4588

It is good to see that 4588 has left Devon, it languished far too long at Churston. Let us hope it is not too long before she re-appears in revenue service.

Maybe a Moderator could move the off topic posts to a thread relevant or of their own.

 

Indeed, though it is the SECR P class that were more famous for being outstripped by the boom in traffic they caused.

The Terriers were introduced for the East London Line and the South London Line, and worked those lines pretty successfully from their introduction for fifteen years or so. An oft-overlooked factor in that success was the use of eight-coach close-coupled block sets of 4 wheel carriages, which enabled around 400 people to be carried in a set of carriages weighing just fifty tons unladen. (Passenger comfort - unrecorded!) In other words, the revolution in the service was a total concept designed for the lightly-constructed line: not just a new design of engine, but a new design of train.

Eventually, a combination of the introduction of slightly heavier, less spartan carriages, and train lengths increasing to 12 - 14 carriages eventually put the duties beyond a Terrier, and the duties were taken over by D tanks, with the Terriers migrating to the country sheds. But certainly, as built, they were an instant success on the duties they were built for.

Tom

 

'Success' has to be judged on parameters and they certainly weren't successful on doing the job they were intended for, even if it was due to changing circumstances. BR failed to find a use for them, even after wholesale transfer to Hull. One wonders whether they were a success in industrial service, as well. A bargain purchase, yes, but most industrial users didn't need or want a loco capable of 40 mph and geared accordingly. It was more a case of make the bargain buy fit the bill rather than the bargain buy fitting the bill. Even the NYMR found that the bargain buys were unsuccessful and they were soon moved on.

 

I know we're off topic (my fault I started it) but Id say Teddy bears are a pretty useful beast, can be used for shunting or branch work, bit more speed than an 08 absolutley ideal for heritage railway work really. You could almost say they're the Small Prarie of the diesel world. Which leads us nicely back to 4588....

 

14's, 08's and many other shunting types were shafted by the fact they were introduced just prior to the years where shunting and short trip working started to rapidly decline, not so much poor loco's as too many chasing too little work, rather like branch line steam loco's when DMU replacements or closure was the order of the day.