Flying Scotsman

That is indeed very encouraging news and I would hope for a relatively smooth passage now in Mr Riley's hands.

 

Very encouraging news indeed!

Just a couple of points though - Who writes the NRM press releases? The style is absolutely sickly florid! - Every time the loco. is mentioned it's either "the great steam giant" or "The iconic legend". Eugh! Far too over-eulogised!
Also, when did the practice of calling cylinders "steam cylinders" begin... I've never heard of the cylinders in my bus engine being refererred to as "diesel cylinders" as yet.

Richard.

 

Well be grateful they didn't refer to them as the "cylinder block", something infernal congestion engines feature. Steamy engines have a "cylinder", or "cylinder casting"

 

Well, I suppose it distinguishes them from the vacuum cylinders!

To be fair, I suspect this press release was not written with the specialist press in mind, who they know will cover this story anyway. Instead, I'd wager they want it to be picked up by the non-specialist press, hopefully with a photo or two. It's the sort of story I can imagine running in The Mail or The Express, but to do so, they have to make this particular moment in time sound like something really groundbreaking and important, rather than just another step in a long and complex process.

Like so many other things in life, writing a press release is really about deciding on your target audience, and then selling your story to them... In this case, I'd reckon the target audience is probably the Editors of newspapers with a readership likely to be broadly sympathetic to the project, but non-specialist. In the circumstances, a whipping up a bit of drama probably helps.

Tom

 

An example of pointless dumbing down. Anyone who doesn't know that engines (steam, diesel or petrol) have cylinders will be no wiser as a result of this unusual description.

 

I agree clear and simple explanations are good. I think you missed my point (sorry if I didn't say it simply enough ) which is that the incorrect use of 'steam cylinders' doesn't make it simpler or more clear.

 

Ok, now I'm confused. What is the correct use of 'steam cylinders', if not for those cylinders into which steam is passed? Is the term reserved for components of the steam brake system? (which Scotsman no longer has - yes?) If so, then is this just by convention or is it enshrined in an official document?

In short, whilst the NRM may have used a somewhat unconventional description of certain of 4472's components in a perfectly understandable attempt to improve the clarity of their press release to a non-expert audience, to my mind they've not used the term incorrectly.

Cheers
Adrian

 

Given that the bits where steam is used to provide force for propulsion are normally just called "cylinders", the term "steam cylinders" might just conceivably be thought to refer to some other cylinders, such as the steam ends of air brake pumps (though there's probably only one of them) or the cylinders in which the piston valves operate. Even if we accept that they haven't used that term in an incorrect sense, they have used one more word than necessary, thus (slightly) complicating the description. So it does seem an inappropriate, and thus arguably incorrect, choice of words.

However people posting on this forum also sometimes choose our words badly.

 

We are all missing the point here! What has been reported is that the frames have received a clean bill of health, and therefore the ultimate restoration of FS to running condition has moved materially forward - which is a good thing. If, as a result of this press release, that fact gets reported in the non-specialist press, that will also be a good thing.

Yet to read the last page or so, that good news seems to have been completely ignored, while everyone froths about the exact wording of the press release and ignores the substantive news that is being reported! I feel some readjustment of priorities might be in order...

Tom

 

It would have been fully vacuum braked, so no steam brake to remove.

 

Clean bill of health or no significant defects? The NRM is going with the latter not the former. So there are defects, no surprise there, but they are not seen as being significant (or can be dealt with very easily) and so the job moves on to phase two. The press release is just that and, given the totally non technical background of much of the press, contains a level of language and content that does not lead to any confusion. Those wanting something rather more involved are going to have to wait. Probably for a long time.

 

And what would they be may I ask?

 

Am I the only one who thinks it's actually quite a well worded press release, given that it's aimed at mainstream press rather than specialist press? If the whole idea is to draw attention to Scotsman, then it's well worth having a press release that's pretty much ready to copy and paste into a newspaper... And to be honest, if it spent most of the time discussing apple vs Brunswick green or fitted bolts vs rivets I doubt if any editors apart from Gary Boyd Hope would wade through to the end anyway. Spot on in my book.


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In the context of a steam locomotive there is no correct usage of 'steam cylinders'; and this incorrect use doesn't make anything clearer otherwise I wouldn't object. The correct term is cylinders. Sorry if anyone minds me frothing on about this minor point. I am delighted to see the overhaul is convincingly back on track with the full backing of the NRM and their bosses, confounding the naysayers who thought this review would be used as an excuse to cancel the project.

 

The correct term is the title on the component drawing. In the case of LMS and BR drawings it is outside cylinder or inside cylinder. It does not matter whether the loco has 2, 3 or 4, they are the correct names.

 

When I was involved with NDT, we always used the term 'imperfections'. When these became significant, it was classed as a defect. However, it is all terminlology. At the end of the day, most metals have imperfections of some sort, laminations being quite common in wrought materials; it depends what it is and where it is as to whether it is significant.