Greatest Mileage in Service

And on another thread you are saying how much superior Thompson's Pacifics were to anything made....

 

To pick up on a tangential point of dozens of posts ago, I believe there really was a marked drop off in workshop standards at the time of Webb's retirement, and this wasn't really sorted until Beames was able to make major changes during LMS days.
In fact, it caused something of a crisis because Webb locos were being withdrawn so quickly, that despite the new Whale engines being built, the reduction in engine availability brought about a bit of a motive power crisis.
Whatever Webb's failings, he ran a tight ship and his workshops were absolutely top notch. The duo of Whale and Trevithick who took over seem to have taken their antipathy to his ideas rather too far, with the result of this crisis.
(All this is from memory, I'm afraid, as haven't got the relevant books handy, but pretty sure it's about right).
Hence it's quite possible that workshop standards at Crewe in the Webb era really were good enough to keep an engine in service almost every weekday for a decade, with some weekend hot work.
Nevertheless, I am also of the opinion that the loco which ran the two million miles may have had some major identity fluidity during the period...
(Not dissimilar to many of our preserved locos).

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Thompson A2 Forhjul by Hermod posted May 22, 2019 at 9:05 AM

They were the UK Pacifics worth modernizing and keep running to the bitter end in my view.

 

I think a certain Mr Peppercorn came along and sorted that out!

 

Ah, but did this fabled Peppercorn achieve 2,000,000 miles per week per loco on an average availability (Sunday’s excepted) of 1,500% while achieving coal consumption of 0.2oz per seat-mile and a whole class per mile lifetime maintenance cost of fourpence three-farthings?

Tom

 

Did anyone else manage to achieve anything like these figures?

 

But that achievement of 3,200,000 km per veek, vith coal consommption of 3.54g/km could only haff been achieved by a chapelon 4-8-0 utilizing exhaust steam compounding unt elesco feedwater heaters operating at a maximum speed of 128 km/hr.

 

Mr L.H. Cotter's fabled 16 3/4 inch double bogie singles with booster tenders exceeded those figures while employed on the legendary three hour Scottish Little Meddling to Much Snoring flyers, a service that included the hard running along the flank of Glen Close and over the shoulder of Ben Fogle - a route that was sadly closed following the great St Simon Garfunkel's day disaster of 1883 when a surge of floodwater through the Rous-Marten Burn caused the Bridge over Troubled Waters to collapse into the Mull of IgTawney just as the evening flyer ran across. (An occurrence that led to the famous William Mcgonagall poem "The poor timing from Rous-Marten")

Seasoned observers from Ahrons to Sekon to Nock believe the like of such running was approached neither before nor since, nor possibly even during.

Tom

 

Why can't I like this more than once

 

I'm given to understand that this included a scheduled 10 minute stop at Hielantfling for haggis shooting (during the season) using Baggenpipen modified especially for the purpose in a secret patented draughtless kilt factory in Scunthorpe by skilled Loch Ness monsters.

 

Flipping 'eck, Tom, I used to think my home brew was potent stuff but yours has got to be at least one order of magnitude more potent. You have been drinking the stuff, haven't you?

 

Mis-post, corrected below

 

Wasn't that Brunel's specification for the original GWR broad gauge locos?

 

I'll agree with all tht but with some reservations about the last sentence.

 

To be fair, my last sentence was rather a stretch, I mainly said it to be provocative!

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Well done! It worked!