How common were outside cylindered 0-6-0 tender engines?

[DCB]

The inside cylinder 0-6-0 is cheaper to build than a 2-6-0 and a lot of the duties didn't need the Drawbar Horsepower power of a modern 2-6-0.  I think Collett would have liked to build  2-6-0s as in the 9351 class as built by the WSR rather than the 2251 whose achillies heel was their driving axle boxes  when used hard.  

Post WW1 there were a lot of light duties or duties requiring heavy trains to be started and stopped but not requiring much speed or horsepower, where adhesion weight and TE mattered.   When new the Gresley J39 could do the work of the much more complicated K2 mogul, I believe the boilers were similar, in fact they took over some freight duties from GC 4-6-0s  as in the late 20s /30s recession the loadings were down and the smaller engine burned less coal on the lighter trains.    The K2 could presumably have been built as an outside cylinder  0-6-0, by shortening the frames if anyone fancied making these already lively riding locos worse and the GW 43XX  as an 0-6-0 with a no 2 boiler and shortened front end would have taken Swindon no time at all to cobble up out of standard bits    But the mogul already rode badly, as did the County 4-4-0 while the inside cylinder City with the same boiler rode very well.     By the time most of the country learned how to make crank axles  which worked the outside cylinder 0-6-0 had lost its raison de etre, OK not everyone learned that trick,  But the fact is the 3F sized inside cylinder 0-6-0 was pretty much the optimum for UK conditions, 40 tons of adhesion and  60MPH on 5 ft wheels.    The big  Coal haulers , J37, J38 made a lot of sense in pushing 60 tons adhesion for short slow heavy haulage, but somehow the 4Fs with lousy axle boxes  and J 39s with their archaic Ivatt or earlier architecture were a shame.   Should have built Deeley 3Fs and K2s respectively

Big advantage of the outside cyl 0-6-0 with outside valve gear is getting the firebox away from the crank axle, and many continental locos needed big fireboxes to burn what passed for coal in Belgium and the like

[Compound2632]

3 hours ago, DCB said:

but somehow the 4Fs with lousy axle boxes  and J 39s with their archaic Ivatt or earlier architecture were a shame.   Should have built Deeley 3Fs and K2s respectively

 

May I once again correct a myth; the issue with the 4F axleboxes was LMS parsimony in choice of lubricant. I'm not sure quite what you mean by Deely 3Fs - the H-boilered 0-6-0s first appeared in the last year of Johnson's superintendency; Deeley continued to have them built. The rebuilding of older 0-6-0s with G7 boilers - producing the class 3F type that would remain familiar into BR days - began in 1916, well after Deeley had left. But both they and the 4F were designed by a Locomotive Drawing Office working to principles established in Deeley's time and before. Deeley was an expert on lubrication; he wrote a textbook on the subject, with his brother-in-law. It was the LMS's neglect of this that led to problems with the 4F but to the company's credit that once the problem was identified, it was rectified. There has unfortunately been distortion of the historical record by authors with their own axes to grind.

Edited June 19, 2023 by Compound2632
typo.

[Morello Cherry]

8 hours ago, Steamport Southport said:

Don't forget it was wartime. The order was specific and they had permission to build locomotives that were already ordered. Which included 100 0-6-0s.

 

They were ordered as Qs and officially that is what they got. Forty Qs to a modified design.

 

Just before the war ended the other sixty were changed to be.

 

"25 Passenger Tank Engines (to be built from material ordered for the 25 Q1 Class)
10 Shunters
25 "West Country" Passenger Tender Engines (utilising for the tenders the material ordered for the 25 Q1 Class)"

 

Only the WCs appeared. The shunter quota was filled with diesels and the USA Tanks.

 

Details here on the Leader page.

 

https://sremg.org.uk/steam/leader.shtml

 

 

Jason

 

I am not disputing any of that. But when you look at the various design innovations that Bulleid introduced in the WC/BB/MNs and the design of the Q1 (which looks like no other 0-6-0), the one thing that isn't innovative is the use of inside cylinders. IMO if there had been a way for Bulleid to move the cylinders outside (to ease maintenance etc etc) then he wouldn't have done. That he didn't reflects the challenges, not least of all route availability. Thinking about the comparison with outside cylinder locomotives in Europe, I'd assume that the loading gauge gives the designer more room to play with. Whether it is an optical illusion but the outside cylinder 0-6-0s in Europe always look very wide at the front where the cylinders are. I assume also ground level platforms etc, means there are less things to smack into.

 

 

[kevinlms]

On 10/06/2023 at 17:47, NZRedBaron said:

I was just curious, you see- one idea I have running around my head is that the (fictitious) light railway that I'm planning to create has an unusual 'house style'; due to the fact the light railway has some limited running rights onto the mainline, many of their locomotives are industrial tank engines that have been rebuilt and mated with second-hand tenders from old main line engines, turning them into tender-tank locomotives not unlike the George England locomotives originally built for the Ffestiniog Railway.

But you're missing the point, that a 'light railway' generally had a speed limit of 25mph imposed on them, so they could use any arrangement they liked as the loco waddling around, was a very minor issue.

[kevinlms]

On 12/06/2023 at 03:30, pH said:

https://transportsofdelight.smugmug.com/RAILWAYS/LOCOMOTIVES-OF-THE-LMS-CONSTITUENT-COMPANIES/LOCOMOTIVES-OF-THE-GLASGOW-SOUTH-WESTERN-RAILWAY/i-VNWfNf6/A

(I like the wheel arrangement in the caption!)

 

 

The North British Locomotive Co., did strange things at times. Perhaps they had an input into the Class 28 diesels?

Edited June 19, 2023 by kevinlms
Missing words

[kevinlms]

On 12/06/2023 at 04:17, Steamport Southport said:

 

 

I am rattling my brain. I'm pretty sure someone else had an outside cylinder 0-6-0. The GER?

 

 

Jason

 

Well the GER "Decapod' 0-10-0T had outside cylinders, but of course it isn't an 0-6-0! I'm sure that Holden wouldn't have been happy, if anyone suggested it was a shunter!

[LMS2968]

52 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

 

May I once again correct a myth; the issue with the 4F axleboxes was LMS parsimony in choice of lubricant. 

I'll agree that lubricant was an issue but so too was the design of the axleboxes, particularly in relation to the bearing surface area. It was marginal on the 4Fs and they did tend to run hot more often than other classes, but I'll agree that this tendency has been much exaggerated and overstated by many writers; generally the 4F were a decent, reliable engine. It was when these boxes were applied to the Austin 7s and Garretts that the real troublers arose as they were incapable of absorbing the piston thrusts of these much bigger engines.

[kevinlms]

On 13/06/2023 at 21:35, The Stationmaster said:

Interesting points and I largely agree.  However 'private' engines were permitted to a considerable extent during WWII in the shape of ROD stock, which included engines manned by serving soldiers.  While checking for some onformation yesterday I found a letter dated 1943 (and obviously answering a query) stating that the running of War Dept engines on GWR metals was covered by an Instruction previously issued by the Supt of The Line - alas no copy of that letter!   I presume that teh question had been asked because many ROD engines were not plated - although according to teh RCTS list some were - seemingly only shunting engines at specific locations.

 

 

But where these 'ROD' locomotives, the Stanier 8F's, of which some of them had been loaned to the GWR in 1940 by the W.D.? Later of course some 8F's were built at Swindon, so presumably the GWR knew that they were eminently suitable for their mainlines.

[pH]

7 hours ago, The Johnster said:

Hadn’t forgotten them, pH, but they were much more like freight horses than a typical ‘goods’ engine in the Victorian sense, and had much smaller driving wheels.  

According to this:

 

https://www.lner.info/locos/J/j38.php

 

they were initially used on “main line goods traffic”, though replaced on this work within a few years by transferred K2s and new J39s.

 

(That site also says they were recorded as far south as Retford on coal trains!)

[Jeremy Cumberland]

5 hours ago, DCB said:

The inside cylinder 0-6-0 is cheaper to build than a 2-6-0

This, I think, is the reason for the Q1. Cheaper, fewer parts to make, and uses less material too. It's only when time/ease of maintenance becomes more important than time/ease of construction and use of materials that it becomes worth moving the cylinders outside and adding a pony truck.

 

1 hour ago, kevinlms said:

Well the GER "Decapod' 0-10-0T had outside cylinders, but of course it isn't an 0-6-0! I'm sure that Holden wouldn't have been happy, if anyone suggested it was a shunter!

If you make the wheelbase longer then the overhang of the cylinders at the front becomes less of an issue, and outside cylinder 0-8-0s were built by Worsdell, Raven and Robinson, for example.

[DCB]

I believe a number of privately owned locos regularly ran in the  NER area on coal trains from their owners collieries to the loading staithes on the Tyne (?)  including the Lambton tanks on the NYMR were used on BR.  This private owner would have become the NCB.

Locos had and have to be "Plated" for use on the main line were not (and still are not)  allowed on the main line network at all, not even in sidings, without the necessary plate  though I am sure blind eyes were turned at times.
The plating required some fundamental stuff like tyre and flange profiled being within within main line company limits as industrials often suffered tread wear, which meant the flanges became too deep,  and the flanges wearing thin to a point splitting knife edge or even losing chunks of flange which probably didn't bother the colliery but which was not ideal if flanges started hitting rail chairs etc.  Presumably there were inspectors...  At some stage in exchange sidings either the BR loco has to run on private tracks or the private loco on BR tracks.

[Flying Pig]

18 minutes ago, DCB said:

I believe a number of privately owned locos regularly ran in the  NER area on coal trains from their owners collieries to the loading staithes on the Tyne (?)  including the Lambton tanks on the NYMR were used on BR.  This private owner would have become the NCB.

 

The Lambton trains worked over railway metals to a connection with the Lambton staithes on the River Wear at Sunderland.  The locos used were, from the late pre-grouping era, largely inside cylindered 0-6-2s like the preserved examples: essentially a tank version of the classic 0-6-0. 

 

Similar engines were used extensively in South Wales for exactly the same kind of work and there is a preserved Taff Vale locomotive, which survived because it was sold to the LH&JC in the late 1920s (Wikipedia suggests it was sold to the NCB, which is a neat trick in 1928).

[Steamport Southport]

48 minutes ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

This, I think, is the reason for the Q1. Cheaper, fewer parts to make, and uses less material too. It's only when time/ease of maintenance becomes more important than time/ease of construction and use of materials that it becomes worth moving the cylinders outside and adding a pony truck.

 

If you make the wheelbase longer then the overhang of the cylinders at the front becomes less of an issue, and outside cylinder 0-8-0s were built by Worsdell, Raven and Robinson, for example.

 

Cost didn't come into it. The only things they were allowed to build was locomotives that were already ordered.

 

Unless they were deemed part of the war effort.

 

There is a myth that they could only build freight engines, totally untrue as the LMS built thirteen Duchesses during WWII and all were streamlined. Likewise the Bulleid MNs which were already on the order book.

 

 

What people are ignoring is the fact that the SR had a lot of lines that didn't have heavy freight traffic so they didn't need large engines for them. A small 0-6-0 was perfectly adequate. They still had a lot of old 0-6-0s dating back to the 19th Century, it was those they wanted rid of. Newer engines such as the C Class were fine, it was things like Ilfracombe Goods and O1s dating back to the 1880s that were to be replaced.

 

 

Jason

[Steamport Southport]

2 hours ago, kevinlms said:

Well the GER "Decapod' 0-10-0T had outside cylinders, but of course it isn't an 0-6-0! I'm sure that Holden wouldn't have been happy, if anyone suggested it was a shunter!

 

I don't think I called it a shunter.

 

it was a suburban passenger tank engine designed to prove that steam could compete with electrics. It eventually led to the N7s.

 

 

Jason

[DCB]

1 hour ago, Steamport Southport said:

 

Cost didn't come into it. The only things they were allowed to build was locomotives that were already ordered.

Unless they were deemed part of the war effort.

There is a myth that they could only build freight engines, totally untrue as the LMS built thirteen Duchesses during WWII and all were streamlined. Likewise the Bulleid MNs which were already on the order book.

What people are ignoring is the fact that the SR had a lot of lines that didn't have heavy freight traffic so they didn't need large engines for them. A small 0-6-0 was perfectly adequate. They still had a lot of old 0-6-0s dating back to the 19th Century, it was those they wanted rid of. Newer engines such as the C Class were fine, it was things like Ilfracombe Goods and O1s dating back to the 1880s that were to be replaced.

Jason

I think the Q class suffered from looking like a 4F and never had its steaming issues addressed until post war.  I have seen a recollection of a fast run on the Bournemouth line where a Q borrowed at the last moment only lost about 10 minutes on an express to Waterloo and the 9 elms (?) blokes wouldn't believe it had come all the way from Bournemouth.  The Southern had very few lightly laid lines, its WC and BoB classes were red routes locos in GWR parlance and there were very few "Branches" from which they were banned,   Traffic was also light except about 6 or 8 Summer Saturdays per year.
So a small 0-6-0 was ideal, except a) you needed 40 extra ones 8 times a year,  and b) a bit slow, and c) they had excessive flange wear on the leading wheels.    A small 2-6-0 would have been ideal (Mickey Mouse)  but  again wheels a bit small for regular sustained high speed. Larger 2-6-0 s were used mainly on goods but again excess wear on leading wheel tyres and track would have been an issue, as suffered by the GWR 43XX, adding a bogie made them too big, adding a bogie and losing a set of driving wheels but enlarging the existing ones was out of the question because that was what they had already, so they built  Pacifics.    It certainly helped to reduce the number of loco crews needed 8 times a year.  But you have to ask yourself if 50 Black 5s wouldn't have been a better solution.  

As for the Q1 they nearly built more,  I doubt there were many west of Exeter duties it couldn't have performed as well as a WC.   I have never read they were anything like as troublesome as the LMS 4F (and Jinty) or GWR 2251 (and 56XX)    Coal gobblers maybe but  a really versatile loco,  just too big.  

[Compound2632]

1 hour ago, DCB said:

I think the Q class suffered gained from looking like a 4F

 

Your typo corrected.

[Nearholmer]

6 hours ago, Steamport Southport said:

designed to prove that steam could compete with electrics

Rather: designed to get the GER out of the deep hole which it was in because it couldn’t raise the capital to electrify.

 

The GER knew that the proper answer was to electrify.

[kevinlms]

16 hours ago, Steamport Southport said:

 

I don't think I called it a shunter.

 

it was a suburban passenger tank engine designed to prove that steam could compete with electrics. It eventually led to the N7s.

 

 

Jason

I wasn't aiming at you, just anyone who may have thought so, back in the day - perhaps reporters? I know exactly what the purpose of it was. To frighten any opposition off, who were thinking of making inroads into GER traffic.

[Compound2632]

2 hours ago, kevinlms said:

I know exactly what the purpose of it was. To frighten any opposition off, who were thinking of making inroads into GER traffic.

 

The Brighton did something similar when an electric London-Brighton Railway was proposed: a demonstration run on a Sunday to show that steam could easily match the proposed electric schedule; it was only the density of traffic that prevented it from being routine, or so they argued.

[JimC]

As a slight aside, I've been trying to sketch up an outside cylinder 2-6-0 version of the GWR Collett 2251 and it's a surprisingly difficult task unless I accept large numbers of new design non standard parts. The theory seemed sound enough. 4575 front end with cylinders taken out to 17. 5in, extended smokebox, job done. But when I get down in the detail nothing fits. Not only is the small prairie connecting rod too short for the larger wheels, the large prairie/43 etc rod doesn't fit either because of the wheel spacing. Alter the wheel spacing, non standard coupling rods and problems locating brake gear, the difficulties pile up...

 

With regards to the Bulleid Q1/Maunsell Q, I understood it was a minimally changed Q chassis with an oversized boiler and much weight saving to permit the boiler. As little new design as possible to save time. 

[LMS2968]

42 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

 

The Brighton did something similar when an electric London-Brighton Railway was proposed: a demonstration run on a Sunday to show that steam could easily match the proposed electric schedule; it was only the density of traffic that prevented it from being routine, or so they argued.

Likewise the L&Y with Albert Hoy's 2-6-2Ts, intended to work the Liverpool - Southport services to the electrics' timings while the line was being electrified. They could do it too, but were redundant once the e.m.u's. were fully available and were then relegated to shunting, for which they were totally unsuited and so earned a poor reputation.

 

So how did an inside cylinder 2-6-2T get into a discussion of outside cylinder 0-6-0 tender engines? Not a clue!

Edited June 20, 2023 by LMS2968

[Compound2632]

1 hour ago, LMS2968 said:

So how did an inside cylinder 2-6-2T get into a discussion of outside cylinder 0-6-0 tender engines? Not a clue!

 

Well, I suppose it's pertinent - having shown that a 2-6-0 / 2-6-2/4T is an ideal layout for outside cylinders, whereas for a 0-6-0 / 0-6-2/4T layout one is better off with inside cylinders, one can ask, why did Hoy stick with inside cylinders? Was the 2-6-2T simply a 2-4-2T that has been to a body-building class? It lacks those engines' elegance:

 

 

[Embedded link to Wikimedia Commons.]  

 

Looking at the front end, one can see that it has its roots in the classic inside-cylinder 2-4-0 from which the 2-4-2T layout originated.

Edited June 20, 2023 by Compound2632

[Nearholmer]

The Brighton was another railway that knew full well that electrification was the right answer. Rather than trying to prove that steam was better for the application in their case they were trying to stave-off the building of a completely new and separate electric railway, while they progressed their own plans.
 

Choosing the right electrification system around the turn of the century was difficult, and the availability of choices actually impeded progress on several railways for a few years, but the Brighton selected single-phase AC from OLE very deliberately because it allowed for easy expansion to the coast. Unlike the GER, they could raise the money, but what they didn’t have was enough time - grouped before they’d finished even the suburban area, the system then dismantled in the drive to standardisation, and in a climate where a national grid was emerging that could support d.c. electrification to the coast.

[Compound2632]

25 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

The Brighton was another railway that knew full well that electrification was the right answer. Rather than trying to prove that steam was better for the application in their case they were trying to stave-off the building of a completely new and separate electric railway, while they progressed their own plans.

 

The Brighton demonstration run took place on Sunday 26 July 1903, with a 50-minute schedule as the target - 60 mph average speed, at a time when the best express passenger average speeds elsewhere were around 55 mph. A B4 was used, with a 130-ton train. The down run, which included some 1:264 climbing at speeds not falling below the high 60s and a maximum downhill speed of 90 mph, took a few seconds under 49 minutes. The return, up, run suffered from a strong cross-wind and the maximum speed was 85 mph; the running time was a few seconds over the target. [O.S. Nock, Speed Records on Britain's Railways (David & Charles, 1971) pp. 113-115.]

 

Had the Brighton started investigating electrification by 1903? I wouldn't be surprised if it was in the air; Billinton knew S.W. Johnson well, and Johnson was certainly well aware that electric traction was the way forward in the long term, though it was three years after his retirement that the Midland started serious experiments.

Edited June 20, 2023 by Compound2632

[Nearholmer]

I think by 1903 they’d got the plot, and knew what they had to do in general terms, but not precisely how best.

 

The London & Brighton Electric Railway  scheme emerged c1899-1900, and that together with the fact that the LBSCR had long been happy to use electricity for non-traction purposes (I think they were the first railway to use electric lighting in trains, for instance), combined to give the impetus.

 

I’m not at home, so can’t check what the standard histories say about the dates, if they catch the early formative thinking at all, but I know that the first part of the suburban scheme was before Parliament in 1903, so they must have been boiling things up for a year or two before that.

 

The decisive moment was probably when they appointed Sir Philip Dawson as their consulting engineer, which I have an inkling was 1902 - he certainly moved house to Sydenham in 1902, presumably to be “on top of the job”.

 

Edited June 20, 2023 by Nearholmer