1014 - County of Glamorgan

And ASLEFs wanting to crew it.....

 

True, we will never know for certain what might have happened. However the Barry 10's prospects were certainly worse than Thornbury Castle's, whose future remains uncertain even now, despite its having been bought by a succession of owners who made a start on restoring it.

 

On a wider but relevant point, how well were the Hawksworth Counties regarded during their working lives, especially when used on express passenger work on Castle duties?

 

I find it strange how your view can change so, Were you not very dismissive about R1 rebuilds not so long ago?

 

Ahhhh the good old Rememberance Line. A fleet of gas producing R1 tanks being built in a shed made from redundant overhead masts with a roof lashed on. All this on a mile long branch on a 1:37 ruling gradient in a suburban area with a high incidence of vandalism. A scheme cynically marketed as a war memorial which was designed to bankroll a personal trainset. I don't think my cynical comments on here killed it as a scheme, rather it was based on cloud cuckoo land. I think Asbestos Alf and his grandiose ideas in Luton was more realistic....

As it happens the Folkestone Harbour Arm regeneration has been fabulously successful and has created a great Leisure space and focal point for the town.

 

I believe that there were problems with the boiler being short of steam generation at times. They would also have been rougher riding than a Castle, particularly with their higher boiler pressure. I remember a footplate ride from Didcot to Swindon on 6998 in 1985; everything on the backhead was a blurr! I was told afterwards that this was due to worn rear axleboxes. By comparison, a Castle ran like a sewing machine. There may well have been wear factors that, at least, accounted for some of this.

 

Hawksworth Castle boiler.
Total evaporation 1799.5sq.ft.
Firebox 163.5 sq,ft
Superheater 295 sq.ft
Fire grate 29.36 sq.ft.
Hawksworth County
Total evap 1545 sq.ft
Firebox 169 sq.ft
S/H 254 sq.ft
Firegrate 28.84 sq.ft
( Collet Castles originally had total evap 1858 sq.ft, S/H 262 sq.ft)
The Counties initially operated at 280psi but this was later reduced ( as per the Bulleid Pacifics)
on the grounds of lower maintenance costs, the Castle at 225psi.
The boiler dimensions, even allowing for the higher saturation temperature with the County,
suggest the Castle had a 10% advantage over the County and after the Cook/Ell mods of
the mid 1950s more so. The higher saturation temp offset by the Castle higher S/H level.
The Counties were designed as a mixed traffic loco, under war time conditions ( as per the Bulleid
Pacifics, although without the concomitant reduction in coupled wheel diameter )
The Counties certainly would not have ridden as well as a four cylinder Castle, ( the GWR
predilection for long stroke cylinders did not help ) particularly at speed . They frequently
post WWII worked some very heavy trains competently. Whilst they received praise when
working north of Wolverhampton, they on occasion hauled heavy expresses on the more level
Paddington Swindon route.
In December 1961 No.1029 replaced a failed Castle at Swindon with a 13 coach 480 tons gross
train and passed Ealing Broadway in 28 minutes 48 seconds from the Reading start with
a maximum of 78mph through Slough. A performance that at the time would have
been considered very creditable with a Castle.

The Counties were arguably the final flowering of the Swindon 2 cylinder 4-6-0 tradition.

Michael Rowe

 

At last, a whole post ( edited here ) with facts instead of prejudice. Thank you Michael.

 

A helpful post, thank you, but pedant mode on for that one bit: the Counties had almost the same size driving wheels as the Bulleid Pacifics.

 

always strikes me as odd the wheel size of 6ft 3. Not a GW 'Standard' size ... was it a case of wanting to go as large as possible but not able to get away with 'king' size wheels and still call it 'mixed traffic ... ?

 

The reason(s) why Hawksworth introduced the Counties at all are not entirely clear. Wikipedia suggests that they were a testbed for features for a possible Pacific. I have seen it suggested somewhere (on what authority, I know not) that they were an attempt to approach somewhere near Castle specs with two cylinders, and indeed the original 280 psi and the smaller wheels gave them a nominal TE a bit higher than the Castles'. Collett had already departed from Churchward's standard wheel sizes for all the larger classes, with 6'6" for the Kings, apparently for no better reason than to reach the magic 40000 nominal TE, and 6'0" for the Halls, presumably to allow them to go just a tad faster than Churchward's planned mixed-traffic 4-6-0s (a tweaked version of which eventually appeared as the Granges). With Collett's precedent set, presumably Hawksworth felt he had a free hand on driving wheel size.

 

The fact that B.R. continued to build Modified Halls and Castles in preference to building any more Counties surely says it all.
Ray.

 

There will be plenty of work for the County, its a useful class 5/6 and a lot of railways are short of motive power.

2999 visiting the MHR at short notice shows this.

 

Surely B.R. were only allowing existing orders to complete. You would not (normally, though there are several examples) order anymore of a design still in the Shaking down process until a stage had been reached where the revised spec. was known. at which point swopping out 20 Noddified halls for Counties is easily done... especially at Swindon.

 

My guess is that Counties were cheaper and easier to build than Castles and that counted for a lot in wartime. Experience of high boiler maintenance costs and Hawksworths own modifications to Castles tipped the balance the other way. He certainly didn't let tradìtion get in the way of several innovations to GWR practice , new frames, bogies, higher superheating and double chimneys etc.

 

In Kenneth J Cook's book "Swindon Steam" he makes a number of comments about the Counties to which he refers as an " express locomotive". He considers that Hawksworth was influenced by Stanier and Bulleid hence the smaller wheels and the higher pressure of 280 later reduced to 250. Also he observes that " the first fancy of a CME has been to design a new express locomotive and this was the first departure from the standard passenger engines outlined by Churchward". He notes that they did good work between Plymouth and Penzance but was "dubious as to whether sufficient was gained in the departure from standards " and there was "considerable fore-and-aft vibration under some working conditions".

One of my acquaintances used to fire this class over the Plymouth to Penzance route so I will have to ask what he thought of the Counties. Perhaps the reason for not building more was that they ran out of names!

On a kindred note, Cook also mentions elsewhere in his book that the Running Superintendent wanted more of the 47xx class but Collett convinced them that another batch of Castles had a wider use as these could work the express freight as well as the passenger services.

 

Well, whatever the case, it will be nice to see some different engines out and about for once, I am looking forward to seeing the County, Night Owl, Grange and what other projects Didcot have yo there sleeves.

Besides, if you think about it, the more big engines have, the less space for them, the more other railways can enjoy (or hate) their presence.

 

The GWS is primarily a museum, not a train set. I would expect them to rotate the collection so that each has a period in steam, then a period as a static exhibit. So I would expect that once the boiler cert expires the Saint will be be laid aside as a static exhibit for a good few years while other locomotives are next in the overhaul queue.