Cumbrian Mountain Express - Oct 4th 2014

Indeed. According to Wikipedia (yes, I know) the grate area of a jubilee is either 29½ or 31 sq ft, i.e. about 60% that of a duchess or an A1. Less grate area means burning less coal, so producing less steam. That's not the whole story, because it's easier (I should say less difficult) to keep 30 sq ft fed than to keep 50 sq ft fed. But still it suggests that a jubilee shouldn't be expected to take much more than 60% of a big pacific's load on any given route; or else shouldn't be expected to make much speed.

It would be good if someone could work out the EDHP for the climbs of Grayrigg and Shap on this occasion and see how they compare with the typical power output for a loco of that size. That would tell us whether Galatea was a bit below par or whether it really was the wrong engine for that particular job. If it was a bit below par, there could be more than one reason, coal quality being an obvious one.

 

No, LMSR rated them 5XP - higher than a Class 5 - and alongside Claughtons and Baby Scots (Patriots to the uninitiated!), BR deleted this classification and moved them - and everything higher up the range - by one class in 1951. When on song, they could produce brilliant performances, but the engine, coal, driver and fireman all had to be at their best; it didn't take much to bring their performances down.

Terry Essery tells the tale of this engine continuing over Lickey summit with fourteen on when the banker suddenly dropped away prematurely, and John Easter Roberts (Hazards of the Footplate, published by himself) tells of having to restart a twenty coach ecs train on the 1 in 75 of Shap with one of these engines when the bobby dropped a clanger. But these were in BR days without a Pendo coming up behind! But eleven over Shap is not excessive for a 5X, provided everything is in good order.

 

But the xp relates more to the speed with which a class five load is capable of being moved by the 3 pot longer legged version of the 5P5F variants, surely, rather than inherently designed to take heavier loads.
Having fired and driven both types in a heritage setting I'd take a black 5 over a Jub for a slow slog. And that is what 11 would inevitably be over Shap with either.

 

The path's the path I guess, and NR don't have the wherewithal to recalculate it for the umpteen permutations of locos and load?

 

Just to clarify power classifications that are being mixed ,
LMS cl. 5xp = BR cl. 6p
LMS cl. 6p = BR cl. 7p
LMS cl. 7p. = BR cl. 8p
No LMS cl. 8p
WCRC are fielding their strongest pair at the moment and whilst it's obvious Galatea is not up to cl.6 standard, they are obviously making every effort to cure what could be a number of relatively insignificant faults rather than one or two major ones, the snagging list could be a long and difficult one. The job which it is being asked to do , is take a cl.8 or at best cl.7 load ,up a long steep gradient and expected to keep time ? What other railway preserved or otherwise, could be used as a test circuit? and there you have it, NR. No other choice, every time they must think it's fixed, it fails to perform, in retrospect I don't think it's done too badly, take for instance, 34046, how long did that take to get main line fit, and they had the benefit of a preserved line as a test bed.
The regular Jube turns on the Aire valley were the 'Thames Clyde' and 'Waverley' which were rarely (if ever) loaded to 9 bogies latterly, after the S&C pilot locos were withdrawn.

 

Agreed: you're echoing a comment made to me by a driver at Liverpool Exchange station in 1968 prior to working the 9.0 Glasgow as far as Preston with a Black Five, "Unless it's an express passenger, I'd rather have a Black 'un than a 5X."
Yes, the X suffix does apply to express passenger workings, but isn't that what 5699 was doing?

 

Indeed, and thats the point, its a tall order to expect a 5X to move a class 7 or 8 load at express speeds on stiff gradients, regardless of how good a 5X it is. The challenge is further added by the cold start from Carnforth so expecting to keep to time is probably unrealistic. That is what is demanded now of locos being asked to perform at and beyond their intended limits as a matter of course to make things economically viable.
Exceptional deeds are always possible, 46115 on the Great Britain this year over Beattock apparently being a case in point, but it would be foolish to plan for such things as the norm.
Please understand there is no intended criticism of either the loco class or 5699 in particular.

 

Class 8 power is great but in the 1960s I happened to enjoy romping along at 80ish behind Jubs (and others) with 8 or 9 on and would like to be able to do it again just occasionally!

 

Smaller load, higher price ? I can live with that !

 

Maybe It is the passage of time that plays tricks, but I still maintain that Galatea's valve events don't sound the same as Jubilees did in squadron service in BR days. Listening to the Shap climb, I just don't hear that " double-three" beat that was so familiar years ago. Without the video images I would not have recognised the sound as a Jubilee.
However, my recollections of the Bristol Barrow Rd Jubilees on heavy northbound trains such as the "Devonian" with load 11 or 12 taken without a pilot up the five miles of 1 in 100 from Chesterfield was that they only made "steady progress", much as 45699 was doing on Shap.

 

I have some analysis of what a decent Jub would have done with the same load as 5699 over this route, based on a good run by 5690 with a lighter load. I can publish it if anyone is interested, but it is rather lengthy.

 

I will 'pdf' it and send to those interested. Just awaiting confirmation of the date of the run by 5690 first.

 

It seems to me that in both those videos the exhaust beats sound pretty even. Ideally they should be perfectly even. A few years ago I watched and videoed a German pacific and its exhaust beats were so even that I didn't realise until I watched the video later that it had three cylinders. If the beats are significantly uneven it means that the cylinders are doing different amounts of work; from each other and/or on forward and backward strokes. I can't answer for how jubilees may have sounded when they were in regular service, but it certainly wasn't unusual for some locos to sound very uneven.

 

Having discovered that you can upload PDF files, here is an analysis by 5AT group member. He has taken data from a good run by 5690 on 2.9.06 with a load of 478 tons, then applied the same power outputs to 5699's load of 553 tons, deriving the speeds that would be achieve at key points, and then compares these to Galatea's actual speed at these points. The conclusion is that Galatea does indeed appear to be a bit below par, (but then you knew that anyway )