Brighton Atlantic: 32424 Beachy Head

Ahh yes a School, I wonder if Stowe will be another 4 coupled loco that with '7 or 8 Mk1s, heavily loaded, greasy rails will just sit at the bottom of the bank spinning its wheels until a six-coupled loco comes to its rescue?' Hmmm, I know what my money's on!

 

No 251 was withdrawn/preserved by the LNER in the period between the end of the Second World War in 1945 and Nationalisation on the 1st of January 1948. So that makes it's preservation before British Railways was formed. I've Ossy [O.S.] Nock' book about British Atlantics, in which [and how true it is I don't know] he states, that the current 251 has little of the original engine in it. As the LNER had decided to preserve 251 they used a selection of spares floating round in the spares pool. Over her career 251 had, had her frames changed and fitted with piston rather than slide valves cylinders as well as a superheated boiler. So they used a spare set of frames and slide valve cylinders , as for the boiler they basically just removed the superheater header/elements and re positioned the chimney and blast pipe. When Alan Pegler had her restored to running order in the fifties for the Doncaster work Centenary, they found her to be a poor steamer, but when they fitted a set of "dummy" superheater elements she steamed like there was no tomorrow by all accounts.

 

They didn't in service...

Why not ask the NYMR about theirs?

 

You need to see Brighton Baltics earlier post to appreciate Im being ironic hence the quotation marks.

 

Just like Repton does on the rather more challenging NYMR?

 

I think people are missing a degree of tongue / cheek interface in @Matt37401’s parody.

Tom

 

As I’ve posted before in another thread NRM had an information sheet (I was going to post a link but it no longer works) which gave some detail of ‘251’s assembly for preservation from available components in 1947; and the poor steaming on a trial trip which led to fitting of dummy superheater headers, to restore some sort of draughting, for the loco’s one and only railtour in 1953.

It also said the Doncaster philosophy was the identity of a loco is the number on the cabside.

 

The clue is in your post there! 'The more challenging NYMR' I can't speak for the Bluebell but they obviously know what's going to work for them, I just think that another posters comments do a great disservice to a group of people who have sat down and tried to right a wrong from many years ago, more power to them I say!

 

I thought @61624 was implying Repton does fine on the NYMR therefore BH should be good on the Bluebell.

 

Cheltenham manages ok on the Mid hants 1 in 60 banks, so I would imagine any other 4-4-0 will if its in good mechanical condition cope ok anywhere, I would say its more to do with the skill of the driver, at dealing with a less than perfect condition railhead , any engine will given a poor railhead slip to a standstill if it cant get grip .

 

I was! Bear in mind that there are lot of sharp curves on the NYMR, which increase the drag of the train.

That's all true. As the NYMR found out with Repton, wheel profiles are important too.

 

That's exactly what I mean!

 

Why is it that a thread about building a new steam locomotive regularly gets derailed with asinine questions about suitability of traction for the line its being built on? It's not the first time this has happened and it's not from the usual suspects this time!

Where were all of these critics over the past 60 years of the Bluebell Railway? Why are they only coming out of the woodwork in this thread specifically? Anyone would think there was a grudge against building a new Brighton Atlantic!

 

Agree with the previous post. I think its a great achievement and a super loco, which I want to go and see in action when its running

 

I often seem to learn a lot from the replies to supposedly 'stupid' questions so I have no objection so long as people are polite. Maybe I'll ask a few.

 

Not from here there isn't Simon! The British tendency to knock anyone or anything attempting to actually do something has often been remarked upon ... though as many of these remarks aren't ever made in English ........

Count me among those continually impressed by newbuild projects, coz I remember when the neccessary skills were 'lost' ... and it wasn't all that long ago.

In the case of "Beachy Head", this sometime extinct class is about as suitable for a preserved line in Sussex as it's possible to get without a heavy lift time machine. The only real source of regret is going to be the lack of Marsh/Panter era mainline stock to hang off 32424's bufferbeams, but Hey! ..... the Maunsell and Bulleid stock is appropriate to the loco with it's composite SR loading gauge and most of these locos lasted well into the MKI era. That aside, the loco's eventual launch will be one hell of a party ... even if there aren't any 'balloons'!

...... and although seeing the loco at the head of a Newhaven bound charter at Victoria would be lovely, it's scarcely essential. So what if it never sets foot onto the mainline? I don't recall that being one of the objectives in the first place.

 

Miff, there is a clear difference between someone not familiar with a subject asking a question, and the outright questioning of a line's handling of its rolling stock, its driving ability, its engineering and its volunteers. Not quite the same thing at all.

I have seen countless posts undermining both this project and the Bluebell Railway in this thread and it's really starting to grate.

 

Regarding the adhesion of the Atlantic, I would tend to assume (in the absence of any extant operational experience of Atlantics in preservation) that the 4-4-2 will have substantially poorer adhesion than a comparably powerful 4-4-0 in much the same way that an A3 or Bulleid has much poorer adhesion than a GWR 'Castle'...

Why was the second Atlantic boiler cut up? I saw the two boilers sitting in the yard at SP on several occasions, but one of 'em disappeared after a couple of years...

 

And what does assume do?

 

I've noticed. Be more like a duck, that's my advice, and allow it to flow over. I doubt either the Bluebell or the occupants of Atlantic House are particularly bothered by on-line criticism of this sort. All they have to do is take as much time as they need to finish the project when they're good and ready - and then prove the doubters wrong.