23/11/2019 at 16:57, rogerzilla said:

 

Hawksworth wasn't really around long enough to show his hand; the County being basically an attempt to get 4-cylinder performance from a 2-cylinder loco, the same as Riddles' philosophy

 

The Hawkworth County was a success in that it did get 4-cylinder performance from a 2-cylinder loco, but as a mixed traffic design was hobbled by coupling surge.  In many ways it was an opportunist design, Hawkworth taking advantage of the toolings at Swindon for Stanier 8Fs during wartime to build some sort of express passenger loco, having had his Pacific thwarted by the Ministry of Supply while Bulleid's was permitted.

 

He could have put the 8F boiler on the Grange and made a much better loco IMHO, or even on the 28xx.

[rogerzilla]

Richard Maunsell took Churchward's basic design principles from the GWR (and Harold Holcroft!) then added the bits Churchward wouldn't, namely higher superheat and outside valve gear.  The N class was basically an improved GWR 43xx mogul.  Maunsell didn't do much detailed design himself but his maxim was "make everything get-at-able", hence the outside gear.

 

Stanier did exactly the same thing in the next generation, using the Hall as the basis for the Black Five. 

 

If the GWR was conservative, it's probably due to two factors: Welsh hard coal covered up a multitude of design weaknesses and, as the only company to keep its identity at Grouping, there were traditions at stake, such as delicate proportions and inside valve gear.

[JimC]

6 hours ago, LMS2968 said:

... and at less cost.

I don't think you can say that. Higher degree superheat comes with a price tag in increased oil consumption and increased wear, hence overhaul costs. So there's definitely a swings and roundabouts element to the costs. As the availability, cost and quality of lubricants changed the balance between the various costs changed and I understand there was a significant change in refining technology in the 1930s.
But the big difference was that whereas the Castles steamed fully satisfactorily, at least with reasonable quality coal - it should be noted that on the LMS and LNER exchanges the Castles ran with LMS and LNER supplied coal, not welsh -  the new Stanier locomotives did not, and the design team under Stanier were only able to resolve this by moving to high degree superheat. But this was to resolve a problem the GWR simply did not have.  Running costs were looked at very carefully - Cook records that they calculated that converting Stars to Castles saved 1d per mile because of the lower evaporation rate.

So I don't think you (or I) can say Collett was right or wrong unless you can actually demonstrate  whether the total cost of ownership at any given date would have increased or decreased.. 

Edited November 25, 2019 by JimC

[JimC]

2 hours ago, The Johnster said:

having had his Pacific thwarted by the Ministry of Supply while Bulleid's was permitted.

This still going? I think its been made very clear: Hawksworth never had the slightest intention of building a pacific - it was a drawing office project which he put a stop to as soon as he became aware of it. An amusing bit of history repeating itself, since Stanier and Hawksworth had worked up a similar drawing office project for a compound castle based 4-6-0 which Collett stamped on as soon as they told him about it...

Edited November 25, 2019 by JimC

[jim.snowdon]

12 hours ago, JimC said:

I don't think you can say that. Higher degree superheat comes with a price tag in increased oil consumption and increased wear, hence overhaul costs. So there's definitely a swings and roundabouts element to the costs. As the availability, cost and quality of lubricants changed the balance between the various costs changed and I understand there was a significant change in refining technology in the 1930s.
But the big difference was that whereas the Castles steamed fully satisfactorily, at least with reasonable quality coal - it should be noted that on the LMS and LNER exchanges the Castles ran with LMS and LNER supplied coal, not welsh -  the new Stanier locomotives did not, and the design team under Stanier were only able to resolve this by moving to high degree superheat. But this was to resolve a problem the GWR simply did not have.  Running costs were looked at very carefully - Cook records that they calculated that converting Stars to Castles saved 1d per mile because of the lower evaporation rate.

So I don't think you (or I) can say Collett was right or wrong unless you can actually demonstrate  whether the total cost of ownership at any given date would have increased or decreased.. 

It isn't about the ability of the boiler to turn water into steam, but about getting as much of the coal's energy as practicable into the steam that goes to the cylinders. The result is either more work for the same amount of coal and water, or the same amount of work for a reduced coal and water consumption. The Princess Royal boilers in their original form steamed well enough, but were heavier on coal and water than they were once they had been modified to have larger superheaters. 

The poor steaming of the Jubilee boilers is a completely different issue and was the result of getting the draughting wrong. The science of what went on in the smokebox was not well understood for much of the steam age, essentially until the work of people like S O Ell picked up the work done by academics earlier in the century and translated that into the design of railway locomotive boilers.

 

Jim

[Pandora]

On 21/11/2019 at 23:21, DavidB-AU said:

Of course top link LNER/ER drivers were well known for low flying. Gerard Fiennes wrote of one day when the 266 Down "Scotch Goods" (regularly hauled by an A4) was delayed leaving KX and didn't get away until 16.50. It caught up to the Talisman at Retford.

 

Cheers

David

The driver of the Scotch Goods,  Bill Hoole?

Edited November 26, 2019 by Pandora

[runs as required]

Thats an interesting point about Chief Officers putting a stop to drawing office "projects" once they got to hear about them.

 

That story is so different to my experience in a railway drawing office - and to my neighbour's mother's recollections as a spirited young tracer in the Doncaster 'Plant' through the Thompson/Peppercorn handover years before Nationalisation.

Her drawing board clearly was a "magnet' in Bert Spencer's section, around which all were pleased to gather and talk - with the exception of aloof Thompson.

Mine in the CCEs at Kings+ was that I was privileged to be appointed (straight from college) in 1960 to a small "Research and Development" group to whom all posh visitors were brought by the Chief or the Deputy to be shown off by our (German) Group Leader.

dh

[runs as required]

19 minutes ago, jf2682 said:

Deviating slightly, I wonder if the term "innovation" can be used in the same sentence as the Midland Railway....

Would breaking down the old (GWR inspired?) railway class system be god enough for you?

[LMS2968]

33 minutes ago, jf2682 said:

Deviating slightly, I wonder if the term "innovation" can be used in the same sentence as the Midland Railway....

Just like the GWR (and all other railways), it was conservative in some (many?) ways but progressive in others. Its early introduction of Control for traffic management was an example.

[Aire Head]

37 minutes ago, jf2682 said:

Deviating slightly, I wonder if the term "innovation" can be used in the same sentence as the Midland Railway....

 

I would check @Compound2632 comments replying to my statement you quoted where I was firmly corrected!

[rogerzilla]

The classic example of a loco that steamed well, but wasn't economical, is the Merchant Navy class.   They used more coal than anything of their power class in the trials and, with their other faults, were only tolerated by BR because the boiler steamed so well. 

 

You can, of course, make most things steam well at the expense of coal consumption - naughty drivers did it with a "jimmy" across the blastpipe.  There's one in the GWR museum at Swindon.

[jim.snowdon]

33 minutes ago, rogerzilla said:

The classic example of a loco that steamed well, but wasn't economical, is the Merchant Navy class.   They used more coal than anything of their power class in the trials and, with their other faults, were only tolerated by BR because the boiler steamed so well. 

They, and their slightly smaller cousins, the West Countries, were probably examples of locomotives whose performance, in their original form, was nobbled by an unreliable steam reverser. BR were unable to test them reliably because the reverser would persistently drift off into full gear, a consequence of which is that they would have to be driven on the regulator, not by the valve gear. The extent to which the original valve gear could get out of phase with the cylinders due to chain wear is another issue that will not have helped, and both it and the steam reverser were discarded by BR in the rebuilding. The rest of the engine, the steam circuit and the boiler were retained as is.

 

Jim

[62613]

9 hours ago, jf2682 said:

Deviating slightly, I wonder if the term "innovation" can be used in the same sentence as the Midland Railway....

In at least two ways they were; the first was the brick arch and deflector in the firebox, which enabled locos to burn coal without smoke, rather than using coke. Coal has a higher calorific value than coke. The other was the development of the valve gear that must have been fitted to the vast majority of steam reciprocating engines, worldwide, the so-called Stephenson Link Motion. The Midland also developed the only practical examples of compound locomotives in the UK. On another front, I think they were the first railway company to trial steel rails as opposed to wrought iron.

 

 

 

Edited November 26, 2019 by 62613

[jim.snowdon]

34 minutes ago, 62613 said:

In at least two ways they were; the first was the brick arch and deflector in the firebox, which enabled locos to burn coal without smoke, rather than using coke. Coal has a higher calorific value than coke. The other was the development of the valve gear that must have been fitted to the vast majority of steam reciprocating engines, worldwide, the so-called Stephenson Link Motion. The Midland also developed the only practical examples of compound locomotives in the UK. On another front, I think they were the first railway company to trial steel rails as opposed to wrought iron.

 

 

 

Not quite. The Stephensn Link Motion was invented in 1842, two years before the Midland Railway Company was formed, by two of Stephenson's employees in his Newcastle works. 

As regards compounding in the UK, the Midland was relatively late in adopting compounding. T W Worsdell was building two cylinder compound locomotives for the Great Eastern Railway in the early 1880s, and later for the North Eastern Railway, using the Von Borries system, whilst Webb was building three-cylinder compounds for the LNWR at around the same time. The Midland did not get around to trying out compounds until the start of the 20th century, twenty years later.

The brick arch is not, strictly, a Midland Railway invention, although it was on the Midland, under the guidance of Kirtley, that the design was perfected in the form that we now know. 

 

Jim

[Compound2632]

2 hours ago, jf2682 said:

My only dislike of the Midland was the small engine policy.  

 @jf2682, what you are really disliking there is the fact that a lot of the company's lines had been built rather economically in the 1840s and 50s, so there were many underbridges with weight restrictions. from the 1890s, the Midland and LMS had a steady programme of bridge reinforcement or replacement, for which we can blame the replacement of Vignoles' elegant wrought iron arches over the Trent by the current hideous truss girder bridges.

[DavidB-AU]

11 hours ago, Pandora said:

The driver of the Scotch Goods,  Bill Hoole?

 

That rings a bell so it probably was!

 

Cheers

David

[brack]

28 minutes ago, 62613 said:

The Midland also developed the only practical examples of compound locomotives in the UK.

The North Eastern used compounding more extensively and for longer than the Midland. The midland's compounds all used the Smith system. Walter M Smith was of course the NER's chief draughtsman and developed the system there (he shared his developments with his friend and former colleague Johnson, who adopted the system at Derby). The hundreds of compound locos (both  von borries and smith types) the NER turned out were certainly practical and successful, but later CMEs decided simple expansion was er, simpler and the coal savings weren't worth it.

Smith compounds were also used by the GCR and GNR(I). Smith's pair of excellent 4 cylinder compound atlantics were well regarded and saw use on royal train duties, the NER had planned to build another 10 but Smith died in the mean time and his executors demanded high royalties for a system which had pretty much been developed on company time and money, so the second NER compounding era ended. Deeley's slight regulator modification to Smith's system on the midland made the locos easier for inexperienced drivers, but lost some of the advantages Smith's locos had with a good crew.

[LMS2968]

9 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

 @jf2682, what you are really disliking there is the fact that a lot of the company's lines had been built rather economically in the 1840s and 50s, so there were many underbridges with weight restrictions. from the 1890s, the Midland and LMS had a steady programme of bridge reinforcement or replacement, for which we can blame the replacement of Vignoles' elegant wrought iron arches over the Trent by the current hideous truss girder bridges.

The Midland directors shied way from the capital investment the straightening and strengthening their road would entail and instead settled on a policy of smaller locos which suited the original infrastructure and double headed these when necessary. They therefore accepted higher operating costs as opposed to capital investment. While it sounds odd it worked on the Midland.

 

The problems arose only after the Grouping. Since new LMS designs had to be able to work all parts of the system, including the ex-Midland Railway, loco size and development was severely limited until the capital was finally invested to upgrade the infrastructure and bigger engines, e.g. Claughtons and Super Ds, were allowed over Midland tracks.

[Compound2632]

@LMS2968, I don't think that's borne out by the facts. The Trent viaducts I mentioned were renewed in the 1890s. There had been some friction between the Locomotive and Civil Engineering Departments over the weight on the drivers of the later series of 4-2-2s, which to the embarrassment of the former turned out to be rather more than the design weight, but matters really came to a head with the first Compounds, which is why they were initially only allowed to work between Leeds and Carlisle. The Board then allocated the sum of £96,000 for an immediate programme of bridge strengthening - the price of around three dozen new engines. That programme continued (presumably with further allocation of funds) although I suppose it would be interrupted by the Great War - it wasn't until the 20s that Belpaires could work west of Derby. 

 

The Midland directors never seem to have been shy of capital investments.

[LMS2968]

Yes, but that started only in the 1890s and over specific routs, rather than the Railway as a whole. Much upgrading of the system had to wait for the LMS in the 1920s and 1930s.

Edited November 27, 2019 by LMS2968

[Compound2632]

Just now, LMS2968 said:

Yes, but that started only in the 1890s and over specific routs, rather than the Railway as a whole.

 

I'm starting to weary of this. Up to the end of the nineteenth century, Midland engines were as large as - on the whole larger than - engines on other lines; and up to the 1890s, the infrastructure had been adequate for such locomotives. Naturally the routes over which it was most necessary to use heavier engines were the ones addressed. 

[Trog]

On a slightly different Midland note, I was warned to be careful/watchful when re-ballasting or clay digging through Midland Railway over bridges because they sometimes had shallow foundations in the 1980's.

[LMS2968]

1 hour ago, Compound2632 said:

I'm starting to weary of this.

We can agree on that at least, especially given the thread's title!

 

You're right in that Midland locos were comparable in size with others up to about the turn of the century, but not after. While the LNWR built eight-coupled goods engines and, soon after, four-cylinder Claughtons, and the L&YR did similar And the Caley had its Cardeans, the biggest Midland loco was the Compound. Why?

 

At the Grouping in 1923, the CME, George Hughes, had a series of locos proposed for all-line operation. Acceptable on the Western, Central and Northern Divisions by the new LMS Chief Civil Engineer, he would not accept them over the Midland. Why? It was the weight per foot run that was the usual problem, hence the sacrosanct Midland coupled wheelbase of 8' 0" + 8' 6"; it spread the load.

 

Right from the start, an urgent need was seen for a loco to work the Toton - Brent (hardly a backwater route) coal traffic single handed instead of the 3F + 4F double heading at that time mandatory. A hundred 2-8-0s were envisaged by the Chief General Superintendent, Mr Follows (Committee minutes 29/11/23) and several permutations of the type schemed out by E. Stewart Cox, but at the meeting of 23/7/24 the CME reported that 'It had not been possible to arrive at a design of engine which could be utilised on all sections of the line.' The Toton - Brent problem was solved in 1927 by the purchase of three Garratts with a further thirty in 1930.

 

It says a lot that a 2-8-0 could not be designed which could work over the Midland Division,, despite the design's 20ft wheelbase (the eventual 8F's was 17' 3"). It was the LMS which sorted out the Midland infrastructure, not the parent company.

 

This doesn't mean that the Midland directors did not invest capital, but they chose to invest it in other areas and accepted the need for small locos, worked in pairs when (often) needed.

[Pandora]

On 26/11/2019 at 12:06, runs as required said:

Thats an interesting point about Chief Officers putting a stop to drawing office "projects" once they got to hear about them.

 

That story is so different to my experience in a railway drawing office - and to my neighbour's mother's recollections as a spirited young tracer in the Doncaster 'Plant' through the Thompson/Peppercorn handover years before Nationalisation.

Her drawing board clearly was a "magnet' in Bert Spencer's section, around which all were pleased to gather and talk - with the exception of aloof Thompson.

Mine in the CCEs at Kings+ was that I was privileged to be appointed (straight from college) in 1960 to a small "Research and Development" group to whom all posh visitors were brought by the Chief or the Deputy to be shown off by our (German) Group Leader.

dh

It has been said that it is the Drawing Office staff  for the real  design work of a locomotive  is undertaken,  not the CME,  was it Henry Fowler CME of Derby Works who denied all knowledge  of ever designing a steam locomotive?

Edited November 27, 2019 by Pandora