Progress on newbuild LNWR George the Fifth Class 'Prince George'

To my mind, shifting to the 'conventional' bearing arrangement is pretty fundamental. I recall a discussion (quite a while back) over frame issues with ex-LNWR locos, where it seems ex-MR staff didn't appreciate the finer points of Crewe's bearing arrangements, resulting in an undeserved bad 'rep' for certain ex-LNW locos. From memory, I think @LMS2968 was the one who cast light on the differences in schools of design.

 

Mr Cox was no admirer of Precursor,Experiments,George the fifths and Prince of Wales class.
His main dislike was frame breaking and this can be be remedied rather easy.
Firebox between frame plates ask for wide spacing and boggie movements for narrower setting to avoid big cut outs on the worst possible place.
It was sometimes done by bending the frameplates but LNWR did it by splicing each side from two pieces but on the worst possible location between aft end of cylinder and some feets in front of the crank bearings.
It had been better to do the splicing around the crank hornblocks.

 

Centre bearing

 

All classes practically extinct by grouping. Mind you, so was much else on the LMS from other constituent pre-grouping railways. Regarding this specific matter, was 'the frame thing' a design feature of just passenger locos, or was it shared by goods locos? I ask as both Webb's 18in 0-6-0 and 'Coal Tank' 0-6-2T served until late in the day.

If it did affect goods classes too, would a better example perhaps be those 0-8-0s (from LNW Classes D,E & F) rebuilt in LMS days as 'Class G1'? I've literally no idea of the reasons for or scope of their rebuilding, but if frame issues did feature in the decision to rebuild, it might be illuminating.

 

The 0-8-0s were fitted with the centre bearing, and like the passenger engines, its removal was ordered. And yes, they did subsequently suffer frame defects. They did however remain in service to 1965.

 

Was the removal just a case of Derby thinking "not invented here" or did the centre bearings cause problems? Helping to resist piston thrust forces seems a good idea, but perhaps not so good if the alignment of all three bearings is less than perfect.

 

They didn't cause problems that I'm aware of, but they did, to Derby's eyes, cause extra maintenance. Aligning the bearings would be no more difficult than ensuring the alignment of all axleboxes along the length of the engine so they were square in the frames and correctly spaced to match the specified wheelbase.

 

If it was in the middle, would it encourage pivoting if there was any slack in the outer bearings? Would that adversely change the wear pattern?

I can't think of anyone else trying them, which implies they weren't a major improvement

 

If there was play in the wheel bearings, the piston thrusts would give some pivoting with or without the centre bearing, although the degree of offset would be negligible. The bearing was part of the overall design and allowed thinner - lighter - frame plates, for which Crewe was well known. It also reduced the bending stresses on the crank axle. Remember too that Crewe was using inside Joy valve gear which most others did not. This meant space for the centre bearing was available between the frames; that wasn't the case if that space was occupied by four eccentrics and associated linkages of Stephenson's gear. Others had their own systems, but it worked for Crewe.

 

This is the first drawing of the centre box that I've seen. It shows two wedges instead of the usual one only for an axlebox.
This means that alignment is not a problem because there is adjustment available forwards and backwards.
Fitters will have easily learnt how to assemble and adjust the bearings and I expect it will not have taken much more time.
I wonder what is was like to oil up? Edit: I just noticed the oil pot on top of the assembly. The horns probably got a drop or two from the oil can.
It looks like quite a well designed feature to me.
Very interesting, thanks for posting the drawing.

 

This is another of those projects that while i wish it well doesnt seem to have much of a financial backing to actually achieve its goals. Its been going long enough now to gain membership/donors and seems to raise about £20k per year. For a project that would need, i would imagine minimum of 2 million to complete, at its current rate 100 years is the time scale. And even if it managed to get to 200k per year income (only a hand full of loco groups have ever achieved that) it would still take another 10 years from now.

Will preservation be littered with partial built projects in 10 years that ultimately get scrapped without ever getting to the finish line?

 

They've got further than the GER Claud group, all they've done so far appears to be a buffer beam and bogie frames.

I agree with Gav above, I would like to see this loco and hope it succeeds but they seem to have made some peripheral parts, framing, smokebox, cab etc, but no major components.

At one time I had this one on my list of ones which will complete, but long term, now I'm not certain it will

 

Thank you for posting this. Thinking about what came later, self adjusting axlebox wedges (Franklin) were just the one wedge. However later it was proposed that both wedges should be adjustable (I believe that this was a Timken design).

A design with outside frame plates in conjunction with a central frame plate, the Golsdorf designed Class 9 4-6-0s of 1898 for example, would benefit from this. These engines were two cylinder compounds and the L.P. cylinder had a 32" bore and lasted until after WW2 which was very respectable, but just think about what might have been achieved. I have been reading about the failures in the Independence class Littoral combat ships recently, a sorry saga; too much rigidity and insufficient flexibility with other factors hovering in the background. Steam locomotives also need careful consideration. There have been long lived designs with rather light frame structures which served very well giving little concern with respect to their frames. Other designs have had very rigid frame structures which were held up to be exemplary in their time but soon caused problems due to cracking. Other designs were produced with frames which were supposed to offer a degree of flexibility but which proved to be incapable of offering satisfactory endurance. Some cast steel bed designs needed to be replaced due to cracking.

You can build a very satisfactory frame structure using 1"/25mm for the main plates which is capable of producing 2,600 hp but you need to be very careful with regard to cross bracing and cylinder design.

The LNWR designs in question might at one level have appeared to be lightly constructed but they had features which allowed them to perform as well as they undoubtedly did which were neither fully understood or appreciated. You could say that these types represented the idea that locomotives should be as light as as possible with respect to the power output expected of them.

 

Given the increasing costs of restoration, construction and operation of steam locos, the increasing cost and diminishing supply of coal, environmental pressures, a decline in disposable income for many people, demographic issues . . . etc., the answer to your question seems depressingly clear.

 

I think there are a few "definites" which will certainly get finished and steam. Off the top of my head, Beachy Head, the P2, Betton Grange, the NER 0-4-4 tank, the GWR 4700, 82045. The next group are probables, which will most likely get there, the GER 2-4-2 tank, the Patriot, although it's had setbacks, I think it's too far advanced to be abandoned, the GCR 4-4-0, the B17, the Clan, the GWR County 4-6-0 and possibly the 3800 4-4-0 too, it seems to be making progress.

The rest I file under doubtful

 

FWIW, my own feeling is that as politicians worldwide run out of excuses for inaction on climate and we begin to get a proper grip on pollutants, the miniscule amount of gunge a few hundred steam locos (and diesels) churn out will be statistically negligible. In that sense, any finger pointing is more an admission that the lack of meaningful political action necessitates the tedious and all-too-predictable diversionary tactics beloved of politicians bereft of ideas.

IMO, the biggest threat to steam over the longer term comes from the attitude of upcoming generations to these strange smelling and noisy antiques ..... and the locos they drive (sorry - just couldn't resist!). I'm not saying 'forget about fuel problems', but am saying that if our future market dries up, then our movement at best shrinks drastically and at worst, dies.

With the proviso fuel remains available (and I honestly believe our movement will find the wherewithal to address the solid and liquid fuel questions), providing our photographically minded brethren can resist the temptation to ask for dampers open at every photoshoot and we're a bit savvy about where old diesel lumps are fired up, there's a future. In the interim, we do need to be mindful that there's going to be a pretty much constant PR battle being waged and it's not one we can afford to lose.

Thst's how I see it at any rate.

 

That addresses two of @Kylchap's points; fuel and environmental pressures, but what about the others? Keeping what we've got in operation will take a lot of money and effort, possibly more than can be found. There will be very little left for the new builds that are not yet finished. A few, such as the Brighton Atlantic and 82045, are close to completion and will be useful, perhaps permanently replacing some of the locos that are in service now. @Cartman's post #55 does look far wrong to me.

 

Please - for the nth time - if you are worried about smoke emissions, "opening the dampers" is not how you would go about generating the damn stuff!

Tom

 

Well however it's done, billowing smoke and clag doesn't go down too well with increasing numbers of the folks on whose tolerance for steam (and early diesels!) our movement is increasingly going to need to rely into the future.

 

Where are all these general public/environmentalist people complaining about smokey steam engines? Every single thing I've ever seen about the issue has come from the enthusiast press or boards, saying we mustn't upset them, but I can't think of a peep from the actual "them", whoever they are.