LMS 2P 4-4-0

Lack of rear handrail. The streamlined tenders had a ladder up the rear face but the non-streamlined ones had footsteps below the rear tank sides, hence the handrail as on all other Stanier tenders.

 

Going north, it was 1 in 75 for about 4 1/2 miles, but these miles were often near the end of a 300 mile non-stop run from Euston. Coming south the gradient was a mere 1 in 125 for the last eight miles, but about 31 1/2 miles altogether as the climb lasted most of the way from Carlisle.

Bulleid Pacifics would have finished their day's work by that point, wouldn't they?

 

I’ve amended my post now but I didn’t know about the rear had rail, so it’s not 6242!

 

That Crewe to Perth lodging turn with climbs over Shap, Beattock and Gleneagles and then back the next day must have been at the limit of physical capacity for a fireman.

 

Ah, as I thought, Honiton was harder (About 1 in 70/80 for the last five miles, after about two miles of 1 in 100). The Bulleid would have been water limited, so after a quick service at Exmouth Junction, would be turned round and on its way back to Salisbury.

But don't worry, I'm really just gently trolling the poor deluded followers of the way of Crewe and Derby, yet to see the true path - forgive them, for they know not what they do ...

Tom

 

we would have lent you an 8F tender if you'd asked....and hung another 150 tons on the back . and no 2P pilot

 

Yes, Tom, we know what you're doing. But don't worry. One day they'll find a cure . . .

 

(Tin hat ON) Didn't Clement Attlee already sort that one out? (and ...... RUN!)

 

No one's biting. We're not GW-ites.

 

They did almost succumb to the cult of the copper cap, you know ...



Tom

 

Everyone makes mistakes!

 

Or the cult of horizontal cylinders.

 

Just to break the fun and make a serious point. When Stanier joined the LMS he was an unknown quantity and the DOs weren't sure how to react to the rather vague design instructions coming out of Euston, and felt that following Swindon practice to the letter might be the requirement. The coffee pot safety valve cover was one outcome of this, as were the horizontal cylinders with their centre lines above those of the driving wheels. Stanier sent forth an edict stating that this wasn't the plan and the cylinders were lowered - but not inclined on this class only - so that the centre lines coincided. In the original position, they would have been the usual distance below the running plate, but the new one gave a large and not particularly attractive gap between them.

The safety valve cover was also changed to a dome-shaped one in accordance with the new instructions and this appeared on preliminary drawings, but was somehow later overlooked. 13245 therefore emerged as in the photos, and Stanier was most annoyed, ordering an immediate replacement (the sheet metal worker apparently made a lot of overtime hammering out the new domed but very ugly object) and that all the photos be destroyed. Most were, but a few negatives survived, so fortunately we still have this evidence of Horwich's Faux Pas.

 

They do say a picture paints a thousand words and looking at the photo supplied by Tom, I can well understand Stanier's reaction. If you're about creating a new "house image", seeing something redolent of the past you're trying to put to bed isn't best likely to go down too well ... most especially with a CME who could be regarded as something of an iconoclast (though I imagine he'd snap back he was a 'modrniser').

It does make you wonder how GW practise might've evolved, had W.A.S not caught Lord Stamp's eye and taken the top job at Swindon ... but that's just a moot point.

 

Interesting comment about Swindon practice being that the cylinder centre lines were above the nominal driving axle centre (to paraphrase). Based on a few GAs to hand, the King and Manor are on the centre line but the 45xx tank is not, the latter presumably because there was a limit to how low the cylinders could be set. Presumably this was a feature of the smaller wheeled classes, including the 43xx moguls even though they had the same wheel diameter as the Manor? It is quite a common arrangement outside the UK.

 

due to the small age difference between Collett and W.A.S the answer is probably not a lot .
i have often wondered tho' why the LMS didn't get the compound Castles that Collett turned down, instead of the Jubilees .

 

I've always thought that, possibly due to the restrictive UK loading gauge, compounding (aside from that brief fad ahead of long travel piston valves) and articulation tended to be viewed as a measure of last resort. Those of the MR (Deeley/Smith) and B&NCR (3'-0" gauge VonBorries) can't have been too bad, given both served into the 1950s.

Although the Mallet layout was more inherently favourable to compounding than either a Fairlie or Garratt, even the generous US loading gauges were challenged, when it came to large* LP cylinders. I'm not aware of any compound Garratts being built after WWI.

* that's "large" in US terms ..... or "ginourmous" in ours!

 

Many years ago a fellow volunteer on the Severn Valley was an ex fireman at Crewe North and this turn came round about every four weeks with the following day being a mandatory rest day for obvious reasons. He told me some of the men couldn't hack it and he would often swap shifts with them, it was a high pay job and a new family meant the money was needed.
Rostered for a Royal Scot with a notional coal capacity of nine tons, if they thought they were in for a bad run they would coal right up to the limit of the loading gauge and ask the coalman to put a couple of sacks on the footplate, so probably 10 tons or more. He told me that on a few occasions he'd shown the driver a shovel full of dust as they went past Hilton Junction saying 'that's the lot mate.' A Scot was not fitted with a steam coal pusher so much of it had to be double handled. He did say that most drivers were decent types and would fire one of the banks for him but even so a a physically demanding exercise, probably not matched anywhere else on the railway

 

Allan Baker, a Crewe fitter at the time, goes into a lot of detail about the Perth Postal. Always worked by Crewe men (Allan C Baker and Gavin Morrison, Crewe Sheds, (1988) Ian Allen, Shepperton ISBN 0 7110 1809 X). The Perth link was a special one and not part of the normal progression route. Men volunteered for it. If anyone found that they couldn't hack it, they came out again and rejoined their normal route at the point they left it, with no loss of seniority. Another oddity was that, when a fireman in this link passed for driving, he stayed in the link and did not go into a shed or shunting list.

 

I didn’t know that, I was told that you volunteered for it but there must have been a lot of ‘normal’ work in it. I assumed that top link crews just had the option of doing it or not. I can’t remember all the details of our conversation, it was nearly 50 years ago!