tythatguy1312

I've heard anecdotes from the Ffestiniog that 2 boilers are a pain. Wouldn't be surprised if crews from Ballybunion thought the same. This COULD be solved by either oil firing or mechanical stokers though

Terrified to imagine what a 7ft gauge 4-8-2 would've looked like in the best way.

that seems to have been a big thing for islands & archipelagos. The Ponta Degalda harbour railway is a prime example, using 7ft gauge on an isolated network into the 1960's.

Something which I admittedly find rather perplexing is the fact that 3ft gauge never took off in the UK, at least compared to 2ft or even 2ft 3in gauge. I think it was only used on about 3 passenger railways and a couple tramways & industrial lines. I'm certainly questioning what locomotives would've been built had 3ft gauge seen more widespread use, especially considering its prevalence in Ireland and the US.

If I'm being technical, an Irish Pacific did exist! However I have significant doubts as to whether a "proper" 4-6-2 would've worked on Irish rails, especially following the devastating blow to Irish passenger rail known as the United States Limits on Immigration. The fact that the 800 class existed at all is a beautiful miracle to me.

I get the concept but the 7fs were already hardly light, meaning the pressure on the Rack would've been rather high and the load on the rest of the axles increased. Plus I hardly wish to see what would occur if a tender scoop hit a rack section

I honestly suspect that a few of the concepts for No.7's rebuild could've appeared on this thread as high power industrial designs. One which stuck out to me was an 0-4-4-0t design

so far I've found another image showing one, as well as a conversion in the same style for the same work done on the County Donegal Railway

It's peat, and I suspect the carriages were reinforced internally to handle it.

I may have found a potential solution to the issues caused by the severely outdated nature of British rolling stock, although the photo is from Ireland

Alright so this idea just kinda hit me. What if more railways adopted the Midland/Southern practice of smaller, more frequent passenger trains? It seems reasonable to me that the absolute peak of steam locomotive size in the UK could've reasonably been hit with 4-6-0's & 4-4-2's, optimised for more frequent and regular timetabled services.

I'm starting to question how Gresley's A1's managed to do with 9 tons what the NYC couldn't do with 20. Really shows the difference in loco design doctrine.

the issue is... they weren't built under Fowler or Hughes. They were ordered by James Anderson (locomotive superintendent) behind Fowler's back, as Anderson was capable of enough doublethink to call the Garratts 2 small engines that just so happened to be permanently coupled together. If they'd been ordered with the supervision of anyone who wasn't as stubborn and conservative as Anderson, they may have been spectacular machines.

That has me failing to see why the Midland 0-10-0 was tried at all. It's clear from a design standpoint that Big Bertha was designed to maintain an absurd tractive effort for 2 miles at the expense of all other abilities, meaning that she'd be awful at continuous running for more than those few miles. The 4f's, though pathetic as far as tractive effort was concerned in comparison to a 2-8-0 or the 0-10-0, were damn good when it comes to rolling under mostly momentum.

It's generally a shame that the Garratts proved so... underwhelming because they had the makings of an incredible machine. A rebuild along the lines of the Royal Scot rebuilds would've done them wonders.

I'm really failing to see why Articulated types failed to catch on for issues specific to the Aberdeen route and... basically wherever Kings, Night Owls and the Bear were banned. The LMS saw success with the Garratt on heavy trains, and a mallet (perhaps a 4-4-4-2) might've proven an excellent heavy mixed traffic type for services such as the Aberdeen route. Yes Mallets were generally seen as slow, but Union Pacific regularly used them for fast goods and passenger traffic.

I feel like we've all spent enough time debating the innate flaws of capitalism and how society as we know it is slowly going to ****, so can we please get back on track. What would British Rail have looked like had the 1955 scheme's Locomotive plan been scrapped early? I feel like it goes without saying that British rail tried to dieselise too fast, resulting in a lot of ignored & misread warning signs. Would better diesels and more efficient steam locomotives have been built continuing on?

I suspect at least part of the reason for "conventional wisdom" may have been America's success with 2,000hp diesels replacing even larger locomotives, seemingly in ignorance of the fact that American diesels conventionally worked in groups, as well as the fact that American passenger trains of the day were rarely heavy enough to warrant anything more powerful than 2000hp. This would've undeniably been compounded by the fact that steam locomotives could easily put on more power than their continuous maximum, albeit only for a short time. Making the issue worse for Diesel-Electric designs was the fact that some of their engine power was siphoned off to power electronic systems in the locomotive or the train itself, with 1 notable example, the Class 31/4, losing 1/3rd of its power to the electric components, such as air-con. It all seems to have been a perfect storm against Rugby's calculations in my opinion.

It really came down to the issue of available power. The most common freight diesels in the US only had 1500-1600hp, being MU'd into groups of 2-6 to accommodate. Unfortunately this massively drove up maintenance costs (on account of having to maintain 4 diesels for the equivalent power of 1 steam locomotive), which is what prompted Southern Pacific to buy the 3500hp Kraus Maffei units. Similar issues on Union Pacific lead to perhaps the single most successful turbine locos ever built. Turns out I misremembered and the Kraus Maffei ML-4000 units were only rated for 3500hp, though operation in groups of 2-3 wasn't uncommon for them

If its of any help, I have heard that the Deltic engines used in the Norwegian Tjeld class patrol boats were rated at 3,100hp each. Whether the engine from a Scandinavian PT boat would even fit in the US's generous loading gauge is up for debate though.

Well I do believe this thread's name isn't specifically "Imaginary British Locomotives" so I do have an intriguing idea. In the US, the Southern Pacific Railroad often struggled with locomotives being underpowered, leading to the acquisition of a series of Kraus Maffei Diesel Hydraulics rated at 4500hp. Could a locomotive using 2-3 Deltic prime movers have been used in its place?

I do believe that this is a wonderful way to fry any poor lad who happens to make contact with the tracks

I have no doubts that electrification would be more popular without north sea oil. Lines like the Woodhead route may have never lost their wires, and the 1973 oil crisis may have prompted earlier ECML electrification. On an industrial scale, steam & fireless types may have survived as far as the 1990's due to the increased price of oil. There's no preventing main line dieselisation (oil was only struck proper in 1964) but it would've accelerated proposals for electrification and slowed down private steam withdrawal.

I'm going over what types of locomotive may flourish under this and this could lead the GNR into building a light 4-6-0 for secondary traffic and heavy branch work in place of the A1's, something along the lines of the Raven B16's. There isn't exactly concept art so... idk picture Henry the green engine, he's pretty close.

Oh god imagine what kind of monstrous electrics Gresley would've designed. That aside, we wouldn't have been spared the first 3 A1's (1470, 1471 and 1472) on account of them being ordered by the GNR prior to grouping.