Worst looking locomotive topic. Antidote to Best Looking Locomotive topic.

[SHMD]

I just thought (at least) half of this might have been relevant here!

 

 

 

Kev.

 

[rockershovel]

I was rather hoping someone could identify the weird little 0-6-6-0..

[Flying Fox 34F]

20 hours ago, rockershovel said:

Apologies if these have already been posted...

 

The 0-6-6-0 appears to be a creation of R. Hornsby and Sons of Grantham. It should be one of their early Heavy Oil engines. I’ve seen other products that they supplied the 18 inch gauge Woolwich network, but they were 0-4-0’s. It’s fitted with Link and Pin Couplers.  Definitely Ugly, but would be fascinating to watch it moving. I wonder where it went?

 

Paul

[Kris]

Today's prize in the Hornby advent calendar is not the best looking loco. 

 

 

[Flying Fox 34F]

2 hours ago, Flying Fox 34F said:

The 0-6-6-0 appears to be a creation of R. Hornsby and Sons of Grantham. It should be one of their early Heavy Oil engines. I’ve seen other products that they supplied the 18 inch gauge Woolwich network, but they were 0-4-0’s. It’s fitted with Link and Pin Couplers.  Definitely Ugly, but would be fascinating to watch it moving. I wonder where it went?

 

Paul

I’ve had a search around the web and discovered this Ugly 0-6-6-0 is a Hornsby - Akroyd Single Cylinder Heavy Oil powered locomotive, built for the Chattenden and Upnor Railway. Works number 6234.

 

Paul

[kevinlms]

17 hours ago, whart57 said:

 

That top one is begging to be modelled isn't it?

 

 

Looks like a distant cousin here.

 

http://www.douglas-self.com/MUSEUM/LOCOLOCO/johnston/johnston.htm

[whart57]

And some locos are born ugly and others have ugliness thrust upon them

 

The Royal Siam Railway acquired some shunters from Henschel

 

 

Basically Prussian T3s with a balloon stack and a pilot (cowcatcher) they don't look bad.

 

Then the Thais standardised on meter gauge and all standard gauge locos were regauged

 

 

Hmm, not so easy on the eye now are we.

 

[rockershovel]

Regauging is rarely, if ever a recipe for aesthetic success. How about this Cape Gauge Quarry Hunslet from Lobito, Angola? Hard to make out in this image but the big coupler at the front appears to swing aside on smokebox door hinges to open the smokebox....

Edited December 5, 2021 by rockershovel

[rockershovel]

Hornby Akroyd appear to have made a business of supplying unsightly motive power to the WD; 

 

 

They also developed the tracked vehicle, lost interest and sold the rights to the Holt Tractor Co of USA, which we now know as Caterpillar...

[rockershovel]

9 hours ago, Flying Fox 34F said:

I’ve had a search around the web and discovered this Ugly 0-6-6-0 is a Hornsby - Akroyd Single Cylinder Heavy Oil powered locomotive, built for the Chattenden and Upnor Railway. Works number 6234.

 

Paul

Described on Wikipedia as "constructed 1903... 2'6" gauge.... single-cylinder, opposed piston heavy oil engine ... under-powered, noisy and difficult to start ... disposal unknown" 

 

I wouldn't describe it as "ugly", more a case of really not looking credible. I'm a firm believer that if it IS right, it will LOOK right and that just doesn't LOOK right... it's ingenious but somehow  fails to convince. 

Edited December 5, 2021 by rockershovel

[62613]

On 30/05/2021 at 12:42, rockershovel said:

 

I didn't understand that point, until you expressed it in that form. I suppose that anyone without a sufficient technical background to understand that torque, power output and Tractive effort are not the same thing, wouldn't see it at all. Perhaps that's the point of the "claimed advantage" - to express that point, in non-technical language? 

 

I would guess, then that constant TE over the whole range of road speeds, was a design goal; it seems like a worthwhile thing to have. It also makes sense of the emphasis on the supercharging system providing high starting torque, because you need that to start the train (as opposed to keeping it moving). I do note that like the aforementioned Rotodyne, noise (particularly from the auxiliary engines driving the super chargers) is described as "hideous", which can't have been a selling point. 

 

I also note that the Mk 1 suffered a major transmission failure at quite low mileage, which can't have favourably impressed potential providers of development funds, let alone purchasers. 

 

The Americans demonstrated conclusively that it was possible to build steam engines which could exert such starting torque, that the train simply couldn't be worked without breaking the couplers. It WASN'T possible to build steam locos which could sustain the necessary TE to work such huge trains over useful distances, or at useful speeds. 

 

Having electric transmission solves several problems at once, not least that it is possible to exert central control over a series of locomotives distributed through the length of the train. It also provides a system by which a relatively simple feedback system controls the individual engines in any locomotive, by monitoring their output relative to the required total. It further means that the power and torque characteristics of the traction motors need not be the same as the generator motors. 

 

I still find it very difficult to envisage how the Fell locomotive was driven and controlled. 

I suppose the thing is that in the early days of UK diesels, it had to be tried; I suppose it's one of the diesel equivalent of, say, Brunel's atmospheric railway, or the Paget locomotive

[Flying Fox 34F]

13 hours ago, rockershovel said:

Hornby Akroyd appear to have made a business of supplying unsightly motive power to the WD; 

 

 

They also developed the tracked vehicle, lost interest and sold the rights to the Holt Tractor Co of USA, which we now know as Caterpillar...

You are right about the tracked vehicle. Hornsby didn’t loose interest, the British Army refused to buy it! They decided the horse was more practical on the Battle Field.

WW1 soon changed their mind, but it was too late.

 

Paul

[rodent279]

16 hours ago, rockershovel said:

Hornby Akroyd appear to have made a business of supplying unsightly motive power to the WD; 

 

 

They also developed the tracked vehicle, lost interest and sold the rights to the Holt Tractor Co of USA, which we now know as Caterpillar...

Is that why they are called Caterpillar tracks?

[pete_mcfarlane]

Those Hornsby locos apparently worked very well, despite looking a bit half finished. It's worth remembering that Horsbys merged with Ruston in 1918 and had some subsequent success with building diesel engines.... 

[rockershovel]

3 hours ago, Flying Fox 34F said:

You are right about the tracked vehicle. Hornsby didn’t loose interest, the British Army refused to buy it! They decided the horse was more practical on the Battle Field.

WW1 soon changed their mind, but it was too late.

 

Paul

That's quite a long way from the whole story. The first demonstration of steam ploughing using a tracked chassis took place as early as the 1830s, was actually quite successful but seems to have been abandoned for lack of investment ;

 

The British Army used "dreadnought wheels", a sort of early tracked vehicle in the Crimea in the 1850s

 

Hornsby gave up on tracks long before WW1 but Holt and others were making tractors commercially at least as early as 1907 ; Hornsby also invented, but failed to commercially develop the track clutch steering system which is the key to steering vehicles of this sort. The British Army bought tracked tractors for artillery use before 1914. 

 

 

. 

 

Hornsby appeared to decide that their profitable oil-engine business was the way forward, is all

 

 

[DenysW]

I'm sorry, Mr. Porta, but your 0-6-2T shunting and branchline locomotive ticks the ugly box for me. The timeline for it starts with UK Austerity 0-6-0, and it takes after its ancestor.

 

Probably intellectually beautiful with just above every improvement crammed into it, of course.

 

[Steamport Southport]

On 05/12/2021 at 09:00, Kris said:

Today's prize in the Hornby advent calendar is not the best looking loco. 

 

 

 

To be honest it's just the bling on the model that ruins it.

 

Looked pretty good IRL.

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/129679309@N05/34158926090

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/91851827@N05/8661706594/

 

 

Jason

Edited December 14, 2021 by Steamport Southport

[whart57]

Have the 4-4-0Ts of the Metropolitan and Metropolitan District railways been mentioned? To be cruel I'd say that hiding them away in tunnels was a kindness to Victorian Londoners.

 

From the front they were bad enough

 

 

But from the back .......

 

[pete_mcfarlane]

It's really just the front bogie and condensing gear that spoils them. The slightly smaller 2-4-0s from Beyer Peacock generally looked OK, although some of the Norwegian ones were a bit weird looking. 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NSB_Class_IV

[The Johnster]

The distinctive Beyer-Peacock 'look' is, I believe, rooted in the Allan designs of the early LNW Northern Division, which used the forward part of the frames to mount the slidebars on, a very solid and reliable form of construction.  A distinct feature is the sloping forward of the 'half moon' smokebox door to sit at 90 degrees to the inclined cylinders, and inclined cylinders are themselves an oddity on post-Planet Victorian engines.  Add the condensing pipework and the loco is never going to win any beauty contests, but they do, to my mind, have a purposeful and businesslike look to them, a workmanlike solution to tunnel working.

 

The large driving wheels should impart a modicum of elegance, but are spaced a little too far apart to quite carry it off.  A longer wheelbase for the front bogie and shorter for the driving wheels might look better balanced, but there are obvious bits in the way of either of these solutions, and the practicality of the loco is more important than how it looks!  A full cab redresses matters a little.

[whart57]

The large wheels puzzle me a bit. Speeds were never going to be high in the tunnels of the Met and District, but you might have thought acceleration would be important when stations are so closely spaced. Five foot drivers might have been more sensible or even 4'6" as on this rather more attractive 4-4-0T

 

[rockershovel]

On the whole I'd reckon it was quite difficult to make an unsightly 4-4-0. They seem to have something about them, although there are always one or two. 

[The Johnster]

Churchward Counties are pretty ugly. 

[Steamport Southport]

5 minutes ago, The Johnster said:

Churchward Counties are pretty ugly. 

 

Seriously? I think a trip to Specsavers or Barnard Castle is in order.

 

Probably the finest looking outside cylinder 4-4-0s ever built apart from maybe the Compounds.

 

 

[rodent279]

36 minutes ago, The Johnster said:

Churchward Counties are pretty ugly. 

I was kind of thinking that, but bit worried about getting a brick through my window!

 

Seriously though, they're not bad looking, but they don't quite look right. They look a little like someone walking in high heels that they're not used to-a little unsteady, like they are about to fall over.