Edward Thompson: Wartime C.M.E. Discussion

What could a B1 do better and cheaper than a K1?

 

Is the book dated (to the day) ? It's looks like the kind of thing that might be presented to the board, so comparing the exact date against board minutes might be useful.

 

Run at speed for a start. The B1 was a good all round mixed traffic loco while the K1 was primarily a freight loco which ran at freight loco speeds, ie below 50 MPH. Apart from on the West Highland, where the line limit was 40 MPH, the K1 saw little passenger use.

Peter

 

I think my reading of the note shown in your photo is that Thompson didn't think he'd need it either, but held the possibility of a design "in reserve" just in case it turned out that one was needed. i.e. they needed to replace a group of elderly 4-4-0s and the B1 wasn't suitable for that group. One possible reason where that might transpire would be turntable length - i.e. it would be easier to replace a handful of old 4-4-0s on some remote branch line in Scotland or East Anglia with a new design of 4-4-0 if using the alternative - 4-6-0s - also required replacing 50ft turntables for 60ft ones at various termini. That sort of consideration might tip the cost / benefit to replacing a 4-4-0 with another 4-4-0 rather than a more capable 4-6-0.

Tom

 

Not wanting to steal Simon's thunder, but there was a date on the front of the album. Unfortunately it is hand written, and I can't completely decode it - 12 ?? 1945, I think 12 Jan 1945 but Simon may disagree as he has it in front of him and I just have the photo I took when it came up for sale.

It is possible - indeed I'd suggest probable - that given the context, that date might represent the date the album was presented to its recipient, rather than the date it was compiled. So I'd suggest that, given the lead time to do the necessary analysis and thinking before then compiling the album, it probably represents Thompson's thinking as of the latter part of 1944, if I have read the date correctly.

Tom

 

If there had been a need to replace elderly 4-4-0s with something shorter than a B1, why not a mogul designed for somewhat higher speeds than a K1; same length and same boiler as the putative D but having better adhesion?

 

Thank You and I dream of rebuilding a worn out Crab with KH in front and one outside long stroke cylinder .
An inside lowpressure cylinder and a balancing rod on the liberated cylinder-free outside.
Steam economy at least as good as a SNCF P 1-4-1 (Worlds best according to Cox)
Continental rule /common sense was that two- outside cylinder locomotives was not run more than 5 revolutions per second and three and fourcylinder up to 6 rps.
If we use 5 feet drivers we can then do the job of a 6 feet B1 for less coal and capital.
Just a dream.

 

I need to go and check it when I am done with work but my thoughts concur with yours Tom, currently.

It certainly has to be before the final version of the A1/1 design which came out in January 1945 for the prototype locomotive, Great Northern, to then emerge in September 1945.

 

Pretty tricky business case replacing the D20/30/34/16s with more modern like for like I should think. A lot of 4-4-0s lasted fifty to sixty years and were only displaced by dmus and changes in traffic patterns and closures.

 

What is known about provenance? It would be good - id unlikely - to try and trace what it was prepared for and who had possession in 1945. So often though its impossible to know.

 

All depends on overhaul costs and budgets I imagine. The GWR managed to do a lot of fleet replacement in the 1930s by using the renewal fund and reckoning on much improved mileage between overhauls.

 

I know the provenance and the story behind it, but I have a few bits of admin to do before I can tell the whole story.

I can say that these were prepared for:

• The board
• Friends of Thompson
• A copy for the drawing office
• The LNER's archives
• The LNER's public relations team

They were internal docs (aside from the personal copies), not to be published.

I have confirmed the existence of one other remaining.

 

12 Jan 1945, spot on Tom. I think it is dated for the gifting of the book to Lt Colonel Sir Alan Mount.

(On a side note, I do love how Thompson's cursive handwriting is wonderfully ineligible, much like my own!)

 

https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/person/mp56210/sir-alan-henry-lawrence-mount

 

Oh that's good.
The Chief Inspector of Railways (i.e. Head of the Railways Inspectorate) and ex chairman of the India Pacific Locomotive Committee. This was the Investigation that Stanier and Cox were involved in. The report is available here https://archive.org/details/dli.ministry.18332 BTW.

 

Thanks for the clarification about the K1 2-6-0. That does seem to confirm that Thompson's thinking evolved over time, with the K1 initially absent from his standardisation plan but subsequently added.

Maybe Thompson's prior involvement with the rebuilding of Claud Hamiltons to D16/3 prompted him to initially consider a new medium-sized 4-4-0? Although the outline design seems to be formed around components from the GCR 4-4-0s and J11 0-6-0.

The LNER's stock of 4-4-0s declined from 864 in 1930 to 604 in 1945. That was followed by a sharp fall to 376 in 1950, with many older classes becoming extinct as new B1 4-6-0s arrived in quantity. It seems unsurprising that Thompson dropped the new-build 4-4-0 proposal.

 

Absolutely agree, but we couldn’t have had this discussion if Tom hadn’t realised its provenance and let me know.

For my part, I think this should probably be in a museum, and once it has been professionally scanned in for my records and research, I will see what I can do about putting it into a good home.

I’d love to curate something on Thompson for a museum one day, but I suspect the draw would be small. A pity, I think a dispassionate appraisal of his work shows a huge amount of promise and logical thinking, together with careful decision making.

 

Whilst Gresley is honoured for his Pacific designs and Thompson for his B1 design perhaps a treatise on Arthur Peppercorn would complete the trio and provide the base for a history of LNER locomotive practice between 1923 -1948 in both design and operation.

 

I can't see what I can add to the existing literature at the moment though. I certainly had material for Thompson, and with Gresley, I got a whole host of new information and data sets I could work on.

Tim Hillier-Graves book on Peppercorn is in my considered opinion the level to aim for, and I know I don't have enough, or even anything new, to write on.

That's not to say "never" but I think I would need a new approach to be able to write a full volume on Peppercorn.