Current and Proposed New-Builds

Its funny how we have 150 pages of excited speculation about things that mostly will never see the light of day, but a proposal - subject too ratification - from a group that has a solid track record of actually building stuff and which is chosen with the realistic possibility of being completed in a reasonable time is just a bit "meh - poor choice" ...

Tom

 

I'm pretty sure its allowed to be a tad disappointed they are not building a K while wishing them every success in building an E!

 

Indeed it is. I don't see much evidence of it on here though!

Keith

 

Fret no more as a group has formed to build a new example. I've only seen this posted on one Scottish railway group over on Facebook. I have no stake in the project but might if it proves promising. Highland Railway Society has thrown their weight behind it. https://www.benaldernewbuild.com/

 

Good Luck to them with this project, it sounds very interesting, and I wish them every success.

Richard.

 

Good luck to both Ben Alder and the E class I say!

 

Both eminently 'do-able' projects ..... both classes I hope I live to see hauling trains. Here's to 'sensibly sized chufferitis'!

 

I've always had a particular fondness for 4-4-0's. Might be attributable to “Edward the blue engine”, but there's a certain aesthetic, particularly with the larger wheeled types, that just gives them a tendency to look naturally “right”. So, according to my lights, there's 15 4-4-0's preserved:

City of Truro -stuffed and mounted
Earl of Berkeley -out of use, awaiting overhaul

T3 563 -stuffed and mounted
T9 30120 -out of use, awaiting overhaul
737 SECR D class -stuffed and mounted
925 Cheltenham -in service
926 Repton -in service
927 Stowe -out of use, awaiting overhaul

MR 1000 -stuffed and mounted

NER 1621 - stuffed and mounted
Gordon Highlander - stuffed and mounted
Glen Douglas - stuffed and mounted
Butler Henderson - stuffed and mounted
246 Morayshire- out of use, under overhaul

Met No1– stuffed and mounted.

So, we are likely to only ever see Earl of Berkeley, the 3 schools, (a very modern and atypical design), the T9 and 246 Morayshire (another modern design) in steam. The other nine preserved examples, the lovely Victorian/Edwardian designs that I think so beautiful, will likely not turn a wheel in my lifetime. Most are in the stewardship of an organisation that seems to believe that steam locomotives should not be steamed, certainly not if they are old and pretty. The notion that steam locomotives, like the hundred year old broom, can be renewed and repaired almost perpetually seems anathema to the custodians of these machines.

Suddenly, it seems, there's the GCR new build , Prince George, SECR E class and a Ben Alder replica in the offing -have I missed any?

What a fantastic turnaround, who could have forseen it ten years ago?

 

The T3 has been destuffed and demounted at Flour Mill workshops ready for overhaul!

 

Well if you like 4-4-0s we have a few over here...
GNR(I) No85 V class Compound 4-4-0 operational
GNR(I) No131 Q class 4-4-0 operational
GNR(I) No171 S class 4-4-0 under overhaul
LMS (NCC) No74 Dunluce Castle 4-4-0 static in UFTM

Keith

 

T3 563 can be moved to the undergoing overhaul category, which is also good news.

I would really like all the "stuffed and mounted" category to be so transferred!

 

I did not know this. That'll be one to see. Anny idea when it last ran?

 

1948

Tom

 

Very true, and a complete oversight. When I visited the Emerald Isle I didn't have the leisure to visit any of the museums. I rather like the American ones too....but that is another list entirely.

 

... and that's just the 5'-3" gauge ones ....

 

To me, these locos at the NRM which haven't turned a wheel in years, and seem unlikely to again, might as well be with Lew in the Brazilian jungle, as another poster has said, or if you are a Greater Manchester bus enthusiast, Mancunian 2139,exported to Russia and current whereabouts unknown!

What I would like, and I think would make the national collection more interesting, would be a kind of rolling restoration programme, when one is a runner, it is loaned out to an appropriate railway, like Gladstone and the D to the Bluebell, the NER one to the Moors etc, when stopped for overhaul, they can go static for a bit while in the overhaul queue.

This stuff about "originality and conservation" I just don't get at all. A loco is a serious piece of heavy duty industrial machinery not a pretty ornament, the real railway used to bin worn parts and replace them all the time, so it would be more in keeping with railway history

 

In what way are they stuffed?
In what way are they mounted?

 

Like a dead animal which has been stuffed by a taxidermist. I prefer to see living animals

 

The big difference being that stuffed animals are stuffed for good! There are only a very small handful of locomotives this applies to.

 

Take the T3. Hadn't done anything for years, pretty much ignored and not that many people were overly arsed about it.

Take it out of that category, start stripping it down and making it a runner again, and it's in the mainstream, people are interested in it and wanting to see it run.