V4 2-6-2 No. 3403

On that basis then building another Gresley A1, Calling it ' The Flying Scotsman' and having it as a stand in should be a no brainer - could easily have been funded by the money spent on the last restoration.
Each locomotive class has its own appeal, in terms of usefulness then a Clan is up there with a Patriot ( not as good as a Royal scot, or even a Jubilee) or a B17 ( not a patch on a V2, or who knows a V4)
The Clan is fast approaching the stage where it will be cheaper to complete it than some outstanding restoration projects and a lot more practical/economical to keep running for decades after, but some restorations i think have a stronger pull on the heart/purse strings than new builds.

 

It's good to review from time to time to have an overview of the prospects for completion of the (still numerous) new build projects, but is this V4 thread the right place?
Edit: I evidently changed my mind about how to phrase that and left the syntax in a mess.

 

According to the website the clan has raised just over 750k so far, and needs to raise 4 million in total. If thats the case then im not sure it is cheaper to complete than some restoration projects. Never mind that it currently raises (last couple of years on charity commission) less than 100k per year, meaning that it will take at least 32 years to raise the missing money for completion (unless being at ctl seal reduces the build cost?) and that's also not taking into account of prices going up, and members continuing to donate for the next 32 years. The brutal numbers dont add up from where im standing for most newbuilds.

If i was the A1 trust i would definitely be shelving the idea of the V4, which is a shame as its another loco i would love to see, unless someone comes up with a massive amount of money to build it.

 

That puts a bit of realism into it. I assume that the Doncaster P2 lot will now throw in the towel, the last I heard it would take 4,000 years to complete!

 

I wonder if they will though?

Im convinced that for some people, the activity of a project is more important than the outcome of the project. In other words, completion is secondary to having a focus for doing - something.

Nothing majorly wrong with that except if you are appealing for other people’s money to carry out your pet project, and aren’t transparent about what the likely prospects are. But I suspect it is easy to say - probably to the point of actually coming to believe it yourself - that “when we deliver [x] component, there will suddenly be an upsurge in credibility and with it donations”. Look at how many projects have rushed in to building a smokebox first …

Tom

 

You can always ask a mod to move the posts to an existing thread or start a new one if a suitable one doesn't exist.

 

Agreed - I'm assuming the V4 is/was being built with the Highland Lines in mind, doing the work that 61994 used to do. Having a number of large components to hand from a previous attempt helped, of course.

I think we can safely forget the V3 and K3.

 

If it's a tender loco, it will usually be smokebox first. so quite logical.

With apologies to all on Nat Pres.....

 

Joking aside, logically you start with the frames but a smokebox and a Procast numberplate is the ‘face’ of the engine that potential donors will relate to.

 

And I would wait 4000 years
And I would wait 4000 more
To be the P2 with a pointy nose...

The Clan project is making a lot of bits, and has some very chunky bits made and fettled. The comparison against restorations is interesting - clearly we don't have data yet on whether a newbuild is cheaper to overhaul at next interval.

I wouldn't say the Clan are a nailed-on certainty, but I'd fancy their chances if they can have something big to show in the near future.

What will be next to steam? My money is on Betton Grange. My previous dark-horse tip of the G5 now looks about as good as some of my other tips.

 

My bet would be on the Brighton Atlantic

 

Oooh good point, but we won't know until it has been in service for 3 months
Clan website: "we made a thing! We made another thing! One is a chassis, the other a fireman's fly button, but we made things!"
3MT "it's June, we did the following things in June. We finished one of them on 1 July, but we report monthly"
Brighton Atlantic "oh yeah, since our last update, we cast the wheels, installed them, built the tender and moved our shed"
(Ftaod, this is affectionate parody, I wish each well)

 

They had a small stand at the Sandoft Trolley Bus Museum a few weeks back so they're keeping hold of their towel for the time being.

 

Correction: the Atlantic Group wouldn’t be so disorganised as to need to move their shed once they’d built it …

Tom

 

John, you could also argue why did the people that took on and rebuilt 71000 do the same sort of thing? Let’s not forget how crap that was despite being tuned by those that supposedly knew best before some well meaning amateur’s actually had a look at the drawings and corrected the mistakes.

 

One of the faults 71000 didn’t have was being underboilered. One thing I would like to know is who thought the Southern needed even more Pacifics when they had more Light Pacifics than they needed and they were far superior to a Clan

 

A good question. However strong or weak the case may have been in the 1950s for building some wide-firebox Class 6 locos for use somewhere in Britain, it's not obvious why the Southern Region would have needed them – unless perhaps to substitute for Bulleid light Pacifics if some of those were to be re-allocated to other regions.
However I'm not sure that "underboilered" is a fair criticism of the Clans. You fit a smaller boiler to reduce total weight, which could have made sense if there were some routes where a Britannia would have been too heavy; just as Swindon built Manors as a lighter-weight version of a Hall or Grange. For any given size of boiler, is it wrong to provide generous-sized cylinders?

 

You can put a Royal Scot boiler on a Jubilee, does that make all the other Jubilees under-boilered
? Is a wc/bb under boilered because it doesnt have a MN boiler on it ?
If you read the notes of the designer of BR standards the general idea on the new designs was that they were, apart from the Clan, deliberately 'over-boilered' for the work they were intended for... although the product of LMS men the influence of the light pacifics and V2 in that is evident
The Clan has its own thread and New builds have their own thread and this argument can be repeated there i feel.

 

The Clans were not under-boilered. The boiler was designed to suit the loco. It should be remembered that on the Clans the leading, driving and trailing axles were all the same diameter. On the Brits the driving axle was designed with bigger diameters. Horses for courses.

 

The terms over-cylindered/under boilered are not uncommonly used. I've never been entirely clear on how this was reckoned. For example, I've never heard the term applied to the Churchward standard types on the GWR, but it is documented that a 43xx, which has far larger cylinders than a BR std 4 2-6-0, would run short of steam if asked to haul an excessively fast and heavy train. On the other hand I have seen the early big Dean 8 wheelers, the 3001 singles and the Armstrong 4-4-0s, described as over cylindered, and the cylinders on the singles were reduced from 20x24 to 19x24, so presumably it was considered an issue.
If the boiler couldn't supply enough steam for the locomotive's intended duties that would seem to be a design problem, but if the locomotive was used on duties beyond its design capability that would seem to be an operational problem. I find it all very wooly and unclear, and I welcome any clarification.