DenysW

The romanticist in me that wants to have Nord locomotives in London (and SECR locos in Paris) thinks that we're being too rational/modern. The Night Ferries recycled war-surplus equipment. If you were building a new service, well before that, that made money from freight, and boosted status from express/luxury passenger services, then it's quite conceivable that Nord would have insisted on having an international no-changes service that its French competitors didn't have, and SER would have agreed - for the same access to France. The SER posted fares for journeys across Europe, and annoyed its commuters by its (apparent and probably true) focus on continental journeys, laying the ground to make this worse with a rail ferry. That means you build the train ferry so that the rails down the middle can take the weight of the locomotive, and that it sits at the open end that takes dangerous cargo. Yes for freight you don't take the locomotives - no publicity gain, and freight mostly doesn't care about more shunting time. If accurate construction costings and valid traffic forecasts had ruled, then the London Extension of the MS&L (under the same Mr. Watkin) would never have been built, and not crippled LNER with its debt.

All true, but the question was would a ro-ro train ferry Folkestone-Boulogne service have made enough sense to pay for the lesser investment than a tunnel or a bridge - and opened up London to seeing from Nord locos? And what would that have done to UK locomotive design?

With his fingers crossed behind his back, and not mentioning that this excludes the French, or the famed Belgian Bypass.

As soon as Watkin's Channel Tunnel plan stated to get serious-ish, we're told the xenophobic hand of the Government squashed it. That's why I though a ro-ro train ferry. Much more tide and weather dependant than a tunnel, but much easier to close down without destroying it.

Just displaying my ignorance here, I'm afraid. Did the MR double-up the use of its power classifications as route-availability classifications? Thus a Fowler 4F 0-6-0 has the route availability for an axle loading at 16 tons (or near offer) included in the spec for where it's the correct loco. It would explain the (later) LMS continuation of building the 4Fs - if their 5F/5P design was not just modestly bigger, it was appreciably more route-restricted. Possibly the same in reverse for GWR who definitely had route restrictions, but don't seem to have formally used power classifications.

As Watkin was a man of grand (grandiose?) ideas and a Director of CF du Nord and the South Eastern Railway, what would the impact of SER/Nord going for a roll-on/roll-off train ferry in the 1880s? Mostly for freight, maybe one sailing a day in each direction with passengers? The train ferry across the Forth was an example, but a small one - 30-34 wagons only, and a short crossing. I also couldn't find out how often it was cancelled due to bad weather. I'm thinking he might have upgraded (some of) SER's loading gauge from small to compatible with Nord's. We might then have seen Nord locomotives turning around at Kings Cross-York Road!

Yes to the balance pipe, but they're not really suitable for filling from one side only. They only have a few inches of water gauge hydrostatic head to push water down a long narrow pipe. Same problem with the LMS Garratts, where the pipe was a modest 50 mm, and was long enough for blocking with dirt to be an issue. So OK for 1-2 l/sec, but not the fill rates you need tofill a tank engine.

According to in Internet that beauty is Great Northern: 0-6-0 GNR 178A, 179, 180, 301A, 307 / 09 / 31 / 32 / 34 / 36 / 39 / 49 / 52 / 59 / 61 / 66 / 72 / 94, 719 / 21 / 46, 838, 1043 / 81 / 90, 1101 / 21 / 22 / 40 / 43 / 44 / 45 / 78 All returned to England in 1919. These locos worked in the various large yards, eg. Vendroux-Les Attaques These locos were fitted with an arrangement by which the exhaust could be transferred to the tender for condensation

Liquified air has been suggested as an alternative to battery storage to deal with the fact that solar and wind power don't work reliably around the clock. Not nitrogen: that adds a distillation stage. It was claimed by the people pushing the idea (on Radio 4's Today programme) that it had about the same losses (30-40%) as charging and discharging batteries.

That appeared to be another square saddle, rather than a pannier. Key difference: only one fill point needed. Still ugly, however.

I've seen it claimed that L.D. Porta holds the record for measuring the least efficient steam locomotive of all, based on losing 96% of its steam to leaks.

All covered and hacked about in the imaginary locomotives thread. Sadly, thermal efficiency is independent of the fuel. It's simply the fraction of the heat available that gets covered into useful work. External combustion is also limited by the high latent heat to boil the water, and you throw that away unless you condense the steam in a way the recovers this. Attempts to do this generally not very successful - e.g. the Erie Triplex locos. Isn't Rugby the sport where they haven't yet worked out life is easier when you play with a ball that bounces true?

I fear you've all forgotten the Spawn of Satan that is accounting rules - as an extra factor. If accounting write-off for locomotives is 40 years (irrespective of whether they are actually capable of lasting 40 years) then writing them off early is a post-tax cost (directly off the bottom line), not a revenue cost. You end up with a host of ancient classes that the accountants think are still adequate. In the industry I was working in, concrete had a 60 year write-off, and Mechanical & Electrical was 25 years. Try to build anything in steel - faster write-off made it uneconomic! Even if after, say, 20 years concrete would be structurally perfect but the wrong size for the new duty. Fortunately concrete locomotives were not an option for the railways.

I agree, but that's with hindsight. It would also have avoided all of the re-raking of ancient ground on BG vs SG vs NG in this thread. A separate topic is "What if IKB had coped Stephenson by having the same 7' spacing between the sets of rails as between the rails themselves?". Probably not much extra cost until you came to tunnels.

Read carefully about how to wire electrofrog points. They seem to be a marmite decision that I'm actually neutral about. Pro: they are less prone to having locomotives stall on them as they get to an electrically-dead section Con: they need bypass wiring and use of non-conducting fishplates because they can cause you to connective +-ive to -ive on sections of track isolated by points. On the permanent layout where the wires get covered by the ballast: fine. On a temporary layout where you are just working out what you want: grrrrr.

I hope that this helps with the original topic ... We can't ask Churchward what he thought of the opportunities offered by the original Broad Gauge loading gauge, but he did record (below) his barely concealed envy at the power of engine available in the US to users of the US loading gauge on Standard Gauge, which I believe is close. Source: Institute of Civil Engineers vol 154 (1903) pp 80-107. Sadly they indexed him as Churchyard for this entry.

Ah. A view of the Gt 2x 4/4 - designed around the time of MR's Lickey Banker, for pretty much the same duty, but in a class that numbered 25. Huge tractive effort relative to a 25 ft2 grate. Speed - no. Also have a look at the PtL 2/2, which achieved One Man Operation of steam trains and looks like it came from the Wacky Races, and the class-of-one AA 1. It appears to be an attempt to apply rack railway design on the flatter adhesion-only lines, and has a retractible wheelset. Eat your heart out Whyte classification. And those are just some of the green tank engines. Please do not review the maintenance aspects of the cylinder arrangement of the 1908 compound pacific S3/6 class. Just revel in its ability to knock platform copings off if we'd tried on the the UK.

"Oi, I went to one of those ex-Polytechnics ..." As did I (an ex-CAT to perfectionists). Some are now good, many have individually-good departments. But The Boss, until retirement, was responsible for shepherding students in Solihull into the best university that would accept them on grades they stood a reasonable chance of getting. Things were getting bad (for all concerned) when the University of Wolverhampton was suggested as the first choice.

As The Boss only really tolerates LMS (although I've ground her down on K. Bay. Sts. B., and, to a lesser extent, articulated locomotives) I should perhaps join the Midland Railway Society. For the avoidance of doubt, K.Bay.Sts. B ran green tank engines, none of them panniers.

"General topic for discussion - did the MR have a small engine policy or was it a light train policy?" Wikipedia's 'Locomotives of the Midland Railway' article has a long, only slightly defensive, article on this. Truth is probably 90% with Wikipedia and 10% that MR also got locked into a rut, ignoring the increasingly numerous routes requiring a a single, large, lightly-loaded engine rather that double-heading.

Two brief notes to Douglas ... 1 English universities have a residence requirement to get "home" fees instead of "overseas" that is irrespective of citizenship. The Boss (aka SWHBO) tells me this was 6 years 'way back. It now appears to be 3 years but this 'fact' is not fully reliable and checked 2 English universities range from world class to fairly rubbish, many in the same city as each other. Do not confuse Oxford with Oxford Brookes, Nottingham with Nottingham Trent, or Leicester with De Montford . Scots Universities on a different system that accepts 'Highers' aged 17 and A-levels aged 18, but the reason the Scottish government picks up the fees is that it has restricted the number of places. More scope for confusion

"Are these drivers completely insensible of their surroundings?" Every now and then in winter you see a driver who has not defrosted the rear or side windows, and only a part of the front screen. Clearly believing that side and rear views are never, ever, needed. Unfortunately you can only detect the blighters under frosty conditions, but they are there year-round. Be very, very, scared.

Without wishing to reject anyone's enthusiasms for some really good historic locos, shouldn't this start with a specification of what the present need is for new steam engines? At present I'd say most heritage railways need to haul up to 8 (30-ton?) coaches at no more than 25 mph on branchlines that vary in ruling gradient from 1:100 to 1:50 (yes, the West Highland Extension has a short stretch that's even more severe). That's about a 300 ton load (including the loco), requiring 450 hp for 1:100 and 900 hp for 1:50 just to overcome gravity. Stephenson's approximation was that 75% of power was used by gravity for a 1:100 rising grade, with the rest on rolling resistance and acceleration, so the gravity-only isn't too bad a starting point for loco power. I fear the older locomotives just don't have the power, beautiful and intriguing as they are.

Stu - When I was made redundant in the mid-90s the world seemed quite binary: full-time or still looking. Bad experience of 18 months on the dole. Both my son and my son-in-law were out of work early this year; both have picked up 24 hr/week jobs (Aldi, Waitrose). Plus Uber-Eats is piece-work - my son became a bicycle delivery-boy (Transportation logistics executive), limiting himself to when the Leicester rain wasn't torrential. Until he got the better offer from Aldi. Embrace the opportunities not to risk all on one approach - entrepreneur or nothing. Best wishes, Denys

The not-panniers were less ugly before a rebuild by George Whale in Edwardian times: That's what you get when a company's philosophy is to regard Ebenezer Scrooge as a dangerous spendthirft.