Current and Proposed New-Builds

There's some more info here: http://www.glias.org.uk/news/292news.html#D

There's a couple of oddities in there: on the one hand saying it was used with wood firing, the other saying it did;t look like it had had a fire in it during its time in industry? I'm not quite sure how I reconcile those two statements - one obviously possibility twas that it was purchased but then never used? Is another possibility that in effect it served as a reservoir, plumbed in to another boiler used as a steam raiser? That might make sense if you had a use case with occasional periods of high demand interspersed with periods of low demand for steam?

See above. Worth noting I guess that without the normal draft of an exhaust system, any boiler in industrial use will look large relative to the hourly production of steam required, i..e they won't normally be operating at anything close to the rate they would have done when attached to a locomotive.

Tom

 

Thanks for answering my query on the issue of main-line running. I had wondered whether it was an ambition when the project began 20 years ago, when the additional safety requirements for main-line operation were less onerous than today.

I find Atlantics as a group among the most attractive of steam locos, and wish some more types had been preserved. If one of the GCR Atlantics (LNER C4) had survived, it would now be able to operate on its old territory around Loughborough, where the relatively flat line allows even a 4-coupled machine to haul a good number of coaches.

 

I am wondering if the time has come to cease new builds.

Yes, really.

 

If a group have the desire and ability to raise the fund and build/recreate a locomotive why shouldn't they?
The only 'against' I can think of is competing against other such projects for donors, but frankly I doubt that would make a significant difference to any of them. People will fund what they want to see running and I suspect most are unlikely to switch funds if their preferred project fails to progress to completion.

 

How would you achieve such a diktat?
If 100 people get together and decide to build a class Z9 from the Wibble and Froth Railway, who are we to say 'no you can't do that'?

 

I’m sure you’ll have been delighted then to see the photos on Facebook recently of the new build Crampton’s boiler beginning to take shape …

Tom

 

I'm more thinking about the skill sets to maintain this stuff disappearing, and then what are we left with?

There's plenty enough sat around the country in dire need of restoration without building WIBNIs. The phrase "linear scrapyards" comes to mind. Just because something hasn't survived into preservation isn't really a good enough reason to build something and there's usually plenty of photographs for reference.

 

As I will have nothing to do with anything that the dead-eyed Trump-worshipper Zuckerberg is involved with, I shall remain in blissful ignorance.

 

Belpaire or original round-topped boiler...?
And in the earlier "Distressed Haddock" livery or the later "Improved Peruvian Vermillion"?

 

I'd look at it the other way. In spite of a lot of mistakes, things have been built, skills have been developed, and even if it only increases the pool a little bit, it does increase the pool.
If something's not been restored until now, is it really a goer (and/or does it involve almost as much work as a newbuild)?

 

Water tube boiler with camping gas firing.
Livery is to be 'Flambéed Cloud White' with duck egg blue lining.

 

I hope you are not suggesting stopping work on existing projects that are making steady (even if slow) progress. Maybe some will still fall by the wayside, but most seem likely to be completed eventually.

Some new builds that were proposed never got off the ground and some that were started have ground to a halt already and can probably be considered dead.

If you mean that nobody should be starting new projects, that might be sound advice, but people may continue to make proposals, not all of them in jest.

 

Correct. I'd love to see all the ongoing new-builds reach completion such as the F5, the 'Clan' and of course, the P2.

But it strikes me as something that has had its day and as I have said before, there's still a lot of unrestored original items out there crying out for rescue.

 

The two new builds that seem to have issues, do have one thing in common, and its nothing to do with them being new builds, Patriot, and the A1/ P2, and its a lack of ensuring contractors are doing the work they have been contracted to do correctly its about failing management, rather than anything, its about people who clearly have lost touch with what they are meant to be doing, and it's not just new builds, Flying Scotsman, Royal Scot, both botched restorations that later needed to be placed in the hands of competent people, who did understand the job.

 

I was not aware of a new build Crampton until now. Pretty interesting.

 

https://register-of-charities.chari...h/-/charity-details/5062664/financial-history
Clearly needs a little more finance.

 

And more publicity too.

 

They are cutting major bits of metal, so I suspect the current year accounts will look very different. They also spent a large amount (£50k comes to mind) on a design study some years ago.

I don’t know for certain, but my working assumption is they have one or more major benefactors who are providing funds as required, and therefore aren’t chasing small amounts from large numbers as a more traditional project might. That also probably explains the comparatively low-key publicity; they have little need for it. Some years ago there was a website, vestiges of which still remains on the Waybsck machine, but that is gone, and they have no Facebook presence as far as I can see - the boiler photos were put up by the contractor building the loco.

Tom

 

So how is the Crampton still being built, when there is no publicity to help promote the project to the general public?

 

I refer you to the post of mine that you literally quoted!

At least that’s my working assumption. They aren’t widely promoting the project to the public because neither the funding nor the construction is reliant on the public.

Tom