How would the Hawksworth Pacific have fared?

[1165Valour]

While Hawksworth dismissed the mythical 4-6-2 frequently attributed to him as being nothing more than a "draughtsman's dream", it does have a certain charm to it. Had it been built, how would it have compared to the express locos of the other regions? Weight-wise, it seems a bit worrying, at least to me.

[The Johnster]

Nail.  Head. Hit right on.  There wasn't much about the Mattingley pacific that was better than the LMS Princesses, it would have been restricted to 'double red' routes, which means that the heaviest passenger work, where it would have been most useful, the South Wales trains that usually loaded up to 16 bogies, would not have been available to it.  Had it been taken seriously, it might have been made lighter with a pan type frame, but as it was the GW had plenty of Kings and 47xx for the double red routes and no work for more locos on them.  It would have been dubious on the South Devon banks as well, and Brunel's atmospheric mistake was always at the back of the mind of any Swindon CME.  

 

It would have been classed as 8P by BR and presumably comparable to the Princesses or A3s; a Peppercorn A1, Duchess, or Merchant Navy in good nick would have run rings around it.  It would also have required an expenditure in bigger turntables in some places, which may not have been just an engineering issue as some of them would have needed land purchases to site them on.  

 

These are only my views, but the thing has been discussed to death in previous topics so other views are available...