West Somerset Railway General Discussion

It had failed when I saw it on the GWSR and was limited to light freight movements around Winchcombe - my memory of a platform comment and quick google finding a blog post was that a hot bearing was the culprit on this occasion.

 

Hence straining the civil engineering.

 

Hmmmm ....

Axle load = 19.25 tons




Axle load = 16 tons





Tom

 

Demonstrates the illogicality of some acquisitions and disposals

 

Well, quite, but I was rather making the point that your usual casual formulation of tender engine = bad and tank engine = good might need a bit of refinement!

Tom

 

Is that actually correct? The 439 Class differed a little from the 431 Class.

"
In 1922 Pickersgill introduced the 431 Class with larger cylinders and cast-iron front buffer beam for banking. The idea was, presumably, to move the centre of gravity forwards and put more weight on the driving wheels."

As an active SRPS member and volunteer I hope that things have been thought through properly. 419 is a splendid loco but needs to be looked after.

People up here who have suspicions that 419's southern expedition is part of a frantic attempt to fill the huge funding black hole that arises from trying to maintain a fleet of Mainline Mark Ones are no doubt miles off the mark

 

No, it wasn't Water or Steam on that trip, its motion fell apart at Norden. The crew had to hit pins in and get it into forward gear to limp back to Corfe to get out the way and wait fitters to arrive. Hopefully its better now. It wasn't ready to do the work at the time.

 

And then you get round to the slight oddity of Riddles 'standard 4' moguls allocated to the Southern Region, where due to of the absence of water troughs, BRIB tenders had a higher axle load than the loco!

 

It has had an extensive bottom end overhaul since then. Reports from Battlefield last weekend are all positive.

 

My source says this loco specifically was employed on Banking turns - https://www.srpssteam.com/locomotives/loco-no-419-55189/

We understand this engine is not your everyday locomotive and my original post explains we are ensuring as a railway the engine will be treated with the utmost respect.

As for the latter comment, I don't know where the funds are going within their organisation but I am more than happy to help the SRPS out, they have been nothing but helpful to us

 

The Stanier 8F had 16t axle-load on the engine but 18t axle-load on the tender. Similar situation with the BR 9F.

 

Whilst I understand that a close eye is kept over every little WSR matter on these pages please give Seb and his team a little credit! I have received numerous communications from some of them asking well thought out questions given I have some experience with 419, they are well on top of the job and don't need such scrutiny!

One of the team even took the time to travel to The Battlefield Line on Saturday to meet the loco's representative where I also happened to be the booked driver on 419 for the day.

Whilst the loco did have a few issues back in 2019 it has since had much work carried out and is a well sorted and very capable machine. Since the 2019 visit to the GWSR where a small team of us, including the loco representative, worked flat out to strip both big ends down, re-machine, re-shim, assemble and test within 24 hours I have been lucky enough, as a thank you for the above efforts, to have been invited by the kind folks at Bo'ness to visit and have a go with the engine twice on their steeply graded railway, she's a gem.....

Maybe 2019 can be put to bed now, it's not helpful and is unfair on the good folk who have worked hard on 419 at Bo'ness whilst also being prepared to let her travel south again for all to enjoy, would be all too easy to just keep her at home.

Mike

 

Many thanks @Mike S . Mine was mere curiosity, following the most recent I'd heard. Delighted to hear things were sorted. This is such a beautiful little loco and I wish all involved a most successful visit.

 

You've got it completely wrong. It's oversized bad but sensibly sized good, More important than ever now.

 

It demonstrates that some people on here don’t understand route availability and how it is calculated. Which isn’t just on axle loading - it also takes into account total weight and bending shear on a typical bridge span. The WSR is RA5 and that is based on the equivalent uniform distributed weight not simple axle load. The most extreme example being a 9F (blue on the old and defunct WR system but RA9 on the BR system).

 

Hope it goes well for you Seb.

 

The RA of the WSR is really determined, I understand, by a single bridge on the cheaply-built Watchet to Minehead extension of 1874. But it would be expensive to upgrade. This is consistent with the 'exceptional load' and 'loads examined' work I did with BR where we could often find solutions to moving items like bridge components by circuitous routes to avoid particular structures or, in some instances, propping up weak structures and/or moving over them at very slow speeds.

I have no idea what restrictions have been placed on 9466 but one amelioration might be to restrict the loco to a low speed over the troublesome structure.

Robin

 

She has lots of character. Is there still a sign commemorating driver Willie Bell in the cab ? It was there when I worked on her at Wallace Street and Willie was a well known face, looking after the Bothy. It's great to see such a flagship loco on tour.

 

I am not loco crew so I haven't spent much time on the footplate of 419. I haven't noticed any such sign and I won't have any opportunity to look for a sign for a few months.

 

Was Wallace Street the location in Falkirk next to the football ground which was the early home of the SRPS. If so I worked on Kelton Fell there in the early 70s with a Mr Birnie (?) who died some years ago.