Sir Nigel Gresley - The L.N.E.R.’s First C.M.E.

Not so. His offspring maybe but Gresley is God.

 

The 3 CMEs had a build the best pacific competition.
Robinson's never got off the drawing board; Raven's was excellent; Gresleys was arguably the finest loco ever built.
He still only won it by a whisker

 

well . that's a red herring if ever i saw one .
if the ECML had been electrified the opposite would have been true. the Duchesses were still relatively new when they were withdrawn and capable of excellent performances right up to the day they were taken out of service . was it Montrose that was rostered as "spare" for Royal Train duty 3 weeks before withdrawal?
no ER engine could hold a candle to them--------still can't

 

It's WAR......

 

if the drain cocks were a real issue they would have been fixed and cheaply . more of a problem in preservation for some reason- possibly intermittent use ?
much cheaper than taking the big ends down after 40k miles.
big ends and derived motion were lived with and accommodated . the problem never went away.--and that was very late in the day. only those of us over 70 remember the Gresley Pacifics clanking around KingsX.

 

Well, Gresley's entry in that competition was presumably the original A1. To describe that as arguably the finest locomotive ever built is maybe a little parochial!

 

May I recommend you take notice of the smiley in my post?

 

No more parochial than several other posts extolling the virtue of other designs/CMEs.

 

The big end problem did go away after Cook arrived at Doncaster. As for the clanking, that was due to the steel used in the rods rather than any big end.

 

True
the finest loco ever built lived in France

 

by about 1959 then by the time the overheating issues due to reduced tolerances were sorted . 1922 - 1959 . that's a lot of hot bearings

 

Earlier.

 

steel doesn't clank unless something hits it . a worn bearing for instance.

 

I seem recall Silver Link ran for several days straight out of the box and broke the speed record. Not bad for a new design. I can never understand why it was never preserved...

 

Perhaps you could kindly inform us to at what mileages the inside big-ends on LMS Pacifics and 4-6-0s were taken down for inspection?

 

Billy Butlin wanted to but BR(E) asked too much. BR(LM) on the other hand were happy to flog off their locos cheaper so Billy went that route instead.

 

Wrong. Read the books.

 

80k -- general repairs

 

Link ran for about 10 days on her own before the next A4 turned up. The only issue they had was with the brick arch in the firebox collapsing. It took a few hours for her to cool down enough for somebody to get into the 'box and rebuild it. Apparently Gresley was somewhat shocked when he found out and remarked that one of the ordinary none streamlined locomotive would have done as a stand in........