if the 350bhp diesel shunter had not been invented....

94XX? Basically a 57XX with a taper boiler, still with 19th century cylinders and motion. As someone once wrote - "0-6-0s, the thing that Swindon was best at."

 

Anyone got a time machine I can borrow? Nothing wrong with changing history for the better, surely? :lol:

 

I'd have said wheelbase and adhesion was more of an issue than axle loading in shunting yards hence a 15xx/USA Tank variant would of been best, the Ivatt/Standard 2's could take care of working the lightly laid Branch Lines, so make a heavy duty tank pack as much punch as possible.

Remember if you want a steam equivelant of an 08 then you need some hefty power (and high axleloading as a result), 08's are not quick but they can shift some serious tonnage at low speed.

 

ONE of the things Swindon was best at.The other one is "everything else"

 

Since the Austerities were designed by Riddles it's surely possible that had Riddles been minded to concentrate on steam ( rather than look to electrification which was his preferred metier ) then he would have adopted this as his "standard" shunter given the work for which it was originally designed and used during WWII.

 

Were the Austerities designed by Riddles? I 'd have said it was more like an adapted off the peg Hunslet design that he adopted. I still think that in the postwar era an outside cylinder design would have been chosen, influenced by American practice from the USA tanks, not slavishly followed but adapted to British practices.

 

Wasnt there a proposed BR standard steam tank locomotive design ? (I thought I read this in a book somewhere over the years).

maybe another train of thought could be the adoption of the german fireless boilered locomotive ? Could this have worked in the UK ?

 

I thought the Austerity tenders were Riddles, but the tanks were from other engine builders

 

There were plenty of fireless loco's in the UK - generally used on large industrial sites with a ready supply of high pressure hot water from their boiler houses. Typically in the chemical industry, for obvious reasons, and some CEGB power staions too. Not sure how they'd work on the rail network though - where would you charge them from?

 

ADB968008: I too wondered about this after reading through this thread earlier, and have had a look in Cox's "BR Standard Steam Locomotives" for clues. It appears that there were no plans for a "standard" steam shunting loco, at least as a new design. The Locomotive Standards Committee, set up in 1948, amongst other things, drew up a list of traffic categories for which there was an immediate perceived need. There were six categories set down:
-Mixed traffic Tender 4-6-0 or 4-6-2.
-Mixed Traffic Tender 2-6-0 or 4-6-0.
-Heavy Mixed Traffic Tank 2-6-2 or 2-6-4.
-Light Mixed Traffic Tank 2-6-2.
-Light Freight Tender 2-6-0 or 0-6-0.
-Dock Shunting 0-4-0.

So no 0-6-0 tank shunter. Equally no heavy freight engines at that stage due to the influx of ex-WD operated 2-8-0s, and no immediate requirement for heavy passenger engines.

I suspect that any requirement for shunting locos was to be fulfilled by the building of more 350hp diesel shunters, but I dont have the hard facts to support this contention.

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if a need had been there for a standard 0-6-0 tank loco, i also think it would have been based on American thinking and ease of maintaining , so a modified USA tank is the most likily outcome, high, or no running plate, rocking grate and hopper ashpan with self cleaning smokebox ,after all what did post war europe base its design on when it needed to replace worn out engines , copies of the same engine that had been shipped over during the war

all the other suitable candidates are with the exception of the WR 1500 class are inside cylindered and not user friendly in an enviroment where ease of preparation and disposal would be needed

 

I would guess that if you want a profitable railway, something that admittedly eluded some companies, you don't drag unnecessary weight round the country, and you don't use a 63 ton 10 wheel engine on a couple of coaches instead of a 41 ton 6 wheeler, nor do you use it in place of a 50 ton shunter...

 

http://www.southern-images.co.uk/li...y=gallery/Trainspre68/SRTenders/PT4c&start=20 :lol:

 

quite common in the west country that sight was....

 

Timely posting of this topic. Today's date is.......08, and the month is ....09!

 

Hmm I guess without any plans we have to summize and make a guess...

which tank engine class was the highest produced ? (I'm guessing it's the Jinty or the Pannier ?)

Or which one used the most standard parts ?

or is more efficient ? (Weight / Haulage ratio or operating efficiency ?)

would it have been feasible to shrink an 84xxx into an 0-6-0 ? variant even ?

 

EDIT: On second thoughts...

 

Well, the pannier had around 1,500+ examples, all with broadly the same chassis. It just needed an upgrade, like mechanical lubrication, etc, to make it slightly more user friendly. Oil fired? Everyone knew the limits & fits, so increased time between shops. I believe Mr. Meanley (Tysley) costed out another batch of 10, so the story may not be over!

Regards,
Ian.

Its sunny here......

 

If you exclude early double framed and Wolverhampton built engines, which were different in detail, I think there were nearer 1200 of the Swindon large (sub)class(es) - 1813/1854/2721/5700/8750/9400, plus around 200 of the rather smaller 2021/54/64/74/1600 classes, which were around 20% lighter and had quite different chassis and motion and were Wolverhampton design in origin. However I think its probably a mistake to assume that the serious detail engineering, as opposed to the general outline and parts interchangeability, had that much in common between 1880 and 1950 builds. Swindon was always working on increasing shopping intervals.

 

Excluding a few earlier Panniers, the 1500/1600/5400/5700/6400/7400 classes amounted to some 1056 units, ( as at 1956/57)with the 5700 class amounting to no less than 861 of that total. ( Excluding however many 9400's were built, my "Combined" says "still being delivered".)
The "Jinty" numbers, at least in the 1956/57 Combined ABC are shown as 52 rebuilds, and 417 new production, so I think it is a safe bet that the GW 5700's were the most numerous.

Interestingly though when you read the description shown in the Ian Allan ABC, each class of GW engine had a quite specific traffic category:
-1500 class: Short wheelbase heavy shunting.
-1600 class: Light branchline and shunting.
-5400 class: Light passenger, push-pull.
-5700 class: Shunting and light goods.
-6400/6700 classes: Light passenger work.
-9400 class; Heavy shunting.

In practice though use was not confined to their original purpose.

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