tythatguy1312

8 hours ago, Nick Holliday said:

Sorry to disappoint you, but there was a real Stroudley E2 loco. In 1894 he produced No 157, Barcelona, which he called an E Special.

https://www.lbscr.org/Rolling-Stock/Locomotives/Stroudley/ES.xhtml

It was designed to haul goods trains on the Cuckoo Line, and was basically an E with a larger boiler and Gladstone cylinders. Although Marsh did allocate E2, the nomenclature never stuck, and it was called E1 before the Billinton tanks appeared. According to Bradley it came out in passenger livery, although designed for more humble duties, but was painted goods green in 1890. It was withdrawn in 1922.

Well that does answer that question of paperwork, though it only really covers the answer of "why did the E3's exist 20 years before the E2's". That being said, the LB&SC seems to be a draw for theoretical locomotives, particularly as it's inherently well known and home to a number of designs which were flawed to degrees where improvement was possible but not done (E2's, B4X's, I4's, etc). Surely there's a lot of gaps worth filling.

Something which should reasonably draw curiosity is the presence of a gap in the official designations of the LB&SCR E Class tank engines, with the E1's and E3's both carrying those designations nearly 10 years before the E2's came into the picture. Considering that this designation was created by Marsh, I will admit I'm curious as to what a theoretical Marsh E2 Class would've actually looked like and how it would've performed in service, as opposed to the overblown pile of mediocrity which was actually built. Would it simply have been the E1X?

Ah, the M-1. That mighty block of cheddar is a fun old thing to debate because of how much it and similar locos (pretty much just the French Heilmanns and Union Pacific turbines) attempted to so radically alter the very fundamentals of steam locomotion. 2 similar machines using steam-electric were built for the UK (both using turbines) but neither really worked very well.

51 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

I'm not convinced the problems with Dugald Drummond's 4-6-0s were entirely down to grate design.

That much is obvious. Actually looking at Drummond's 4-6-0's indicates that an oversized firebox was 1 of several flaws, namely the 4 cylinder layout, constricted ash-pan layout, incredibly poor drafting and the use of experimental & unneeded technology, namely Drummond's water tube addition. These flaws seem to be what made the locomotives worse than the 4-4-0's they failed to replace.

1 hour ago, DenysW said:

 

A Prussian P8 of 1908, as the Roco model, shown in DRG livery. From Roco's blurb: 4,000 produced up to 1926, 1180 hp, lasted in service until 1972 in West Germany. From Wikipedia: Axle load: 17.4 tons/axle, cylinder 22.6" so too big for UK loading gauge outside.

 

So why didn't we like this halfway house between wide-grate and narrow-grate engines? It looks like GNR could do good wide-grate Atlantics (at the time as the P8) that fed into their wide-grate Pacifics, but that virtually everyone in the UK struggled to go from narrow-grate 4-4-0s up to successful 4-6-0s. Why not copy Germans with this medium-grate design?

British thinking of the time, to put it lightly, was highly based on the success of 4-4-0's, engines which traditionally carried narrow fireboxes. I'm frankly unsure of the reason Ivatt elected for a wide firebox on the Large Atlantics, though it wouldn't exactly shock me if the GNR's American Influence predated the A1 development considering their ownership of an American 4-2-2 for a few years.


Also of note is that the P8's firebox grate area of 27.98 square feet was entirely achievable with a narrow firebox designs, with the Drummond 4-6-0's carrying significantly larger firebox grates at 31.5 square feet. Now that proved to be less than ideal considering that the Drummond 4-6-0's couldn't be worked hard in the slightest, but it does show that the P8's layout has no real advantage compared to narrow grates.

Is there anything preventing a large Garratt/Fairlie from doing this? Both designs are articulated and highly powerful, with the ability to run cab-first to prevent the poor crew from being smoked to death. I get that a Large Garratt is exactly what they ultimately did but I'm thinking something older, more crude and running on 4 cylinders instead of the mistake known as 6.

2 hours ago, john new said:

I vaguely recall reading a news snippet a bit back stating some otherwise redundant HST power cars were being repurposed as non-pax locomotives. I can’t recall more details, or the TOC name, but this video looks like supporting evidence.

I managed to look into this and apparently a company called RailAdventure snapped up a few to use in deliveries of other locomotives & multiple units, adding to their fleet of locos on the continent.

Something that I've been silently questioning since the wagon debate is to why enclosed vans were kept to the same dimensions as their open counterparts. Whilst it seems many private wagons would've been kept to the size for the Be All-End All that is cost, there's regular instances of vans being run fast enough to warrant 4-4-2's on the trains. Surely vans for produce & other perishables should've been constructed to their postal/luggage equivalents.

32 minutes ago, Northmoor said:

Informative and thought-provoking as always, Johnster, but I can only pick one symbol.....

 

Wasn't it the case that at Nationalisation, BR inherited very slightly over ONE MILLION wagons?  I also think it was Beeching who in challenging the unforgivable cost of storing customers' wagons for them, identified multiple examples of wagons that completed a single round trip a week.  Now compare that to the Aire Valley power stations MGR traffic......

Starting to think Beeching was right to input such insane cost-cutting measures. I'd suggest a legislation to block the purchase of further wagons which lacked such advanced, innovative features as... vacuum brakes as a start, but the British Government's attitude to the interwar railways seems to have been "fusing them down to 4 fixed them, right?"

4 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

 

Interesting idea - here's an artist's impression:

 

 

[Embedded link to Pinterest.]

if I'm being fair a light branch 0-6-0, even one vaguely based on one of Brighton's less impressive designs, is still more useful than a golf cart. That being said the NWR's mainline motive power has been discussed... but what of their branch line power? Ignoring him for now, something of note is the implication that Vertical Boiler locomotives were capable of working the line, revealing that it had honestly too little traffic to justify even something the size of Thomas. Any idea on what would've replaced them outside of the constraints of a story designed to entertain children?

2 hours ago, PhilJ W said:

I'll leave this here without comment.

 

I do believe that Sigi Strasser's design for a golf cart stretches this thread to its limits. Next thing you know someone'll suggest a shortened Brighton E2 with prominent sandboxes and the rear running plate dip removed.

3 hours ago, rockershovel said:

I think we're coming back round to the central limitation of a thread of this sort. Steam traction ruled the rails for well over a century and during that time, pretty much anything that was feasible was tried, or at least examined. 

 

The 4-6-2, with varying numbers of cylinders became established as the paramount "fast passenger" type, with the 4-6-0 holding its own under specialised conditions.

 

The 0-8-0 became established as the generic "heavy freight" type, developing into the 2-8-0 and subsequently developing into the 2-10-0 during the last flourishing of steam. 

 

The 4-6-0 became the common "mid range" type for most duties over a long period of time.

 

The 0-6-0 flourished for a long time before being displaced by the 2-8-0 on main line freight and the 2-6-0 or light 4-6-0 for minor lines

 

The 2-6-2T and 2-6-4T established their utility for heavy suburban or branch line traffic, which didn't require and couldn't accommodate articulated types such as the du Bousquet 

 

The 2-8-2 was fully explored (by LNER) and shown to be capable of anything the 2-10-0 or 4-6-2 could do, and more besides but the network simply didn't require, or couldn't cope with locomotives of that size - so the 2-8-4, 4-8-2 and 4-8-4 behemoths of last-generation US steam (or French steam, to a lesser extent) weren't required. 

 

The 0-8-0T became the ultimate heavy shunter, with 0-8-4 and 4-8-0 variants in small numbers leading long careers.

 

Specialist banking locomotives appeared in very small numbers (and personally I'd feel that a tender version of the SR Z class, possibly with a semi-articulated Engerth type tender, would have been the ultimate all-purpose banking loco - anyone care to photoshop THAT?). 

 

Articulated types never really rang any useful bells. The Mallet didn't fit the loading gauge, particularly the compound types. The Garratt had a niche success with LMS but didn't justify itself at LNER. The Kitson, or Kitson-Meyer MIGHT have been the ultimate "Valleys heavy ore train" loco but never got the chance, and I suspect that getting a Kitson type layout into the loading gauge might have been a considerable challenge. 

the only solution I believe capable of solving this issue is to try and mess with designs which were simply never used en masse in Britain. Shays immediately spring to mind, but other types such as earlier Franco Crosti designs, proper overhead electrics and cab forwards (no, the Wisbech Trams and the Leader don't count) are viable options. Would an articulated loco or a Pennsy style duplex have a niche in Britain? Probably, but it speaks volumes when there's only 1 notable example each out of all the ones I suggested. I doubt they would've realistically been constructed but they might've had potential if introduced in Britain.

2 hours ago, JimC said:

To the (substantial) limits of my knowledge I think a 4 Cyl 4-8-0 or 4-10-0 will work, but not a 2-8-0 or 2-10-0. However I have doubts about whether a 4 cylinder locomotive would be much more capable than a 2 cylinder one at the specific task of slogging up Welsh valleys at low speed with a heavy train of iron ore. A mixed traffic or express 4-8-0, on the other hand would most likely be a viable proposition

you could always try a duplex. Though a direct offence to all things considered reasonable locomotive practice within the UK it could theoretically cram 4 cylinders into a GWR style machine

29 minutes ago, Northmoor said:

It's not as twisty but the traffic on the Worsborough incline East of Penistone wasn't dissimilar.  The efficient solution to the Ebbw Vale traffic problem was electrification.

the Great Western doing something as modern and advanced as electrification? Don't be preposterous, they'd sooner make a Swindon built copy of the TGOJ M3t for the work

6 hours ago, The Johnster said:

  I believe it was intended for the Newport Docks-Ebbw Vale iron ore traffic, one of the heaviest-loaded jobs in the country and uphill all the way, banked from Aberbeeg.  The 5202 2-8-0 tanks used on this traffic suffered with excessive tank leakage caused by the frames being distorted under load by the sharp curvature of the Western Valley line

I do believe that this may be a route where an articulated locomotive may be preferred, at least compared to a 2-10-2t. A 2-6-6-4t Mallet might be worth something on the work, though other proposals could also work. That being said it'd be fairly inadequate for other work.

25 minutes ago, JimC said:

 

I suppose in theory it would look something like this. In practice though it would be of very limited utility, since there would be little weight for the rearmost wheels to carry. A 2-10-0 with a 47xx, Castle or even King boiler, on the other hand, would be a more useful different proposition

 

In theory extra weight could be placed by moving the cylinders (and by extension the pilot bogie) further forward. A Somewhat similar solution was used on the front (well the rear) of the Italian GR670's

24 minutes ago, Ohmisterporter said:

 

That was the Highland River class. They were found to be slightly high at the chimney and dome; nothing that could not be easily rectified. 

Apparently they were also too heavy, which caused the management to demand them gone. However, when combined with hammer blow, they weren't any heavier on the track than the Castles they were intended to supplement

13 hours ago, DenysW said:

I have always believed the similar-but-different rationale that the privatisation was carried out to maximise the short-term return to the Treasury, with no thought of the 5-25 year ramifications.

to be absolutely fair (or, being honest, to play Devil's Advocate) it did technically function until the entire system completely imploded in 2020, but yeah Privatisation was done in that fashion. They didn't actually care for the future at the time and they clearly still don't care now.

1 hour ago, burgundy said:

the LB&SCR very deliberately set up the Newhaven Harbour company as an independent company (albeit with many of the same directors) for this kind of reason.

I do believe the LB&SCR should be treated as a somewhat special case in these situations honestly, mostly stemming from them purchasing 2 batches of barely modified Ivatt Atlantics. Visually they are slightly distinct but otherwise the untrained eye would have an extremely difficult time telling them apart, particularly as both the Brighton and Doncaster examples were later painted black. Surely this is also evidence that no such law existed against building a batch of a foreign company's locomotives, though the LB&SCR wasn't exactly competing with the GNR.

40 minutes ago, rockershovel said:

Is it simply that the whole field is such a niche activity that no prosecution on behalf of a trade association is envisaged? 

I imagine so. Surely the legal system has far more important things to prosecute than 1 Railway building locomotives for another, especially as such activities are considerably niche due to the existence of dedicated locomotive builders which existed outside the niche of railways (Baldwin, Beyer Peacock, etc)

40 minutes ago, Corbs said:

The claim of £500 per loco in the wikipedia page has no direct citation but it makes me wonder whether the statement that they made a profit contravenes the law?

I thought the Highland either didn't do it or were deliberately being unpleasant when they did but yeah that would be a convenient method of working around the law. That being said the practice of selling off unsatisfactory locos seems to have been surprisingly uncommon, as opposed to selling off elderly machines (such as that Terrier which ended up in Brazil). Does make me question as to why railways disliked letting go of their worse designs, but the Rivers might've just been a special case. Due to their weight.

4 minutes ago, DK123GWR said:

I have read (on RMWeb) that there were laws against the railway companies building locos for each other, but have never been able to verify it. If it was illegal, can anyone point me to the relevant legislation? I would like to give it a read as I think it would be interesting to explore any loopholes there may have been.

I don't think that such a law existed in writing, more-so that it was typically company policy. Notably the LNWR did build at least 1 locomotive for a foreign company, No.1320 for the Pennsylvania Railroad. It was constructed by a contractor but, besides a comical looking cowcatcher and bulked up cab, it was unchanged from LNWR 2-2-2-0's of the day.

Something that I managed to find during my hours of meaningless research is the LMS' consideration towards buying a batch of GWR Castles (not to be confused with the Highland Castle 4-6-0's) prior to the construction of the Royal Scots. Assuming this had occurred (IIRC the GWR said no) I'm tempted to imagine the impact on LMS locomotive development, which could perhaps be huge.

5 minutes ago, melmoth said:

The rendition of the coupling rods on the Scotsman suggested that a fair amount of water had been carried over into the cylinders.

 

 

so the cylinders based on the Peppercorn A2's?

Alright i'm sorry. I strongly stand against the use of AI art in general but I'm sorry for reacting so boldly over this based on my own assumptions, even in the face of said assumptions being either unverifiable or wrong