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

The writings of ES Cox and RC Bond show that the post-nationalisation management were heavily influenced by American practice, so I can't see that they'd have spent much time dliberating on the merits of GW engines! Stanier and Ivatt had moved on where they had produced LMS versions of GW staples, and if there had been a need for a new shunting class I think they would have done so in this case as well. I don't think their solution would have born much resemblence to a pannier tank!

 

Outside cylinders? 0-8-0? Maybe the answer would have been an updated Maunsell class Z! (OK, it's actually a 3 cylinder design, but hey....)

http://www.semgonline.com/steam/zclass_1.html

Tom

 

Many US lines used 0-8-0 tender locos as shunters .... How closely might US practice have been followed??!!

I did say "influenced by" not "slavishly copied"! The influence would have been outside cylinders and valve gear, mechanical lubrication, rocking grate etc - all features that make maintenance less arduous, but they would have been applied in an appropriate way for UK needs, so when it came to freight engines we saw a 2-10-0, not a 4-8-8-4 design!

 

Ordered by the GWR in a fit of pique, apparently. Some of them hardly turned a wheel in service.

I think given the LMS influence something based on an Ivatt 2MT as mentined before is most likely, although I'd support the 15XX because I think its the best looking steam shunter ever. And I'm an LNER guy!

 

deleted

 

The 'Flying Pigs' were influenced by the American 2-8-0 war loco, so I would thought a slightly more user-freindly version of the 'USA' tank would have been devloped. Possibly a two clyinder 0-8-0T or 0-6-0T?

But I doubt it was ever considered, even in the 1930's diesel shunters were being devloped to replace steam shunters as it was more econmical to use.

Having said that not quite sure for the reason why the that last batch of J72 was built. Why didn't they either build more of the J50s which had been the LNER group standard shunting design, or order new J94 from Hunslet? Was it just Regional 'I know better'?

 

Weight I imagine. The J50s were 57 tons, J94 48 tons and J72 <39.
At the same time the WR was simultaneously building 45T and 55T shunters.

I came across a rather more rational explanation just the other day, which would also explain why there were simultaneous batches of 57s at the same time as the 94s. It seems at the end of the war the GWR still had a considerable number of pre group absorbed Welsh locos, mostly 0-6-2s, and all would be needing replacing during the 1950s. The heavier 94 would presumably have rather more braking power than the 57 and the job was mostly taking loaded wagons down the Valleys and empties back up again. Of course in the event the world changed...
Anyway its not nearly as good a story as either the pique one or the one about the Churchward trained GWR Director objecting to Domes...

 

Cox comments that a total of some 1550 non-B.R. standard locomotives were built after Jan 1st 1948, until 1954. No doubt as in the case of the 94xx's mentioned above, some of these were orders placed before Nationalisation that were allowed to continue, but in the case of a number of ex-LMS designs these were orders placed after Nationalisation to fill immediate needs on other regions. For instance in 1950-52 41 Fairburn 2-6-4 tanks were built at Brighton and allocated initially to the Southern Region, 30 Ivatt class 2 2-6-2 tanks were built at Crewe and added to Southern stock, and Ivatt class 4 and class 2 2-6-0 locos (43xxx and 46xxx) were built at various works for the Eastern (61 engines) and the North Eastern Region (49 engines). Immediate needs filled by existing designs that could be built more quickly than any new Standard designs that were still being developed on the drawing board.

46118

 

Effectively all the LMS locos that were built were standards - there were only detail differences bretween the Ivatt 2s and the BR ones, the Fairburn tamks and the Standard ones, and the 43xxx and the 76xxxs

 

If the Western Region was short of modern motive power for the Welsh Valleys, woulden't a repeat order of 52XX's (assuming heavy coal/steel traffic) or 56XX's (mixed) have been more appropriate ?.

 

Not if the lighter, cheaper and presumably more economical 94s could do the job is an obvious answer. But the real one is that I don't know enough about the subject to comment with any authority at all. I don't even recall where I came across the pre-group replacement story for the 94s or how well authenticated it is. And its worth remembering that history is written not only by the victors, but also by those who happened to write it down, and if none of those involved in the decisions happened to write down what happened before hindsight coloured their memories ( or for that matter if the desire for an amusing anecdote in the book meant the anecdote was written down and the real decision making points skipped) then the smart money is that all we will ever have is speculation. After the second world war Churchill said "History will be good to me: for I intend to write it". I imagine the principle has wider application...

One wonders what might have happened if, instead of the rather uninspired bunch from the LMS running the Kremlin, say Peppercorn and Cook had been lead players in BR design... One thing though, I bet we'd still have had 350hp diesel shunters as the GWR had a batch quite similar to the LMS ones from the same manufacturer.

 

What about 1366 class which worked the Weymouth Quay. They seemed to do a good job at Weymouth and they got out side cylinders.

 

only because they dont have room for inside ones and are a derivation of a Cornish design anyway. The 94xx in SOuth Wales were to replace all the ancient Panniers still around in the fifties surely. They would have been quite unsuitable to replace 0-6-2Ts in their rather specialist roles.

 

The old Taff Vale, Rhymney and Barry Railway locos in South Wales were all side tank locos and the forerunners of the 56XX class. They were, certainly, not replaced by 94XX pannier tanks. Indeed, only 25 84XX/94XX pannier tanks were allocated to Cardiff (East Dock), Cathays, Radyr and the Cardiff Valleys sheds in the mid 1950s.

 

Well, as I say I'm not in a position to say whether you're right or wrong.

However its is true to say that the pregroup locomotives were pretty much all gone by 1958, and if this page is any guide
http://www.greatwestern.org.uk/060_9400det.htm
about half of the first 100 of 94s seem to have gone to Welsh sheds and been withdrawn from Welsh sheds. So if the 94s weren't partly replacing the pre group Welsh locos what classes would you say were taking up that traffic?

What I can say with a little more confidence, because its in the RCTS book I have, is that pre group large 0-6-0PT withdrawals from 1940 numbered something a bit over 100, all gone by around 1951, and something approaching 200 57xx were built over the same period. In addition RCTS also states (RCTS Locomotives of the GWR Volume 5, pE82) "...Cardiff Valleys uses them extensively on coal trains formerly worked by absorbed companies 0-6-2T's, which they were orginally designed to supersede." I imagine that is the source I had for the pre-group replacement story. I don't know enough about the subject to say how authoritative the RCTS books are as a source, but it is at least (pub. 1958) a contemporary one.

 

Jimc, you are quite correct that a large number of 94s went to Welsh sheds, but the vast majority of these went to sheds in the Newport (86) and Neath/Swansea (87) areas. It would be interesting to view the engine record cards of the 94s, just to see what length of time some of the locos spent in store when fit to work.
There were 280 old side tank/ pannier tank locos allocated on the Western Region at the beginning of 1950. There were 200 84/94XXs, 70 16XXs and 10 67XXs built by 1955, so the numbers of old and new are exactly the same. So the question has to be asked whether the loco replacement programme was a needed and neccessary thing or an accountancy exercise.

 

In 1947 according to Lyons, An Historical Survey of GWR Engine sheds, the main distribution of absorbed 0-6-0T and 0-6-2T was:
Newport division about 26
Neath Division ~15
Cardiff Valleys >150

RCTS states that the distribution of 94s by districts early in 1957 was:

London 32 (shunting and empty stock)
Bristol 10 (not stated)
Newton Abbot 22 (shunting and empty stock)
Wolverhampton 16 (not stated)
Worcester 19 (not stated)
Newport 26 (quite extensively for branch passenger)
Neath 37 (branch passenger and heavy shunting esp steelworks)
Cardiff Valleys 41 (coal trains)
LMR 7 (Lickey Bank)

By then Diesel shunters were starting to pick up heavy shunting duties and of course traffic patterns had changed a lot since the late 1940s - I think I'm right in saying that by then rail freight traffic was already in serious decline. What a loco was ordered for and what it ended up being used for ten years later could easily be different!

I think it reasonable to suggest that the Newport, Neath and Cardiff Valleys work would all be picking up tasks previously allocated to various absorbed classes - a significant number of the absorbed 0-6-2Ts were passenger engines rather than freight after all.

Having done this little bit of research I submit that my earlier suggestion that the 94s were primarily ordered as replacements for various pre group absorbed classes is pretty well substantiated. The numbers are in the right order of magnitude, and orders for replacements for the pre group GWR 0-6-0Ts were complete by 1950. Of course it also means that my *very* tongue in cheek suggestion that the 94s were effectively a standard shunter was quite wrong: they seem to have been intended as much for traffic as for shunting, and I can't quite imagine an 08 in the front of an 8 coach passenger traffic train going up the Cardiff valleys (or am I wrong again!)

 

Somehow, the thought of an 08 trying to maintain times taking a passenger train uphill fron Cardiff to Merthyr is scary. It would probably expire before it got to Radyr.