GWR- a research project

[Ron Solly]

A young modeller here in South Australia had this to say on another forum


Hello Everyone,

As a high school student from South Australia I am currently completing a subject called Research Project in which I have to answer an open ended question through extensive research. As students we created our own questions.  As I am interested in railways I wanted to relate my project to railways and my question is bellow:
To what extent was the Great Western Railway innovative and how did those innovations influence other railways in Rolling Stock Technology and Infrastructure?
 I was wondering if any of you could provide me with some answers and/or sources to help me answer my question. Please be aware that it doesn't matter if some of the Great Western's Innovations didn't necessarily influence other railways, for example, their ATC system. Also the influences don't necessarily have to be limited to influencing other British Railway companies. 
 
Regards Connor



he eventually, after some pointing in some directions came up with this

https://youtu.be/_1MrU5kFWG8


see what you think.

Edited August 4, 2017 by Ron Solly

[Miss Prism]

Good vid.

 

CofT's run down Wellington Bank however was done with its original parallel boiler and older slide valves. (Which kinda makes its speed even more impressive!)

[Nearholmer]

It said student can find a copy, it is worth looking at a book called "The Great Western's Last Look Forward" by Christian Barman, the core of which is the GWR's plans had nationalisationnot happened.

 

But, the GWR lasted so long that it is a question with a "yes, no, maybe" answer. The broad gauge, highly engineered mainline was exceedingly innovative, to the degree whereby locomotive design went off into the realms of over-innovation initially; the openness to US boiler developments, fine tolerance engineering, locomotive testing etc were, if not innovative on a global scale then certainly 'fast follower' in the GB context. Diesel railcars: agoin 'fast follower', and they had tried the emerging technology in the early 1900s. Gas turbine? Potentially. Air services, bus services ......

 

But, there are plenty of aspects of the GWR that look typical of a mega-firm that has standardised its practices, got a pretty good formula working, and then begun to rest on its laurels a bit.

 

I'm biased, but I would say that the two innovative railways in the 'grouping' period were SR and LT. I say this not because of electrification, but because both were very keen on 'scientific' approaches to management and runners of a very tight ship. The SR particularly had a genius for what would now be called 'value management'.

 

Big old question, though, and needs aboutthirty years of study to answer it properly by comparison with other railways and other industries!

 

Kevin

Edited August 3, 2017 by Nearholmer

[The Johnster]

Nearholmer hits the nail square on the head.  The GW is in many ways an enigma, with periods of intense innovation followed by the stifling corporate culture that 'we've done it as well as it can be done, why improve' which ignored progress elsewhere.  The Churchward innovations were largely adaptations of US and French practice, and he never claimed them to be original.  But there were some serious innovations in those years, the optical sighting system for lining up frames accurately being on a par in performance with modern laser technology.

 

This on a railway which was still designing and building Victorian inside cylinder 0-6-0 tank engines in the late 1940s.  At nationalisation, when the 16xx were being developed, the coaches had been outstripped by the all-steel buckeye couplered types on the LNER and Southern, and in most areas practice was unchanged even into the diesel era.  If Swindon' last gasp was the hydraulic programme, it was as ill advised and badly planned, implemented, and practiced as any of the worst wastes of money elsewhere on the railway.  Shed allocated Britannias and 9Fs howled in protest because they'd asked for Castles and 28xx; the rot was throughout and not just at management level.  

 

Railcars and ATC are usually quoted by the die hard supporters around now in the discussion; I give them ATC, the progenitor of all modern cab signalling, but it was not the only such system in the world (beware the 'Gales in Channel, Continent Isolated' attitude), just the only one in the UK.  The groundwork for the railcars was done on the Irish narrow gauge, desperate for cost cutters to compete with buses, and, again, in the US and continental Europe.

 

The Belgians were far more innovative.

Edited August 3, 2017 by The Johnster

[298]

What about their plan to electrify west of Taunton? It was scuppered by WW2 and scant details are known, but would have probably been based on continental DC practice. Although such plans certainly weren't unique, it is relevant in the sense of the scale of the project where other companies only managed smaller single route projects.

[Nearholmer]

Wasn't that more of an evaluation report, commissioned from a consultant, than a plan? (Yes, and the consultants were Merz and McClellan, who recommended 3kV dc, which was first proven properly in the USA, and was as much an British Empire as Continental system, well within the capability of British industry)

 

And, all of the big four evaluated electrification of main lines, either around the time of the national report into the topic c1931 or in response to it, and some historians say that the GWR was never serious, merely sabre rattling to force coal prices down!

 

And,and, I have an inkling that the GWR evaluated it pre-WW1 as well.

 

K

Edited August 3, 2017 by Nearholmer

[The Johnster]

The original OP's OP's question was about innovation and influence, and the influence side of things is more difficult to quantify and asses.  There is to some extent a polarisation of opinion amongst professional railwaymen, railway journalists, and enthusiasts on the matter, with there being little middle of the road between them.  The period at the start of the contention is the early 20th century, when the locomotive policy under Churchward was remarkable, and remarked upon, but also at the time of introduction of corridor expresses, restaurant cars which made stops for food unnecessary, and the building of the cut-offs, all of which enabled the company to achieve massive timetable reductions at a time when other companies were struggling with increased loads and the problems involved in big engines.  

 

The GWR was largely successful in implementing the modernisation program which followed the abolition of the broad gauge, but had made very little progress between the 1850s and 1890s.  Were the Iron Dukes, revolutionary in the 1850s and still in top link service at the end of the broad gauge, really the best that could have been done by then for top link expresses?  This complacency made the Churchward revolution all the more startling and noticeable, but how much notice was taken of it at the time?  There was plenty of admiring comment about the efficiency of the new locos, and criticism of their aesthetics at a time when Wainwright's SECR 'D' class was taking the honours, but the design features and methods of working were by and large not adopted elsewhere except for the taper boiler, which is nothing special and simply the result of having a smokebox of a smaller diameter than the ring at the firebox end, and the de Glehn 4 cylinder front end layout of the Stanier pacifics.  Professor Tuplin, always a good read if nothing else, reckoned the 'Saint' 4-6-0 to be the most influential design in modern UK steam practice, but I'd have given that honour to the much less glamorous 'Hall' derivate.

 

The GWR ploughed it's own furrow, to a large extent in it's own field, and got some results from the crop, but I would question the extent to which anyone looking over the hedge and commenting, positively or otherwise, actually took such practice into account in their own fields, er, railways.

[brianusa]

Luckily plans for wires west of Taunton or Bristol for that matter, have never materialised. The GW main line is an excellent example of why and who wants all that catenary spoiling the country side and the trains.

 

Brian.

[Peter Kazmierczak]

In terms of marketing, promotion and engaging with what we now call stakeholders, the GW was innovative - led from the top by Felix Pole.

[John_Miles]

The Great Western had a serious superiority complelx. This came straight from Brunel who fancied himself as a genius - he wasn't but he was very clever although badly flawed. He "innovated" in several ways like choosing a rail gauge which was different to everybody else, picking a propulsive technolology (vacuum) which was relatively untested and resulted in a mainline through South Devon which was badly suited to locomotive propulsion. His ideas for steam engines were unworkable and he had to be rescued by the Stephensons and Gooch. Having slagged off Brunel, later the GWR did do some good things like an Automatic Warning System for signals and Churchward's work on steam engines set the standard for the rest of the 20th century in the UK. If they weren't so bloody arrogant one could admire them.

[Nearholmer]

Influence comes from the diffusion of ideas in multiple ways beyond straight copying by looking over the hedge. For instance, didn't Stanier take Swindon ideas to the backward LMS?

 

K

[Ron Solly]

As advised by the modeller who was 17 at the time, still at school

 

 

Ron, 

 

I believe people misunderstood the nature of the task. Can you let them know that the task only ran for 1 semester and was completed last year and was more based on helping students establish research skills rather than a huge paper, the focus was on research skills, not necessarily content correctness. Also, the availability of sources mostly books is certainly not as high in Australia as the UK, nor the personal communication relating to British Railways.

Regards Connor

[The Johnster]

Influence comes from the diffusion of ideas in multiple ways beyond straight copying by looking over the hedge. For instance, didn't Stanier take Swindon ideas to the backward LMS?

 

K

 

Only to a very limited extent.  The state of the LMS in the late 20s meant something had to be done, but beyond the taper boilers and de Glehn front end for the pacifics, Stanier took little from Swindon that could be adapted to LMS practice.  Long piston travel and Stephenson valve gear failed to make it north, as did Swindon optical frame setting, or domeless boilers for long.  You might argue that the 1924 loco exchanges had more GW influence at Doncaster. 

 

The first of the Stanier moguls was apparently turned out with a GW style domeless boiler with a safety valve bonnet and copper capped chimney; Stanier was not pleased and ordered their immediate removal.  That may tell you much about his attitude to implementing Swindon ideas at Crewe and Derby.

[Nearholmer]

A man who was Swindon born, bred, educated, trained etc will have taken with him a great deal, between his ears. That having been said, he might not have been able to implement all that he thought was good, and he may not have thought that everything his old masters did was good.

 

Stephenson valve gear is a case in point where the GWR was almost certainly clinging to the familiar, where better existed. Waelschaerts gear was proven, and didn't the Hughes moguls have it? In fact, weren't the Horwich engines already generally more advanced than Derby practice, despite attempts to 'water down' the design by use of old fashioned components?

 

K

Edited August 4, 2017 by Nearholmer

[Nearholmer]

Ron/Connor

 

I well understood that it was a high-school project, hence my comments about it being a big old task.

 

People have had PhDs on the back of self-set questions as apparently simple, but actually very deep, as that one.

 

Kevin

[John_Miles]

This is turning into an LMS GWR - how much influence did Stanier have. The OP was about GWR innovation. They tried gas turbine locos, diesel hydraulics none of which proved to be long term solutions.

[Peter Kazmierczak]

I think I've got the completely wrong end of the stick with this thread.

 

I read the first post as being that the young student was asking for help. A later post implies he's already finished his project.

 

Yours confused,

Peter

[Ron Solly]

Peter, the young modeller had asked for help in another forum in Aug 2016 and while he had finished it sometime later in 20166 , he did get around to posting  his Youtube result on the forum so I posted it here for others to see.

It was not intended to start a new conversation here but his initial request and his results for anyone who may be interested in what he found out.

The first post had his initial enquiry plus the result of it.

[Nearholmer]

Ah, but it's like those meetings of the engineering institutions, where someone presents on a topic, which sparks a discussion that lasts all evening ......

[Peter Kazmierczak]

Thanks Ron.

 

I didn't see the bit below the "Regards Connor" in the original post..........

Edited August 4, 2017 by Peter Kazmierczak

[The Stationmaster]

A man who was Swindon born, bred, educated, trained etc will have taken with him a great deal, between his ears. That having been said, he might not have been able to implement all that he thought was good, and he may not have thought that everything his old masters did was good.

 

Stephenson valve gear is a case in point where the GWR was almost certainly clinging to the familiar, where better existed. Waelschaerts gear was proven, and didn't the Hughes moguls have it? In fact, weren't the Horwich engines already generally more advanced than Derby practice, despite attempts to 'water down' the design by use of old fashioned components?

 

K

 

Interestingly Stephenson valve gear does have its advantages (including over Walschaerts) but is best suited to inside cylinder.inside valve gear arrangements rather than hanging it on the out side.

 

The Churchward period - and in workshop practice terms the Collett period also - were undoubtedly innovative and much of what Churchward incorporated into or developed in his own designs spread to the other Railways, all four of the grouped companies with the Southern acquiring it via the SECR, the LNER via loco exchanges, and the LMS via the acquisition of Stanier as Kevin has made clear.

 

GWR publicity was something which was picked up by the LNER although it could no doubt be said that they also learned from the outside world of business.  And of course one particular GWR innovation (and invention), the electric token machine, became very nearly the national de facto method of traditional single line signalling equipment due to its superiority over the various earlier offerings for the working of single lines.

[Killian keane]

If I were you I would have a look for the December 2005 railway magazine which is devoted to the great western and includes a rather informative timeline

[The Johnster]

This is turning into an LMS GWR - how much influence did Stanier have. The OP was about GWR innovation. They tried gas turbine locos, diesel hydraulics none of which proved to be long term solutions.

 

Well, Stanier had a massive, and arguably the defining, influence on the LMS, but I would question the amount of influence the GWR had on Stanier.  Some, obviously, but it is harder to pin down an actual GWR practice in design, workshop practice, or running that translated from the GW to the LMS directly as a result of Stanier being offered the big job on the LMS.  It must be pointed out that, on the GWR, there was in the grouping period only one workshop that designed and built the locos, whereas on the LMS there were 3 (and 3 on the Southern and 2 on the LNER), so imposing a standard method of working was much easier for Churchward at Swindon than for Stanier at Derby, Crewe, and Horwich.  Realpolitik must have dictated that compromise and adaptation were the order of the day, and Stanier was a new boy and an outsider having to cope with the aftermath of a poisonous internal political struggle at the start of his regime.  His success, which was considerable, must have been as much down to his ability to delegate detail work down to the other workshops as it was to his skill and undoubted ability in designing very successful locomotives and overseeing their building and operation.

 

The LMS was already very familiar with Walchearts valve gear before Stanier's arrival, from the Royal Scots, Patriots, SDJR 2-8-0s and Big Bertha (to make the point that Derby had heard of the concept), Crabs and Fowler 2-6-2 and 2-6-4 tank engines, as well as the larger Lanky and LNWR pre-grouping 4-6-0s.  Such matters are far too technical for a Johnster's understanding, but I am given to understand that the persistence of Stephenson's valve gear on the GW was due to that railway's insistence on long piston travel and presumably crank throw, for which it is more suited; as I say, don't ask me to explain this, I'm only parroting what I've read.  

[Nearholmer]

"Well, Stanier had a massive, and arguably the defining, influence on the LMS, but I would question the amount of influence the GWR had on Stanier."

 

I know we're off down a rabbit hole, a long way from the broader question that the OP was examining, but: when Stanier was made an offer he couldn't refuse, to join the LMS, he had spent his entire working life, c40 years, with the GWR, the very same firm that his father worked for, and the same firm that effectively owned the town in which he grew up. Doubtless he kept up with developments elsewhere, as any good engineer does, but it would be nothing short of a miracle if the GWR hadnt had a huge influence on him.

 

My point about valve gear was that this was possibly one of the areas where he thought that the GWR had 'missed a trick', and that the LMS was already better placed, but that is only a surmise.

 

A further random thought is that it is a bit difficult to get a clear picture on long term influence of the GWR, because the LMS triumphed in multiple areas when it came to senior posts in the newly formed BR. In that sense, at that crucial period, the GWR seems not to have been very influential at all.

 

Anyway, someone mentioned the Belgians earlier, and they very definitely did copy the GWR when it came to the front of their 608 class autorail! One of these is preserved, and I've often thought that it ought to visit Didcot.

Edited August 4, 2017 by Nearholmer

[rodent279]

Luckily plans for wires west of Taunton or Bristol for that matter, have never materialised. The GW main line is an excellent example of why and who wants all that catenary spoiling the country side and the trains.

 

Brian.

Absolute nonsense.

Wires may be functional rather than aesthetic, but I'd rather be travelling on a swift silent electric than a slow dirty outmoded diesel.

I don't see how you can say wires intrude on the countryside anymore than the railway itself does. If you can put them up through the fells, through the Arlberg & Gotthard valleys, in the Bernese Oberland, then a bit of west country dairy land is no big loss.