LMS 6202, the "turbomotive"

Bringing this one back again. After much searching I have found a short piece of film of 6202 on a Pathe Newsreel. Luckily its the first item so you don't have to see the whole thing but it is well filmed. It does look quite a nice loco indeed. Is that a hint of a rear sander I see as well ?

http://www.britishpathe.com/record.php?id=6318

There is also another good 10 minute film of an earlier 1924 North British steam turbine loco that concentrates on the technology but sadly hardly shows us much of the loco itself which looks to be very square. Can't see much on the web either when inputing its number. As you will see it was far from simple. Anyone ever heard of this one ?

http://www.britishpathe.com/record.php?id=73085

 

As the caption says "Reid-Macleod Geared Steam Turbine Condensing Locomotive made in Glasgow, Scotland by the North British Locomotive Co. Ltd" http://www.lner.info/locos/Experimental/ReidMacLeod.shtml

 

there's a bit about the Reid-Macleod loco on the LNER website: http://www.lner.info/locos/Experimental/ReidMacLeod.shtml andalso here: http://www.dself.dsl.pipex.com/museum/LOCOLOCO/reidmac/reidmac.htm It and the earlier Reid-Ramsey loco from which it was rebuilt were experimental steam turbine locos. See http://www.dself.dsl.pipex.com/museum/locoloco/reidrams/reidrams.htm Over the years there have been quite a few experimental locos of various designs. The Kitson-Still loco was an interesting diesel/steam experiment. http://www.dself.dsl.pipex.com/MUSEUM/LOCOLOCO/kitson/kitsonst.htm I think that the last experimental loco built for the UK was the English Electric gas turbine GT3. It's such a shame that it didn't survive.

 

Its interesting that with some of these they were very close to the bogie layout of a modern locomotive, so they were heading in the right direction but probably never realised it. I guess thats often the case where you try to make too many steps forward in one go, as if it fails human nature might make you think the whole thing was a bad idea rather than just bits of it.

 

Thanks ever so much for the film of 6202, Pesmo. A picture says a thousand words, I think, and at 24 frames a second, that's a lot of words.
I'd like to contribute this link to a film of the preserved Swedish steam turbine loco. I find it interesting for the soundtrack, which gives an inkling of what people on 1930s LMS mainline stations must have heard whooshing through. One thing's certain, English would be poorer by one verb if turbos had won out, namely "to chuff" (and to "bark" would have been strictly for dogs).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZsrzUjcHeAs

A German website says that steam-hauled freights on the TGOJ line used to weigh up to 1700 tons, but it makes no mention of single- or double-heading, only that the turbos were "sehr erfolgreich", running for 23 years until the line was electrified.