1014 County of Glamorgan

To a degree yes however my view is that there are an abundance of 28xx and 8fs kicking about. If they haven't been rescued after half a century then realistically they aren't going to be. If 48518 was going to get rescued it would have been. Hot air and waffle does not an engine make.

Better to let somebody mop up the useful bits and make something different. The County and Saint will both be unique. Despite the County only having 225psi in the boiler it will still be ooo'd and ahhhh'd over as it wafts up and down. No doubt demands will be made to paint them in BR colours will be forthcoming from the usual suspects soon enough.

Two many Castles knocking about if you ask me. Reckon a cheeky pony truck wedged at the back end of 7027 and an extra axle with inside bearings on the tender will compliment the new firebox that can be popped onto to boiler will be swell... Et voila - The Great Bear (ver 1.1)!

 

Fairly certain it was a radial truck on The Great Bear but happy to be proved wrong - I take your point, of course, and it's an interesting "what if" - but I'd rather have the Castle. The Great Bear was a developmental dead end, arguably, however good the locomotive was (and there's good evidence to suggest it was a perfectly capable machine).

 

Too true pal

 

The same could be said of the locos we already have working or those in the overhaul queue. They'll all need looking after by somebody in years to come.

 

Quite so, it was too good for the infrastructure it had to run on.

 

I wouldn't equate being too heavy with being too good. Would appear that it wan't significantly better than a Star and once the Castles came along, its fate was sealed.

 

I once suggested rebuilding 7027 as a Star, only to be assured that later series Castles actually had very few components in common with the Stars...

 

The boiler proportions were out on the Bear. As Stanier was later to discover it needed a shorter barrel and tubes and a combustion chamber, but AIUI Churchward had just had no end of combustion chamber troubles on the Krugers and wasn't anxious for more. It had huge superheater surface (more than an early Gresley Pacific), but most likely by the time the steam reached the end of the tubes it was almost reheating the combustion gases. But the biggest problem was that the Castles (which were just upboilered Stars really) could do all the work that needed doing.

 

What happened to 2861's wheels and what condition were they in? Anyone know?
Ray.

 

I was being somewhat mischievous in comments regarding Thornbury Castle but interesting discussion none the less. Give me a King Arthur or U Boat any day of the week over all those Stephensons valve gear and safety valve bonnet clones!!

 

Having had 31806 on the SVR for a month or so there aren't many that I'd take over a good u boat. Fantastic bit of kit. And that's coming from someone with a vested interest in a "Stephenson valve gear and safety valve bonnet clone"!

 

If that's what you're used to, the U boat should be streets ahead, then! Apart from being slightly beyond its limit, it was well liked at the NYMR.

 

My experience is people often like this loco or that, until they experience for the first time something out of Ashford, at which point they realise the previous error of their ways!

Tom

 

Bah, the only negative comments we've had about '57 relate to the footplate being slightly exposed. Of course if we're lucky enough bring her to the NYMR I'd expect no such comments from the stoic northerners of Grosmont!

 

We've got the the S15 so we're used to these exposed tenders. One driver & fireman famously (notoriously!) stripped to the waist when on the S15 and arriving at Goathland tender first in a blizzard, proclaiming 'men of steel'. Nobody else has been that daft, though.
2807 was a popular gala visitor with the crews but I was denied the opportunity.

 

Must be the lap of luxury compared to Swindon's offerings - now, back to my bucket seat

 

That sounds about right. A devout yorkshireman who I used to work with always claimed that you could tell snake pass was in Derbyshire because "a Yorkshire Road would never be troubled by a bit o' weather".

Well hopefully we'll get to do a comparison study before too long, I need an excuse to return to the moors.

 

Funny, I would have guessed you were already on a pedestal.

 

Nah - might get knocked off

 

Ah I see, balance issues? That would explain the need for cab doors too.