DenysW

I feel our MPs are generally non-corrupt, but only because very few have enough power for commercial/foreign interests to want to corrupt them. Local authority housing committees (with planning veto) less so.

Gloomy, gloomy, I'm afraid. As per various news threads: - There was heritage activity on the line so it wasn't upgraded from full 'abandoned after Beeching' status for the £45m - The immediate service is every 2 hours, rising to hourly next year - The line is broken and built-on in places at the Plymouth end - The bit shown on today's news was single track So: muted good news, not the dawning of a glorious new era.

From 'Northroader' about French wagons: " It would appear that brakes applied by a side lever appeared in the twentieth century, but were not universal. Air braking also started to be applied from roughly 1890, and new wagons with airbrakes also had longer bodies, higher capacity, but also longer wheelbase, to improve track running for higher speeds. Freight train operation could then be classed as “RA” (regime accelere) for fast services, and “RO” (regime ordinaire) for slow unbraked trains, with older designs of wagons." Where there was a will there was a way.

I do like the idea of the panto design meeting with the topic being the steaming capacity of a new design with the debate being: - It steams perfectly well - OH NO IT DOESN'T - OH YES IT DOES Having just read "The History of the Midland Railway" (1901) written by C.E. Stretton, yes there is lot of overt bias in some of the old accounts. Isn't Cox supposed to be relentlessly pro-Horwich? Stretton just seems to have thought that the Midland was run by wise, thoughtful people* for the public benefit and for the benefit of their shareholders, whilst gallantly resisting the unscrupulous tactics of the devious LNWR and MSLR, occasionally also the L&YR. * Except Hudson

The complete post by 'Rifleman', and you'll understand why I flagged it as an 'anecdote' not a 'fact' : Posted May 10, 2014 (edited) A couple of stories may shed a bit of light on Derby's small engine policy, and their engineering design work. Some years back, I visited the Churnet Valley Railway, shortly after reading a biography of Sir William Stanier. I got into a discussion with one of their loco staff about a section in the book dealing with Anderson's iron grip on loco design, and what happened at a meeting between Stanier, Anderson and Stamp. According to the book, it was agreed between them that, in future, all design and engineering decisions would be left up to the CME, and that the Operating Dept. would simply advise on what sort of train loads and timings the engines were required to be handle. Now, having dealt with characters like Anderson in my own experience in engineering, I found the biographer's suggestion that "Anderson had agreed to this" very hard to believe. After all those years of giving orders to the CME, that he would just quetly let go of that power? No chance! I strongly suspected that Stanier was well aware of the internal politics in the LMS, and - knowing that Stamp was hard-pressed to find someone who could take on the job - Stanier gave Stamp an ultimatum; "keep Anderson out from under my feet or find someone else as your new CME." As I was discussing the 4F, and its failings, with the CVR man, I mentioned reading this account, and my doubts about it. The CVR man, smiled, and said: "Funny you saying this; we had a visitor last week who came in for a chat - a very old guy, who was working as an apprentice in Derby drawing office when Stanier took over." And the story he told me was this. Stanier was brought into the D/O one day, and introduced himself to the staff in a very courteous manner. He explained that, as he was from Swindon, he only had limited knowledge of the way Derby worked, and said that - for the time being - he wanted to see every drawing before it was issued to the works, and go through it with the relevant man, in order to learn about their engines. Two days later, one of the draughtsmen knocked on his door, and went in to show Stanier a set of drawings he had completed. The draughtsman later told his colleagues that Stanier started going through the drawing with him, noticed a certain aspect of the job, and asked the draughtsman why he had chosen to do it that way, rather than two or three other ways he could have done it. The man told his colleagues he was taken flat aback by this question, and - when he'd got over his shock - said: "Well - we've always done it that way, Mr Stanier!" Stanier looked at him a bit thoughtfully, then carried on looking over the drawing. Coming to another feature of the design, he asked the same question - and received the same reply. After the same thing happened about half a dozen times or more, Stanier decided he'd heard enough. Picture the scene in Derby D/O, in January, 1932. The draughtsmen quietly working away, slide rules slithering, pencils scratching over the paper - despite the Great Depression, they still had their 'jobs for life' at Derby, God was in his heaven, and all was right in the world. And then the lid blew off Hell! According to the way the old Derby apprentice told the story, there was a near explosion in Stanier's office, and he erupted into the D/O with the horrified draughtsman in tow. Calling all the staff together, he read them the Riot Act - if any of them so much as DARED to tell him that they had designed anything in a particular way because "we've always done it that way, Mr Stanier" he should ensure that he brought with him his letter of resignation "which I WILL accept on the spot!" The CVR man said his impression was that, on a quiet day in Derby, you might still be able to hear the echoes! Can you imagine any threat more dire, to a staff member on the railways in 1932, to be threatened with dismissal? Mind, in fairness to Stanier, the old boy said that, if you told him you'd decided to do a job in this way, for thios reason, and not in that way, for that reason, Stanier was perfectly happy with that - and, if he did decide to over-rule you, and tell you to do the job another way, he would always do you the courtesy of explaining his reasons for doing so. He didn't mind a draughtsman making a judgement with which he disagreed, as long as the man showed that he was using his judgement, and his brains - and not simply blindly copying what had been done before - but, even so, it was four weeks before another drawing left the D/O! As regards the effects of Anderson's interference, the Garratt never lived up to expectations for the reason that Anderson, against all the advice from Beyer-Peacock, pig-headedly insisted it being built with the same strangling 'short travel, short lap' valve gear that hampered the 4F - and with the same hopelessly under-sized axle-boxes, too. Another example of Derby's policy of the blind following the blind was in the 4F's smokebox. Terry Essery told me that he once went to visit the Keighley & Worth Valley Rly, on a day they were running a 4F. The loco crew asked him if he would like to have a go on the shovel, and he said: "I should have known they were up to something - their faces were so deadpan!" They were, indeed! Terry told me that, even on the hard pull out of Keighley, the engine kept blowing off, and he said he'd never known a 4F steam like it before. At the end of the run, he asked the crew: "Right - what have you done to this 4F?" Grinning like Cheshire Cats, they took him to the front of the engine and opened the smokebox door - to reveal a petticoat pipe! A feature that was never in any 4F. Terry asked them how they had worked out the dimensions, angles, and so on - and they laughed and said that all they'd done was to borrow the petticoat pipe from another engine having a full rebuild: " . . and we just rigged up some brackets and put it in, just to see what would happen; works a treat, doesn't it?" They'd got the idea from comparing the 4F smokebox with that of a Jinty. The Jinty, with its slide valves, has the boiler quite low, allowing for a decent depth of chimney, with only a short distance between the blast pipe and the bottom of the chimney; result, a good draught on the fire and a free-steaming engine. (having fired a Jinty on the Kent & E Sussex Rly, I know that to be a fact!) The 4F, with inside piston valve gear, has to have the boiler mounted much higher, and only has room for a very short chimney - made worse because the gap between the blast pipe and the chimney is much greater; result, a lot of the exhaust steam misses the chimney completely, and goes bouncing round inside the smokebox - so the draughting is poor, with steaming to match. As Terry said to me: "Think of all the needless labour they could have saved the firemen - and the tonnage of coal they wasted - all for the lack of a petticoat pipe. And they built over 800 of those 4Fs, without ever bothering to try what those lads at Keighley worked out in a couple of days!"

Wagons. There's an anecdote in rmweb that Stanier, once in Derby, asked to be talked through every drawing that was to be issued, so that he could learn the Derby way of doing things. He then exploded - on the very first one - when the reason for many of the details was "because we've always done it this way, Mr. Stanier." He could apparently accept disagreement, but not doing things by rote without thinking or understanding. In the 1920s LMS built 30-50,000 new wagons, of which only 30 were the 40 ton (net) coal wagons for Stonebridge Park copied from a German example and built in Crewe. Lots of inertia, and no trickle-out-effect of a better way of doing things when you change to power-station quantities of coal. We focus on the rational reasons in favour of change (and that are barriers to it) and forget that no-one likes change or to be told they must do it.

To clarify scope a little for the the world of opportunities in Welsh Whisky, the fair village of Llanfairfechan offers a single malt called Aberfalls. It's not just Penderyn, folks, although their liquor (Merlyn) is dangerously slurpable.

The first LMS diesel shunter was done in this exact way, although Wikipedia reports that puzzlingly few bits of the old steam loco were actually used. Accountancy reasons, such as revenue vs. capital budgets? Errors in budget predictions that meant that written-off wheels were the way forward?

On the imaginary LMS Garratts we tend to focus on the axle boxes. But the whole thing was Midlandised, including having the short travel valves that weren't that successful on the 4F 0-6-0s. Then boiler had less surface area (tubes & firebox, superheater) and was lower pressure than a BR Standard 9F. It did have a bigger grate. It just looks likely to have been limited by one d*mn thing after another. It does come back to telling Beyer Peacock what to build, not what you want it to do.

"I suspect a lot is down to ownership" LMS introduced 40 tons (net) wagons for Stonebridge Park in the late 1920's where, as customer, they were much more in control. I suspect as much is down to "What's in it for me, gov'nor?"

Calves liver much better (up to good-and-edible), lambs liver marginal, ox liver no. My parent's late dog would lick the bowl after lamb's heart, but declined ox heart. I too her word for it.

Back to the imaginary ones ... Would the next development for the Beyer-Garratt (and even the LMS ones once you fix the axleboxes) have been to go the turbine route with fore-and-aft turbines? On 6202 Stanier/LMS seem to have reduced the one-speed-only characteristic of turbines to manageable levels, and a Garratt design gives you the opportunity to re-engineer the exhaust pressure from the turbine to give the same suction into the chimney with half the steam. Then you can condense to recover the energy from the rear engine's steam. This overcomes the direct problems seen with the Erie triplexes. Result: more efficiency, more complexity. Not sure I'd want to drive something that much of a juggling act with loosely coupled goods wagons.

Open mind. Sixsmith doesn't quote the return times (and those numbers originate from a Derby report 6 months into the trial of the first three units, thus with new-conditions locos), so that avenue is closed. There was the one-off trial of using an LMS Garrett in the 1930s with a rake of passenger coaches, implying LMS didn't totally rule out using them on heavy stopping services. But it did fail due to a hot axle box and limped only as far as Leicester. So it may come down to whether you believe that the lighter-load/higher-speed (less slow?) combination caused the failure, or whether it was just a random incident of that (relatively) common problem. There also seem to have been several Toton-Cricklewood routes, at least in Leicestershire, and I find it difficult to believe the riskier approach would have been available on all and for all timings. oto

(Sir) Guy Granet was an administrator and a lawyer, not an engineer. Having just exploded my brain by reading the thread about 'what would have made the Midland abandon its small engine policy', he does seem to have been a (very) competent administrator, who introduced coordinated system for goods management that reduced costs. He didn't get the knighthood for designing goods engines, or better matching what was built with what was starting to be needed. I still hold to the cynical opinion that faster passenger locos get knighthoods, and more efficient freight locos don't. I agree with the previous rebuke on this that the company might have a greater need for better goods vehivles, irrespective of sexyness.

" "the 17mph average running speed of the working timetable" This is absolutely true for the Garratts on the down (loaded) journey. Sixsmith quotes stops as being made at Brentingly (15 minutes) and Luton for water, and 25 minutes at Wellingborough for general engine requirements. The down running time was 7 hrs 49 minutes for 126.5 miles, but the total time start-to-stop was 10 hrs 24 minutes. Care is thus needed to distinguish between running speeds, and journey-time speeds. 50 mph for return (empty) journey is an assertion from Wikipedia and is more likely to be running time than journey time.

I believe 25 mph (full) and 50 mph (empty) for mineral traffic may be more representative of LMS in the 1920s/30s, judging by the Garratts. What they all failed to solve (due to a combination of freight rates agreed to avoid ruinous competition, inertia, and lack of capital) was conversion to braked goods to get those speeds up to 40 mph, and get more trains/hr down the congested lines into the conurbations.

"Really? I'd say that the end-of-steam-era Big Boy and Challenger types were some of the sexiest steam designs anywhere. The South African Garratts were right up there, too. " Let's also not forget the AE class of the Virginian Railway, with the 48" low pressure cylinders. Slow but hugely powerful. However, this thread routinely points out the stranglehold on locomotive power imposed by UK loading gauge, and the US designs are a very long way indeed from fitting into it. I also believe (i.e. it's my own calcs) that the Big Boys required 40 tons/axle permanent way, and the Virginian 30 tons/axle. And that's before thinking about how to fit freight trains that long into our block system, and how they'd cope with our unbraked goods, and with needing 130' turning circles (the Virginian cheated with short tenders because it only had 105' turning circles). So I still don't think that improved UK-relevant goods designs got you a knighthood, and nor, it seems, for example, did fixing the design and maintenance practices that gave hot axle boxes on MR/LMS designs.

When I moved to New Jersey in 1982, the petrolheads were regretting that GM, Ford, etc. had discontinued production of 400 cu.in. engines, and the biggest left was 'only' 350 cu. in. My units conversions are a bit suspects, but I get the larger engine to just over 6.5 litres.

Trains, anyone? Douglas must be depressed to see our politics so mimics his own, and is just as dire and acrimonious.

There are those who believe what they want to believe, irrespective of the truth, and current politics of most stripes has a lot of them. It's not just Trump. This isn't new: I was amused to find in some ca 1870 ICE minutes (by which time we now think they should have leant and moved on) Crampton saying a low centre of gravity was essential for good locomotive design, and Stirling saying single-driven-axis was the best conceivable design for express locomotives.

The tram museum (at Crich, Derbs) is closed until March 2022 for maintenance. The trolleybus museum (at Sandtoft, Lincs) appears to be open normally.

The sales pitch for the cherry-red battery-driven loco was coming from Pittsburgh, so the competition from lineside delivery of power isn't as strong. I also live in beautiful Leicester, on the Midland Mainline, which every successive government promises to electrify and is lying. From Westminster you can't tell the difference between Sheffield and Market Harborough. No argument with the batteries having lots of rare, expensive, environmentally unsound metals in them, however.

A headline that caught my eye: "The future of [rail] freight is battery and it’s painted cherry red" Not clear whether it's a publicity stunt, a push for funding, or real. Wrong shade of red as well, should have gone crimson lake.

As an afterthought, Bulleid might well have decided to out-Ivatt LMS, and pro-actively embrace the incoming diesel era at LNER immediately post-war. After all, Gresley had produced the right express steam for the London-Edinburgh route, and adequate express steam for the Edinburgh-Aberdeen route, so what is left? Better goods steam locomotives - not sexy at all.

"Or "What if Gresley had been succeeded by Bulleid?" [grabs coat, runs for the door]" Anticlimax I believe. Bulleid was hired by Southern to shake them out of a rut and he did, with a mixture of successes, failures, and why-bothers. LNER seemed much less in need of a shake-up, and it was wartime, so Bulleid would probably have done engineering improvements rather than radical change.