Flying Scotsman

No, I'm resigned to that fact! I actually like Tornado for a lot of the reasons you say you like late-period Flying Scotsman, i.e. a loco built out to the limits of the acceptable gauge. I think - and again this is aesthetics - when I think of FS, the adjective that comes to mind is "sleek", but somehow that sleekness seemed to disappear as the loco visually bulked up in later life. Whereas with a Peppercorn A1, I think "purpose", and Tornado is undoubtedly purposeful.

I should state that I am nothing if not consistent: I find a Mark 1 Spitfire infinitely more graceful, on land and in flight, than the rather brutish later marks, puissant though they might be! I'm also aware that Edwardian railway enthusiasts were scandalised by designs such as the Maunsell N or Urie 4-6-0s, which now we would consider very elegant reminders of a byegone age!

Tom

 

After reading a lot of this, it amazes me that 20,000 people turned up at the ELR to see a matt black loco with three different numbers and no name plates. How many complaints were there? Well, the only ones I heard were about the lack of nameplates.

 

It now has an A3 boiler, which is where a good proportion of the overhaul cost went.

 

Actually that was its last trip under British Railways ownership. It disappeared into the works, was given the single chimney and the still BR green corridor tender and had a test run, before being put through the paintshop to emerge as LNER 4472 for her first run under his ownership.

 

Nail-Head...

 

Yes, I realise, thanks.

 

Indeed. It demonstrates that you can do just about anything to Scotsman and the brand is strong enough that people will still turn out. It doesn't mean that you couldn't do better.

 

It hasn't got an A4 boiler now, the NRM went to great expense to refurbish the knackered A3 boiler. I think it's previous A4 type was sold to Jeremy Hosking as a spare for Bittern.

 

Lots of comments on the online news items though. From the GBP who didnt understand why she had 3 different numbers on display. What the things were at the front and where was the Green paint. Replies were given and most said she will be painted green after running in. Not many people stated which Green though, I await to see what is said when she returns in BR Green. Like I said I'm not bothered it's great to see her running again but the old livery comments won't go away just like that i'm afriad.

 

I have little doubt that is exactly what they'll do at some future overhaul. I'll be very happy to pay for it.

 

I have wondered about that myself. The A1s became A3s gradually over the years. Given the amount of frame repair required on the A3s, if Gresley had stayed in office and the war hadn't intervened, I don't think a scenario where early A3s started coming out of Doncaster with A4-pattern frames, cylinders, boilers and steam pipes would be at all far fetched. Effectively a non-streamlined A4, with the structural integrity to take that power.

 

Depends on your point of view, for railways it begins when whatever you have preserved was withdrawn from normal revenue earning service and goes back from that start point. It would be interesting to hear the NRM official view on this.

 

Evidently we're both consistent, because I like the Spitfire Mk IX, again having that sense of greater power without it being exaggerated.

I do like the thought of the scandalised reaction to the N in particular, on a railway that had barely even seen an outside cylinder previously. "As if it wasn't bad enough that young Maunsell has resorted to these disgusting excrescences, his design positively flaunts them."

 

Give or take a few periods under overhaul, I believe Flying Scotsman has been in more or less constant revenue earning service for about 92 years

Tom

 

I think that view is rather limited and limiting now that steam has been preserved only for 47 years. I also think it unlikely this discussion would be quite so passionate if we weren't talking about an NRM owned loco, where the NRM have been extremely focused on authenticity in the past.

 

Note I used the term normal revenue earning service. Give some people a hair and they'll split it

 

They say people prefer locos to be as they remembered them in their youth............

 

In which case I should prefer to see New England B1s and 9Fs in a deplorable state. I don't.

 

So the 53 years she has spent in preservation (so far) count for nothing then. That's 13 more years than she was in front line service.