45699 Galatea

Learn something new every day! I'm sure I read somewhere that air braking allowed a higher top speed, must be old age! Thanks for the correction.
Dave

 

can i add my congratulations to wcrc for a magnificient job.

 

48151 has visited the GCR...

And 5944 has been to both the NYMR and GWSR, but I tend to think they're the exceptions that prove the rule!

 

I assume you mean 5972? Unless 5944 Ickenham Hall has crept under the radar?

Sorry!

 

No, he means the poster on here! :smile:

 

It's just another hall. All their numbers look alike!

 

Congratulations carnforth. Recall seeing the carcass of 5699 at carnforth bridge north and tyseley. Remember my Dad saying she would never run again. We are lucky someone had the fortitude and finances to repair her.

 

Another one to look forward to! Well done to all involved, and BR green with yellow stripe gets my vote.

 

Welcome back to the big bad world of mainline operation, Galatea. Congratulations to all at Carnforth for completing another "impossile" project. Here's to many years of reliable running. Can't wait to hear her 3-cylinder roar. I have a week's holiday "up north" in August to take in some of the summer regulars, and would love to see/hear her on the S&C, hauling The Waverley or Fellsman, perhaps.

 

I would be a little surprised but she is certainly capable. With a pending loaded test run we shall see.

 

Yes well done Carnforth I look forwards to a trip with Galatea would be even better if it was double headed with the Midland Compound

 

Oops, sorry! Slurring my words on a public forum - whatever next?! Was that the night I posted in "Today's Pint"...?

 

If my memory serves me right, I am sure I did a trip in the 70's with Leander & Midland compound [mind you I do have a problem remembering what I did yesterday]

 

Midland Compound and Leander at York 28 Oct 78 | Flickr - Photo Sharing!
(not my photo, but I think I was there too)

Richard

 

There was another Midland Compound/Leander double header on 20th October 1979, which went round the York circular, then Leander went back somewhere westwards (Carnforth??) on its own, with a pretty volcanic exhaust as it passed me at Church Fenton. I also think they double-headed on the S&C in a snowstorm in the early 1980s.

 

Hijacked from another thread but I think more appropriate to discuss on here. (Mods, please move it if you disagree.)
The legendary account of 45699's unassisted ascent of the Lickey with a 420 ton trailing load is told by Terry Essery, who was the fireman on the footplate so it is first hand information. It must have happened but could it have happened as told?
According to the RCTS, 45699 was weighed in 1953 and came in at 80T 10cwt and the all-welded tender at 26T 3cwt (tare) so we have good figures to go on. we need to guess at how much coal and water she was carrying, though. The loco had come from Bristol and had last taken water at Gloucester so let's guess at 5 tons of coal and 2000 gallons of water, adding 13.9 tons to that weight and giving an all-up figure of 120.5 tons.
The trailing load is claimed to have been 'about' 420 tons. For a 14 coach train that figure sounds reasonable but pre-nationalisation coaches varies significantly in their weight so it could have been either light or heavy. If we take that figure and add it to the loco weight, we get a gross load of 540.5 tons. The Lickey is, according to info I have, 1 in 37.75. Based on these figures, we need a balancing force of (420+120.5)/37.75 = 14.31 tonf or 32072 lbf. We then have to add more to this figure in the form of rolling resistance. For coaching stock at low speed , this would be about 4lbf/ton, giving a further 1680 lbf. Then there is the loco resistance. I don't know of any published info on a Jubilee but there is info on a reasonably similar Black 5. At low speed, we are looking at an loco resistance of about 2100 lbf. I think that we can safely ignore curve and wind resistance. (Although a strong gale in the right direction can give a significant helping hand!). Add all this lot together and you are looking at a total cylinder tractive force of 35852 lbf (if my maths is correct).
The tractive effort of any reciprocating steam engine is not constant and the conventional formula simply gives an estimated average, albeit a realistic estimate. We know that the loco was wound into full gear and with full boiler pressure so the M.E.P. is going to be around the 85% mark; possibly slightly more, but not much. Big Dave has suggested that, as it was fresh out of shops it might have wheels turned to their minimum of 6'-6" but I can't accept that idea. That would then make them scrap on their next required turning, meaning another works visit. Photographic evidence shows that the tyres were fairly thick so I would suggest that they are nearer the spec. 6'-9". Cylinder size is another matter and they could have been bored oversize, by what I don't know. To get the required TE out of a Jubilee, we would require a cylinder diameter of (35852x81x2/(225x26x.85x3))**0.5 =19.7". I can't see that being the case, I'm afraid.

So what could be wrong? The most likely is a poor estimate of the trailiing load. The guard would/should have informed the driver of his load but who is going to check its accuracy? It's easy to get your sums wrong when adding up on a piece of paper. Were any vehicles removed at a station stop before Bromsgrove? It's possible. Would the crew have looked back and counted how many vehicles they had in tow? Perhaps. That something happened with the bankers is almost certainly true but it was only later that Terry found out what had happened. Did they in fact lose all the bankers or just a couple? The lagging bankers eventually caught up with the train again so it is also possible that 45699 had the lot for a short while but speed was slowing, as all the laws of physics say it should have done; although Terry denies this.

What actually happened and what was the truth, we'll now never know but it makes a grand story and, like all good stories, there is some truth in it, somewhere.

 

I have a colour slide of the Midland Compound with Leander taken from Long Preston bridge in, I believe, 1982.