Pre-grouping goods train maximum speeds?

[LMS2968]

Speedos were certainly available pre-Nationalisation and even pre-WWII; the LMS and possibly others fitted them to many of their Pacifics but they were removed during the war as spares became unavailable. 6202, the Turbo, kept her speedo throughout as it was the only way a driver could tell if it was slipping.

[Morello Cherry]

It is worth noting how many accidents where the general nature of unfitted freights and their slowness was a contributing factor. (If they weren't so slow and/or unfitted then they wouldn't have been where they were when the accident happened).

 

The accident reports are a good source for speeds how they were run as witnesses will invariably describe their run upto the point of the accident.

 

At Quintinshill, you have the loops being occupied by goods trains. The goods train heading north having taken 25 mins to do the 10 miles from Carlisle to Quintinshill (it was an hour late leaving Carlisle), and then the empty coal train in the other loop. (Whose crew had been on duty since 10.15pm the previous evening - (where would they have worked from? The coal train is described variously as an 'empty coal special' so is it a returning Jellicoe Special?))

 

At Charfield you have a goods train that takes water (without telling the signalman) and both the LMS and GWR goods trains having to be shunted out of the way. The GWR goods was shunted twice, once at Berkeley Rd Jnc and then again at Charfield, it leaves Berkeley Rd Jnc at 4.53 and doesn't get to Charfield until 5.13, so 20 mins to do something around 5 miles - a 15 mph average.

 

Shrivenham is one of many involving breakaways - the Guard in that case seems to have assumed that they had stopped at a signal (although I think there is a suspicion that he was asleep). But there it is interesting because the speed at Marston crossing is variously described at 18-20 mph (driver and guard) and 10-15 mph by the signalman. And the average speed between Shrivenham and Marston is given as 21.5 to 25 mph and a top speed is estimated as being 25mph. There is a long discussion around how fast the mineral train was going when it split to work out how far the separated portion would have run to then work out where the split took place and whether the train was complete or not when it passed different boxes.

[GeoffAlan]

20 hours ago, Penlan said:

I seem to recall that HGV's on the roads had a maximum of 20mph too, up until after WW2, can't recall the year, but my father drove some heavy timber lorries twixt Leicestershire and the Scottish borders at the time and took forever......
Me sat on the running board? May 1949.  I recall him stopping outside the School once to pick me up in this, bit more impressive than a current day SUV. 
 

 

I remember, back in the 1950s heavy goods lorries, like the ERF and Foden 4 axle lorries being limited to 20mph, lighter lorries were limited IIRC to 30mph. Frankly some of the bigger lorries had the same issue as unfitted goods trains, not a lot of power and very poor brakes.

 

Even when the limits were lifted quite a few of the older lorries still carried rusting 20 or 30 plates on the rear for a good while. 

[LMS2968]

47 minutes ago, Morello Cherry said:

It is worth noting how many accidents where the general nature of unfitted freights and their slowness was a contributing factor. (If they weren't so slow and/or unfitted then they wouldn't have been where they were when the accident happened).

 

The accident reports are a good source for speeds how they were run as witnesses will invariably describe their run upto the point of the accident.

 

At Quintinshill, you have the loops being occupied by goods trains. The goods train heading north having taken 25 mins to do the 10 miles from Carlisle to Quintinshill (it was an hour late leaving Carlisle), and then the empty coal train in the other loop. (Whose crew had been on duty since 10.15pm the previous evening - (where would they have worked from? The coal train is described variously as an 'empty coal special' so is it a returning Jellicoe Special?))

 

At Charfield you have a goods train that takes water (without telling the signalman) and both the LMS and GWR goods trains having to be shunted out of the way. The GWR goods was shunted twice, once at Berkeley Rd Jnc and then again at Charfield, it leaves Berkeley Rd Jnc at 4.53 and doesn't get to Charfield until 5.13, so 20 mins to do something around 5 miles - a 15 mph average.

 

Shrivenham is one of many involving breakaways - the Guard in that case seems to have assumed that they had stopped at a signal (although I think there is a suspicion that he was asleep). But there it is interesting because the speed at Marston crossing is variously described at 18-20 mph (driver and guard) and 10-15 mph by the signalman. And the average speed between Shrivenham and Marston is given as 21.5 to 25 mph and a top speed is estimated as being 25mph. There is a long discussion around how fast the mineral train was going when it split to work out how far the separated portion would have run to then work out where the split took place and whether the train was complete or not when it passed different boxes.

To be honest, while true that, had a particular train run at a different (not necessarily higher) speed, it wouldn't have been there when the accident happened is true, it didn't apply simply to loose-coupled goods. There were instances of expresses running into the rear of local passenger trains, so you could also argue that those accidents wouldn't have happened had the local been running at 80 mph rather than a more pedestrian rate - or stopped at the platform.

 

Railways had to - and still do - deal with trains running at different speeds and the signalling system has developed to provide protection to all. The alternative is that all trains run at the same speed, and all stop at the same time, which lacks the necessary flexibility to meet the needs of passengers and goods customers.

[Michael Hodgson]

7 minutes ago, LMS2968 said:

Railways had to - and still do - deal with trains running at different speeds and the signalling system has developed to provide protection to all. The alternative is that all trains run at the same speed, and all stop at the same time, which lacks the necessary flexibility to meet the needs of passengers and goods customers.

All trains running at the same speed does help significantly with line capacity and train timekeeping.

 

Mixing stopping passenger and express trains limits the ability to tmetable expresses at express speed unless a flight of sucesssive expresses is followed by a series of stoppers (in decreasing order of average speed).  This means 4-track sections of route may be needed in suburban areas even in places where 2-track might otherwise be sufficient.  Conversely it means that if capacity has to be increased dramatically as in WW1/WW2, the long distance trains have to run slower overall so that the maximum traffic can be handled.

[The Stationmaster]

On 15/04/2022 at 19:21, jim.snowdon said:

Essentially, loaded trains were almost hauled downhill.

 

Officially they were hauled to get them moving and the engine and brakevan were then officially meant to have sufficient brake power to stop the train.  Note my use of the word 'officially' - the reality was often very different once the train got moving down the gradient.  And I can tell you from personal experience that it is rather hair-raising to be travelling at 40mph on a loco which is being pushed by 1,000 tons of train with every wagon brake pinned down hard.

 

What I will do is dig some more Pre-Group times for freight and mineral to give an idea of their booked average speeds.  As I said before that is probably as near as we can get in many instances to the sort of speeds they were limited to.

[LMS2968]

1 hour ago, Michael Hodgson said:

All trains running at the same speed does help significantly with line capacity and train timekeeping.

 

Mixing stopping passenger and express trains limits the ability to tmetable expresses at express speed unless a flight of sucesssive expresses is followed by a series of stoppers (in decreasing order of average speed).  This means 4-track sections of route may be needed in suburban areas even in places where 2-track might otherwise be sufficient.  Conversely it means that if capacity has to be increased dramatically as in WW1/WW2, the long distance trains have to run slower overall so that the maximum traffic can be handled.

Yes, all true; all trains running at equal speed does make life easier for the operators, but is that the point of railways? They are there to meet the needs of their customers and passengers, and those needs are not all the same, so not all trains can be the same. This applies as much today as it did in 1830: there are still non-stop expresses, stopping passenger and heavy goods trains all sharing the same tracks. It would be nice if they all ran at the same speeds but they never did and still don't, and the system most deal with that. This did sometimes involve segregating faster and slower trains on to dedicated tracks, but this was normally to increase line capacity rather than being down to speed differentials.  That's how it was and is, unless you're on something like the Docklands Light Railway with all trains the same.

 

We are talking about what was and, mostly, still is rather than what would have been ideal.

[The Johnster]

Drivers and guards were issued with watches for the purpose, amongst others, of assessing speed by noting the point to point timing of their trains, but the primary assessment was by experience, in the form of the loco’s ride, frequency of exhaust beats, or that of the clank of valve gear, read  piston operated vacuum pump on GW outside cylinder locos. 
 

On loose coupled trains the trick was to keep the couplings taut to avoid a ‘snatch’ when the loco accelerated, and the risk of a coupling breaking.  As doing this continually o’er hill and dale will tend to result in the train’s speed building to an excessive one, and because the drawhooks were spring so that all sorts of different pulling and pushing forces were unleashed within the length of the train, especially a stretch over the vertical convex curve of a summit, keeping control of such a train demanded intimate route knowledge in all and any visibility, close co-operation between driver and guard, and a gentle touch on controls. 
 

While we assume that all drivers and guards were masters of the technique required, the truth was that they varied along a spectrum from superb to out and out dangerous!

 

Not relevant to the OP’s original query, but the famous Windcutters and Annesley Runners of the last days of the GC route, predicated on the principle of having guaranteed clear runs over very long distances in which the speed was allowed to build up, must have been run at speeds well in excess of 35mph, never mind 25 for unfitted trains, and do not seem at all to fit with the above comments.  The method seems to have been to keep steam on to keep the couplings tight and disregard the speed. 

 

[The Johnster]

2 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

Officially they were hauled to get them moving and the engine and brakevan were then officially meant to have sufficient brake power to stop the train.  Note my use of the word 'officially' - the reality was often very different once the train got moving down the gradient.  And I can tell you from personal experience that it is rather hair-raising to be travelling at 40mph on a loco which is being pushed by 1,000 tons of train with every wagon brake pinned down hard.

 

What I will do is dig some more Pre-Group times for freight and mineral to give an idea of their booked average speeds.  As I said before that is probably as near as we can get in many instances to the sort of speeds they were limited to.

The piles of broken wagonry often found at the ends of sand drags at the bottom of the inclines bore witness to the fact that what was ‘officially’ supposed to happen didn’t necessarily always go to plan…

 

The spilled coal never seemed to be there for very long, though!

[keefer]

On 17/04/2022 at 10:55, GeoffAlan said:

Frankly some of the bigger lorries had the same issue as unfitted goods trains, not a lot of power and very poor brakes

Hence signs at certain locations at the top of steep hills, showing 'Stop and engage 1st gear' - especially on the major trunk routes in the days before motorways.

Even modern trucks will quickly cook their brakes if engine/gear braking isn't used - like with pinning the wagon brakes down, you want your power brakes to be available if needed.

Edited June 11, 2022 by keefer

[Michael Hodgson]

I certainly remember the 20mph lorries on the old A1 and A6 long before the motorways, especially those struggling up Shap/Tebay (we didn't need to go as far as Beattock).  And my father had trouble overtaking them in his split-windscreen Morris Minor with the whole family and luggage on board, as that couldn't accelerate very hard. 

 

Various roads all over the country had steep hills with sand-drag type run-offs for lorries whose brakes had failed.  I often wondered how many ran away down the former A47 at Tutshill as the old run-off just before Chepstow Bridge could take you straight into the River Wye if the gravel didn't stop you.  Not that car brakes were as good as modern ones either - drum bakes not discs being the norm.

[The Johnster]

21 minutes ago, Michael Hodgson said:

I often wondered how many ran away down the former A47 at Tutshill as the old run-off just before Chepstow Bridge

A48.  Leckwith Hill approaching Cardiff from the Dinas Powys direction was pretty scary, as was Thornhill from from Caerphilly.  To reach Caerphilly in the opposite direction from the mountain road was said to need Stuka pilot training, and you couldn't avoid it by the detour either, as this involved Nantgarw Hill, for which the buses had to have special gearboxes or they couldn't get up it!  I'm sure there were many similar terrors all over the country.

 

The Caerphilly Mountain road still requires close attention to what you are doing, and is unfogiving of those who do not pay it due respect...

[Morello Cherry]

10 hours ago, LMS2968 said:

To be honest, while true that, had a particular train run at a different (not necessarily higher) speed, it wouldn't have been there when the accident happened is true, it didn't apply simply to loose-coupled goods. There were instances of expresses running into the rear of local passenger trains, so you could also argue that those accidents wouldn't have happened had the local been running at 80 mph rather than a more pedestrian rate - or stopped at the platform.

 

Railways had to - and still do - deal with trains running at different speeds and the signalling system has developed to provide protection to all. The alternative is that all trains run at the same speed, and all stop at the same time, which lacks the necessary flexibility to meet the needs of passengers and goods customers.

 

That is true but it is also true that while we see increases in average passenger speeds over time  there is not a commensurate  increase in average goods traffic speeds.

 

The coal train at Quintinshill was an unfitted, short wheelbase wagon mineral train, 20 years later at Shrivenham, the coal train is an unfitted, short wheelbase mineral train. Compare and contrast with how passenger trains  developed in that same 20 year period.

 

Passenger trains are going faster, and freights are still plodding along at 25mph and having to be shunted out of the way every few miles because passenger speeds are increasing. As the gap between passenger and freight speeds grows surely that increases the risk?

 

How does the UK compare to France or North America when it comes to the end of unfitted and short wheelbase goods trains?

 

 

 

Edited April 17, 2022 by Morello Cherry

[The Johnster]

Badly, very badly.  The US had more or less converted completely to air-braked bogie stock by the very early years of the 20th century, and adopted the Janney buffer/coupling, so it's freight trains could, did, and do run very fast indeed; in fact, speeds have lowered in many places over there because of deterioration in the condition of the track.   On mainland Europe, most wagons had longer wheelbases than hours,  and thus could safely run at higher speeds, and air brakes were more or less universal by the end on the 1950s on all UIC railways, including those of the old Soviet bloc.  France was typical of this and one of the leaders of it.

 

Here, there seemed little interest until the mid 60s in longer wheelbases or air-braked bogie wagons, and the mineral traffic was hobbled for many years, right up to the late 80s, by the coal industry's reluctance to accept anything but 9' wheelbase wagons that George Stephenson would have felt at home with, even when it was nationalised.  Mining is a speculative venture and mine owners were very unwilling to take on any committment that involved raising capital in case they couldn't repay the loans, and it took until the late 60s for the MGR concept for power station coal to raise running speeds of this traffic.

 

In the UK, we have traditionally gibbed at raising capital and spending money on our railways, and it is my opinion that much of this is rooted in the Hudson bubble of the 1840s  and the Overend Gurney bank failure of the following decade, both of which ruined many of the middle class core investors who had been promised untold riches by railway promoters.  The deep distrust engendered is still apparent in the letters pages of the dailies.  We consider ourselve entitled to a Pullman service for a 3rd class fare, and don't like investing money that is not going to give much of return until some time has passed, which is why we have been so slow and ineffective in electrifying our railways.  We are gibbing at paying for HS2, which will release capacity on the traditional railway and enable it to be used by stopping passenger trains and modern freight trains that can both run at about 90mph while the fast traffic whizzzes past on it's own route; this is what has happened in many European countries, Japan, and now China.  We are well behind and have been for 120 years or more, and show no signs of catching up any time soon!

Edited April 18, 2022 by The Johnster

[rodent279]

7 hours ago, The Johnster said:

Badly, very badly.  The US had more or less converted completely to air-braked bogie stock by the very early years of the 20th century, and adopted the Janney buffer/coupling, so it's freight trains could, did, and do run very fast indeed; in fact, speeds have lowered in many places over there because of deterioration in the condition of the track.   On mainland Europe, most wagons had longer wheelbases than hours,  and thus could safely run at higher speeds, and air brakes were more or less universal by the end on the 1950s on all UIC railways, including those of the old Soviet bloc.  France was typical of this and one of the leaders of it.

 

Here, there seemed little interest until the mid 60s in longer wheelbases or air-braked bogie wagons, and the mineral traffic was hobbled for many years, right up to the late 80s, by the coal industry's reluctance to accept anything but 9' wheelbase wagons that George Stephenson would have felt at home with, even when it was nationalised.  Mining is a speculative venture and mine owners were very unwilling to take on any committment that involved raising capital in case they couldn't repay the loans, and it took until the late 60s for the MGR concept for power station coal to raise running speeds of this traffic.

 

In the UK, we have traditionally gibbed at raising capital and spending money on our railways, and it is my opinion that much of this is rooted in the Hudson bubble of the 1840s  and the Overend Gurney bank failure of the following decade, both of which ruined many of the middle class core investors who had been promised untold riches by railway promoters.  The deep distrust engendered is still apparent in the letters pages of the dailies.  We consider ourselve entitled to a Pullman service for a 3rd class fare, and don't like investing money that is not going to give much of return until some time has passed, which is why we have been so slow and ineffective in electrifying our railways.  We are gibbing at paying for HS2, which will release capacity on the traditional railway and enable it to be used by stopping passenger trains and modern freight trains that can both run at about 90mph while the fast traffic whizzzes past on it's own route; this is what has happened in many European countries, Japan, and now China.  We are well behind and have been for 120 years or more, and show no signs of catching up any time soon!

Bang on.

Many times you see in daily rags, on social media, and even occasionally in the railway press (which should know better), unflattering comparisons with Japan's Shinkansen network, France's TGV network etc, accompanied by sarcastic digs at our railways. They completely miss the point that those are dedicated high speed lines, in which all trains run at or near the same speeds, and more importantly, have the same braking curve. We run fast passenger trains at 2 miles a minute, mixing them in many cases with slower passenger and stopping trains, and even slower freight trains.

Then we complain about the cost of building new railways.

Edited April 18, 2022 by rodent279

[kevinlms]

6 hours ago, The Johnster said:

Badly, very badly.  The US had more or less converted completely to air-braked bogie stock by the very early years of the 20th century, and adopted the Janney buffer/coupling, so it's freight trains could, did, and do run very fast indeed; in fact, speeds have lowered in many places over there because of deterioration in the condition of the track.  

 

You missed an important consideration in the US. They have largely eliminated the passenger carrying railway, in many parts of the US. All that's left apart from some rapid transits, are a decreasing number of government services (Amtrak) run over private freight railway companies, who once operated top notch and full facility services, that catered for the high rollers.

[Penlan]

I thought this topic was about pre-grouping goods traffic speeds........

[H2O]

For expected speeds a look at contemporary working timetables for single section lines that carried both freight and passengers may be helpful. For one of my areas of interest the S&D could be an example as they had single line sections with sharp inclines and declines as well as level. It was not for nothing they had a nickname of 'slow and dirty' so I'd guess they would want to speed up the freight services as much as they could.

[Cwmtwrch]

1 hour ago, H2O said:

For expected speeds a look at contemporary working timetables for single section lines that carried both freight and passengers may be helpful. For one of my areas of interest the S&D could be an example as they had single line sections with sharp inclines and declines as well as level. It was not for nothing they had a nickname of 'slow and dirty' so I'd guess they would want to speed up the freight services as much as they could.

Which wasn't very much, because of the level of contemporary technology. Higher freight train speeds basically were difficult to impossible without having all stock fitted with compatible power brakes, which didn't happen until the 1970s. In S & D days the problem was never making the trains go [just use more and/or more powerful locos, admittedly at a cost], the problem was always stopping them, which limited line speeds and train weight. Hence the interesting tests of possible replacements for the 7Fs in the early 1950s; someone may have had a metaphorical thumb on the scales for that one, but the problem was very real.

 

Later, after complete dieselisation, freight was speeded up by more powerful locomotives, but there were still problems, even with trains with wagons which all had power brakes, because some were air and some were vacuum [which are not compatible, of course], some were piped with the other brake and some not, all of which led to some very complex calculations about available brake force, and one or two rather dramatic accidents when trains failed to stop... 

[The Johnster]

4 hours ago, Cwmtwrch said:

 

 

Later, after complete dieselisation, freight was speeded up by more powerful locomotives

To a certain extent, but at exactly the same time traffic levels dropped out the bottom, enabling the new diesels to run faster for longer distances on the post-Beeching railway while the freight was largely taken by HGVs which clogged the motorways as quickly as they could be built.  Had steam been required through the 70s and into the 80s (Riddles' original concept holed below the water line by the 1954 managerial re-organisation (coup) and the 1955 Modernisation Plan, 9Fs could have handled the new block fully braked freight trains well enough, but it the event new manning agreements and lower traffic levels enabled the new diesels to look good and steam became irrevocably associated with the pre-Beeching railway, Flanders and Swann, and the Titfield Thunderbolt. 

 

Type 3 diesels equate approximately in power to Class 5 steam, and Type 4 to Class 8 or 9.  But the assessment of steam power and the requirements of the 1955 Plan diesels to replace it, carried out by the Rugby Testing Station, seems to have been flawed and the actual power of steam locos underestimated by about 30%, resulting in a large number of Type 2 diesels whice were fundamentally underpowered for main line work, and Type 4s that could only just manage express timings with reduced loads cf steam, limited further by eth and airco.

 

Compare Cardiff-Paddington; 1956, Brit and 16 coaches, 3 hours 10 minutes, 1966, Type 4 and 12 coaches, 2 hours 40 minutes, 1976, Type 4 and 10 coaches with eth and airco, and some junctions upgraded for faster running, 2 hours 10 minutes, 1978, HST, 8 coaches 2x Type 4 power car, 1 hour 38 mins, only recently equalled by electrics touted as fastest ever timing.  Many routes have similar stories.

[H2O]

7 hours ago, Penlan said:

I thought this topic was about pre-grouping goods traffic speeds........

 

[Gary H]

On 15/04/2022 at 17:36, Compound2632 said:

Even in the first decade of the 20th century, an express goods train, consisting mostly of wagons fitted with automatic brakes, could run fast - well over 50 mph  - under clear signals on a falling gradient. But such trains were very few and far between. 

Still quite spritely compared with road goods vehicles of the time.

[The Stationmaster]

On 17/04/2022 at 14:44, The Johnster said:

Drivers and guards were issued with watches for the purpose, amongst others, of assessing speed by noting the point to point timing of their trains, but the primary assessment was by experience, in the form of the loco’s ride, frequency of exhaust beats, or that of the clank of valve gear, read  piston operated vacuum pump on GW outside cylinder locos. 
 

 

Drivers were not issued with watches,  The policy going right back into Pre-Grouping/Pre-Great war days was that a Guard needed a watch because he was in charge of the train and therefore needed to be aware of the time in order to ensure that it departed punctually and also to maintained a record of the train's running - for which he also needed a watch.  Drivers had no need for watches when there was a Guard ot yje train (or in earlier days two Guards on many trains).

[Michael Hodgson]

On 17/04/2022 at 18:53, The Johnster said:

A48.  Leckwith Hill approaching Cardiff from the Dinas Powys direction was pretty scary, as was Thornhill from from Caerphilly. 

 

Sorry, yes indeed, A48.  The A47 is round this part of the world.  Staying completely off topic, I think the steepest hill I've come across in England is about 1 in 3 near the NYMR, but Scotland and Wales probably have steeper.

[Michael Hodgson]

1 hour ago, The Stationmaster said:

Drivers had no need for watches when there was a Guard ot yje train (or in earlier days two Guards on many trains).

In any case stations had clocks.  I believe it was one of those things you had to install when you wanted the man from the Ministry to give the necessary permission for your new railway to open.