Edward Thompson: Wartime C.M.E. Discussion

I guess there's always scope for corrections (if any) in future print runs.

 

Very sensible response! Did I recall that your next book will be about Mr Bulleid?

 

I was hoping for Francis Webb!

 

"John Chester Craven: how a robust approach to workshop discipline and strict upbringing of children led to a solid and standardised locomotive fleet that served his employers admirably".

Tom

 

Those that suggest it, do it.

 

I'm with Marc Antony: "I come to bury Cæsar, not praise him".

Tom

 

I have been asked to do a Bulleid book…

…and one on Sir Nigel Gresley, which is a big honour for me. I’ve started work on both books simultaneously.

The latter excites me because I have so much research already applicable that I can use. Gresley fans should have no fear by the way - I have already done a treatment and I think it’s going to reveal how much Gresley was up against it as CME. There’s reasons behind every decision, as it was with Thompson after.

 

I physically printed out the book about five times and edited it along with four or five other editors from nat pres, my publisher, my typesetter and my wife all going through it and there are still likely some things we will have missed. Sometimes they just happen!

I personally look forward to a revised version in years to come when more evidence appears or the arguments change again. Always room for fresh ideas and improvements.

 

Not sure his child rearing was so successful

 

I will look forward to the Bulleid book in particular....another very "Marmite" designer who needs to have his designs considered, in the context of the time, for a fair appraisal.

 

The "Marmite" character has been very clear for a long while, with much consideration of both the good and bad features of Bulleid's work. But, as with Thompson, what Simon can bring to bear is evidence from primary sources of why decisions were made; both Bulleid's own decisions and his masters' decisions about what they would or wouldn't allow him to do.

 

What else would be interesting is how the original Bulleid pacifics are used and serviced in preservation times - so potentially a lot more information to assess the design criteria.

 

Putting the cat amongst the pigeons...

Cost of conversion, P2 to A2/2 configuration (removal of streamlined casing, removal of driving wheel axle and addition of bogie, addition of cylinder and third set of walschaerts): £2400 per engine in 1943.

Cost of conversion, Merchant Navy as built to as rebuilt, doing virtually the same conversion (sans removing a driving wheel axle): £7500 per engine in 1955.

Even allowing for inflation 1943-1955 - this feels like quite an eye opening comparison.

Thoughts?

 

While it won't account for the whole difference, wartime wage and price controls were very much in force when the P2s were rebuilt, so inflation rates in the immediate postwar years would be relevant. Ditto import controls. Then there were considerations surrounding the end of the last wartime rationing regulations, the last of which went in 1954. If memory serves, wasn't 1955 the year of a cetain notable strike?

 

You need some sort of detailed list of exactly what was made new really... for example valve gear is expensive with all the machining. The Bulleids must have had three complete sets, but was a lot of the P2s gear outside gear reused?

On a different topic... I saw reference elsewhere that there are people who suggest the P2s shouldn't have been rebuilt but transferred to more suitable routes. It occurred to me that if there were really more suitable routes than the ones the class was specifically designed for then something must have gone extraordinarily badly with the design process!

 

Good points, though straight away my thoughts went to those ex-LBSC "Terriers" and ex-LSWR 'Ilfracombe Goods', where neither could have fitted their 'second life' roles any better had they been specifically designed with Col.Stephens' lines in mind

 

Must confess that my brain is now busy trying to work out which of the good Colonel's lines needed one or more P2s.

I vote for either the Shropshire and Montgomeryshire, or relaying Snailbeach to 4ft 8.5....

 

1955 prices were, across the economy, 75% higher than 1943 prices. So the starting point, not allowing for sectoral differences, is £2400 to £4300.

 

The P2s had one new set of valve gear per engine for each new centre cylinder and front crank axle setup. The Bulleids had parts of their outside valve gear reused - the P2 rebuilds reused their outside valve gear in its entireity.

Speaking personally - the argument for "transferring them south" is rife with poor logic and lots of apocryphal stories (including the talk of a "rebellion up north at their rebuilding" - which frankly is an invention by writers after the event). Several years before rebuilding the P2s had poor availability and mileages. Their traffic utilisation was abysmal. Nobody outside of the Aberdeen main line wanted them on that basis.

Nearly double.

 

What are you trying to prove?