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Range of the BR Class 05 Diesel Shunter on 1 (300 gal) tank of fuel?


BillB
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I just got this neat little shunter from Heljan, mainly because it's (D2592's) first allocation was Wakefield (Dec 1959 - Jan 1964). I'm wondering if the real thing would have had the range to operate a small branch line. In particular I'm thinking of the East & West Yorkshire Union Railway branch to Newmarket Colliery, which ran past my house (but was actually operated by steam tanks). The line ran westwards from the colliery to Patrick Green, where there were (in the 1960s) the remains of some old sidings, points, and maybe a passing loop, then past the remains of a derelict and largely demolished WW2 Ministry of Supply depot, where one could find empty boxes stencilled WD for mortar bombs and grenades! Where there had obviously been extensive warehouses, sidings, and rail loading facilities, and on in the direction of Lofthouse, where I assume it joined the LNER main line. So maybe 2 - 3 miles.

 

I have found info on the 05, 300 gal tank, 204 hp, 18 mph top speed, but not the range. But I have seen the wiki photo of 2599 trundling thru Goole towing a brake van + 4 vans + 2 open wagons.

 

Grateful for any info,

Bill.

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I would think that it would do more than a mile per gallon of fuel, but if you take that as the lowest figure, you still have a range of 300miles.... Obviously sitting around idling would cut that, but it must be a good rule of thumb..

 

Andy G

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Based on what the 6 cylinder version of the engine did in marine use, I reckon about 700 miles.

 

6 cyl using 5 gallons per hour, so half as much again will mean 300 gallons should last 40 hours, at full power, (half that consumption for idling).

So 40 hours at 18mph gives you 720 miles.

 

As previously said, enough to run from depot to outstation, work all week, and return to depot for refueling/servicing at the end of the week. Perfectly feasible to run a few miles up and down a branch.....

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6 hours ago, Davexoc said:

Based on what the 6 cylinder version of the engine did in marine use, I reckon about 700 miles.

 

6 cyl using 5 gallons per hour, so half as much again will mean 300 gallons should last 40 hours, at full power, (half that consumption for idling).

So 40 hours at 18mph gives you 720 miles.

 

As previously said, enough to run from depot to outstation, work all week, and return to depot for refueling/servicing at the end of the week. Perfectly feasible to run a few miles up and down a branch.....

All of which shows how correct the LMS was to not build any more steam shunting locos, after the mid 1930s. As much as I like steam locos, the maths didn't add up, especially when you could just stop the engine and restart when next required - assuming the batteries were up to it!

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Expressing it a different way you could say at least a fortnight on average shunting duties.  Back in 1973 in South Wales some of our yard pilot 350s (aka Class 08) could reliably manage three weeks between refuellings and none of them - including the trip engine that worked a few miles from the yard - went less than a fortnight.

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3 hours ago, Wickham Green too said:

Not just the LMS, I don't think the LNER built anything suitable for shunting alone ( other than for hump work ) and the Southern certainly didn't .......... but there were plenty of superannuated locos, on all lines, suitable for shunting so there was no real need.

I'm not so sure that superannuated locos were the bargain they appeared to be. They still needed manning by 2 people and needed the fire kept going, because if you let it out overnight, it would take some time to be ready.

The LMS in it's last years, built plenty of new 2-6-2Ts and 2-6-0s as replacements for geriatric locos from the 1870s onward, because according to their accountants, modern locos were more efficient, especially when getting loco crews, was getting harder. Also didn't need to keep a large range of obsolete parts.

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I think it's fair to say that all the 'Big Four' built replacements for lots of elderly steam locos - though the Southern's contribution was largely by electrification. ( Your 'plenty of new 2-6-2Ts and 2-6-0s' were largely supplied after nationalisation as a 'pre-standardisation' movement - as were their 2-6-4T brethren.)

Returning to the topic of shunting locos : while the LMS had a whopping 45* diesels at the end - as against four on the LNER and three on the Southern - cessation of building steam shunters hadn't exactly made a huge change to the overall fleet. At that time, the scarcity of home-grown oil fuel was a major handicap and a serious problem when foreign exchange was in such short supply.

( Unfortunately discussion of the [ missed ? ] opportunities of 'Sentinel' steam technology is outside the remit of this thread.)

 

* That's 45 with LMS numbers in the 1948 ABC.

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10 hours ago, Wickham Green too said:

I think it's fair to say that all the 'Big Four' built replacements for lots of elderly steam locos - though the Southern's contribution was largely by electrification. ( Your 'plenty of new 2-6-2Ts and 2-6-0s' were largely supplied after nationalisation as a 'pre-standardisation' movement - as were their 2-6-4T brethren.)

Returning to the topic of shunting locos : while the LMS had a whopping 45* diesels at the end - as against four on the LNER and three on the Southern - cessation of building steam shunters hadn't exactly made a huge change to the overall fleet. At that time, the scarcity of home-grown oil fuel was a major handicap and a serious problem when foreign exchange was in such short supply.

( Unfortunately discussion of the [ missed ? ] opportunities of 'Sentinel' steam technology is outside the remit of this thread.)

 

* That's 45 with LMS numbers in the 1948 ABC.

It's hard to come to the conclusion that the LMS wasn't making inroads into their steam shunter fleet, because they weren't wanted or desirable. There was a major set back called WW2, so not surprising more diesel shunters didn't get built.

But it's true to say the LMS didn't build a single steam shunting loco after the mid 1930s. Other railways did.

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14 hours ago, kevinlms said:

It's hard to come to the conclusion that the LMS wasn't making inroads into their steam shunter fleet, because they weren't wanted or desirable. There was a major set back called WW2, so not surprising more diesel shunters didn't get built.

But it's true to say the LMS didn't build a single steam shunting loco after the mid 1930s. Other railways did.

And a lot. On the ex-GWR, the 1600, 1500 and 9400 classes (some of the latter lasting barely five years, I believe). OK, they may not have been purely shunting locomotives (light branch line work, empty stock movements, etc). And then there was the outrageous new build of J72 (NER class E1) - what was that about, especially since the LNER had been acquiring ex-MOS Austerities (J94)? I don't remember J72s doing much trip work - most of those I knew were station pilots and the like, and very pretty they looked too, in NER light green, east end of Newcastle Central, (68723, 68736?) and viewed through the big front windows of a dmu going to my gran in Hexham past Geordie Stephenson's birthplace and over the bowstring bridge at Wylam. Sometimes invited into the dmu cab to 'drive' (well, put my hand on the throttle at least).

 

So many unrepeatable experiences in one short trip. 

 

PS Thinking about it, J72s may have been tripping in Hull, I suppose, but then as now that was a foreign country and they did things differently there. 

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1 hour ago, lanchester said:

And a lot. On the ex-GWR, the 1600, 1500 and 9400 classes (some of the latter lasting barely five years, I believe). OK, they may not have been purely shunting locomotives (light branch line work, empty stock movements, etc). And then there was the outrageous new build of J72 (NER class E1) - what was that about, especially since the LNER had been acquiring ex-MOS Austerities (J94)? I don't remember J72s doing much trip work - most of those I knew were station pilots and the like, and very pretty they looked too, in NER light green, east end of Newcastle Central, (68723, 68736?) and viewed through the big front windows of a dmu going to my gran in Hexham past Geordie Stephenson's birthplace and over the bowstring bridge at Wylam. Sometimes invited into the dmu cab to 'drive' (well, put my hand on the throttle at least).

 

So many unrepeatable experiences in one short trip. 

 

PS Thinking about it, J72s may have been tripping in Hull, I suppose, but then as now that was a foreign country and they did things differently there. 

Don't forget - as you partially mention - that steam locos were genral;;y far more flexible in usage than equivalent size early diesel shunting locos.  The diesel shunters were exactly that - shunting locos whereas most of the similar size steam equivalents could do freight tripping and in many case work branch or local passenger trains.  Thew other important factor was that steam locos were much cheaper to build and in the economic conditions imediately pow st WWI and for some years after didn't need fuel that had to be paid for in US dollars (which were also in short supply).

 

The diesels definitely had the advantage that they could be worked by a one man crew and didn't need the amount of attention at a running shed to clean fires and coal them etc that was required fora steam engine.  So they could work 24 hours a day for, often, 6 days of the week at a stretch without any need to go to shed.  thus they made sense as a shunting engine but that was the limit of waht they could do. 

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If you want a good comparitive analysis of the cost of operation of steam and diesel shunting locos, "Diesel Locomotives and Railcars", B Reed, c1947 contains an entire chapter on the topic, chock-full of tables and calculations. But, unhelpfully for this discussion, everything is expressed in terms of cost per hour of shunting, rather than miles run, but he does give in passing a figure of c30 gals fuel consumed over a 24hr three-shift shunting operation for a 200hp diesel, derived from the 1930s trials undertaken by the LMS.

 

Interestingly, his comparison shows that, across a wide range of hours shunting per annum, comparing a c300hp diesel with a 16in steamer, the diesel with a crew of two is consistently more expensive (so you wouldn't do that!), whereas with a crew of one the diesel becomes cheaper than steam at about 2000hrs shunting per annum, and the margin in its favour gets greater the more hours are involved. I havent back-worked his calculations, but I think this is because of the significantly higher capital cost of the diesel.

 

This does go some way towards explaining why steam locos lingered surprisingly long in some industrial applications (and I'm not talking about collieries, where the fuel was effectively free, here), in that some operations only needed to fire their loco up for two or three days each week, for a single shift - a steam loco already so old that its capital cost was long-forgotten would easily be cheaper than a diesel, and even a hefty boiler repair would be cheaper than buying the diesel.

 

And, I agree with Stationmaster about the comparituve inflexibility of diesels at this sort of date. Bullied had a crack at the problem of cretaing a diesel that could shunt and trip, but "blew it" by using a mechanical transmission - if he'd opted for a c500hp DE (better 600-800hp) it probably would have succeeded, but would have needed very hefty blowers, or a two-speed gearbox, for the traction motors, almost certainly would have been a Bo-Bo to spread its weight, and probably worked out too high in capital cost. EE did sell Bo-Bo DEs of c600hp to overseas railways at this time*, for "road switcher" service, the things that became our Class 20 as engine capacities increased, and they seem to have been both popular and long-lasting, so where coal was expensive, and oil cheap, it could be done.

 

5BAAAAC7-CA51-48A4-981C-C6B2568FE316.jpeg.dc776ac3c1285ff2c2f342ebe42956c0.jpeg

 

In miniature, the exact same problem hit by Bulleid applied on the BnM turf railways in Ireland, which quickly grew from very localised things at the outset to long straggly routes, tens of miles in some cases. They used Ruston 48hp locos with a dual ratio box (same as Bulleid did), and they too hit problems getting the right step between the ratios, and the right "cogs" within each ratio. Their solution was simply to flog the locos in a way that no mainline railway would countenance - the engine governers were routinely "foxed", and trains were "exploded" from rest using oodles of sand on the rails, flames spouting from the exhausts! They eventually procured the Wagonmaster locos to overcome all this - a very clever loco, configured around standard agricultural tractor components made at the Ford factory in Cork, and designed by an ex-Ashford works man who had, guess what: worked with Bulleid. The Wagonmaster's weak spot eventually (after about thirty years hard labour) turned out to be the additional reverser box that was added beyond the standard tractor transmission, and many ended-up having to be driven very slowly in reverse. Many were re-engined and had hydro-kinetic transmissions fitted to them.

 

*South Australian Railways actually created a "very mini Class 20", a Bo-Bo 350hp DE in 1949, using the same engine as the well known EE 350hp 0-6-0 shunters, their Class 350, the type was mainly a shunting class, but could run trips with very limited loads. It weighed almost exactly the same as the EE350hp 0-6-0. Nice drawing of one here 

https://sarplans.steam4me.net/images/SAR_Rollingstock_14.gif

 

** The SR did sketch out a diesel conversion of the "milk van" motor cars from the LBSCR overhead electric sets, I think in the early/mid 1930s. It never went ahead, probably because the size/weight of engine that could be accomodated at that date would have made it either too weedy, or too slow, to be useful as a "road" loco.

 

Edited by Nearholmer
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1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

....... This does go some way towards explaining why steam locos lingered surprisingly long in some industrial applications (and I'm not talking about collieries, where the fuel was effectively free, here), ....

Another type of loco where the 'fuel was effectively free' was the fireless machine ..... a type I suspect could have been used rather more widely in the UK than it was.

 

( Unfortunately the days of anything on Bord-na-Mona seem very limited now.)

 

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17 hours ago, lanchester said:

And a lot. On the ex-GWR, the 1600, 1500 and 9400 classes (some of the latter lasting barely five years, I believe). OK, they may not have been purely shunting locomotives (light branch line work, empty stock movements, etc). And then there was the outrageous new build of J72 (NER class E1) - what was that about, especially since the LNER had been acquiring ex-MOS Austerities (J94)? I don't remember J72s doing much trip work - most of those I knew were station pilots and the like, and very pretty they looked too, in NER light green, east end of Newcastle Central, (68723, 68736?) and viewed through the big front windows of a dmu going to my gran in Hexham past Geordie Stephenson's birthplace and over the bowstring bridge at Wylam. Sometimes invited into the dmu cab to 'drive' (well, put my hand on the throttle at least).

 

So many unrepeatable experiences in one short trip. 

 

PS Thinking about it, J72s may have been tripping in Hull, I suppose, but then as now that was a foreign country and they did things differently there. 

Was it to do with axle loading? Normanton, an ex Midland shed, kept at least one J72 for trip workings to Castleford as they were only loco able to access the Hickson branch. There must have been other examples of weight restrictions that would have excluded the austerities.

With the end of steam an 03 was given this duty.

Edited by doilum
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There were all sorts of oddities that had to be shunted, with various axle-weight, wheelbase, and clearance limitations, which is how some of the very small classes of diesel shunter arose - one was a short wheelbase four-wheel design that was capable of very heavy shifting, for use in the London docks replacing hefty 0-4-0 steamers, for instance.

 

All a tremendous waste of money as shunting progressively ceased to be, of course, but very interesting!

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On 16/10/2021 at 02:03, kevinlms said:

It's hard to come to the conclusion that the LMS wasn't making inroads into their steam shunter fleet, because they weren't wanted or desirable. There was a major set back called WW2, so not surprising more diesel shunters didn't get built.

But it's true to say the LMS didn't build a single steam shunting loco after the mid 1930s. Other railways did.

 

Are you sure about that?

 

What about the batch of Kitsons ordered by the LMS just before nationalisation? But like many locomotives didn't appear until later.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LMS_Kitson_0-4-0ST

 

 

Jason

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2 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

The time lag between the demise of the LMS and that batch appearing seems awfully long. Were they built on saturday afternnon overtime only, or something?

There was delay on many railway items as the war got in the way, wagons ordered before the war were were not delivered till after and shortages of material after did not help either. Liverpool Corporation did not have the last batch of wagons delivered till after nationalisation.

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On 17/10/2021 at 15:19, Neil said:

The 05 would be eminently suitable for branch work. Check out this Geoff Plumb image of a railtour on the Isle of Axholme. These locos regularly worked the branch freights at the time.

Not really much use for any sort of train work as they  were far too slow - they were limited to 17.8 mph.  The BR 204hp design, later Class 03, was probably the most suitable for branchline work as they had a maximum speed of 28.5mph (and of course actually worked passenger - Workmen's - trains on the Highworth branch) and were considered the best available for some mainline freight tripping because of their higher speed.

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4 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

Not really much use for any sort of train work as they  were far too slow - they were limited to 17.8 mph.  The BR 204hp design, later Class 03, was probably the most suitable for branchline work as they had a maximum speed of 28.5mph (and of course actually worked passenger - Workmen's - trains on the Highworth branch) and were considered the best available for some mainline freight tripping because of their higher speed.


Whilst this was certainly the case on Highworth, Calne (pick up freight and also assisting ailing DMUs), presumably running out from Swindon fuelling facilities, were

branch freights with runs on the main line not the exact type of duties the infamous D95xx (later class 14) were intended? They certainly did this on branches like those south of Gloucester (eg Nailsworth; Forest of Dean; Dursley). They would certainly been less disruptive (when operational), on the main line runs owing to better speed and power ability than an 03. However by 1967 these D95xx seem to have been displaced (to store or transfer to Hull, or both) either by closures or the influx to BR shed of more D63xx locos, which were used at Dursley and Lydney, for instance (presumably cascaded from elsewhere owing to closures in the south west late 1966 and changed duties (more DMUs available for stopping passenger services in the south west - though I noted quite a few D63xx still on these in Devon in summer 1967). The volume of WR class 03s needed also seemed to diminish in this period also (eg D2115 from Hookagate scrapped at Cohen’s Kingsbury in 1968 - I noted it from a passing Birmingham to Derby train less bonnet and engine unit; displacement by 08s such as at Wenford Bridge). 

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