Bulleid Pacifics - Past or Present

Fair point. Some recent pictures have been posted in the gallery: https://picasaweb.google.com/116839141471298057728/Restoration2011#5647303117049057426

We wanted to announce the Photo Competition to encourage people to get started. There's a volunteer workshop next Thursday/Friday after which we should have some more updates and pics.

 

Well, I asked, and I got!!
Looking very much like a finished article now that the face is on. Cheers!

 

Update: slight change of entry conditions. You can enter five photos from each event or location, e.g. 5 from Swanage, 5 from WSR Gala, 5 from Embsay, etc. (Not restricted to 5 in total.)

 

Looking forward to reviewing progress on 34053 at the AGM.

 

Any updates on progress of 34092 lately?

 

I was up the KWVR a few weeks ago, but forgot to ask about it. I think its safe to say these a bit more work to do yet before it steams again. Last I heard was that they were going to start on the boiler after fabricating the air-smoothed casing support frames, which will presumably minimise the amount of time needed to finish the locomotive once the new ticket starts.

 

Latest on 35005 http://www.watercressline.co.uk/News/Loco/View/674

 

There is some more news on SKP etc on the SLL website: http://www.southern-locomotives.co.uk/News/news.html (Below the Photo Competition section)

Also some more photos of work on the loco: https://picasaweb.google.com/116839141471298057728/Restoration2011#5653804694361748018

 

Thanks, Nick.

 

A few of us were having a chuckle at Ropley last week about how Eastleigh has become a sub-shed of Ropley

 

It's good that 35005 will be safely undercover at Eastleigh. I will be out to see 'Can Pac' on her way tommorrow afternoon. It might be some time before we see her again!

 

Does anyone know if 34067 Tangmere managed to escape from Carnforth and make it safely back to Southall today. Hopefully they will have worked some magic
at Carnforth and got her fully fit again. It is great that it would appear they have managed to fix the problem so quickly. It was a very sad site to see her towed off the WSR in reverse by a diesel.

 

Saw a report of it heading south through Milton Keynes around 17:30.

 

Here's three shots I took of 34059 at her claggiest best around the Freshfield Bank area yesterday on the 11am, 1pm & 3pm service trains.
https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/R8ImAEvYaPaCaKYeNyxz5g?feat=directlink
https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/qX7vh_p698jdm7ztCdEixg?feat=directlink
https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/xaQYgZn9XmXgxIuehb_f8g?feat=directlink

Cheers

 

Regret that as of Sunday morning 34059 is now stopped / failed with a cracked thermic syphon.

 

Oh dear that is sad news to hear, let's hope a swift return to steam will be forthcoming.

 

Again? they're not having much luck with Archie

 

Not the rarest of problems with a Bulleid firebox I'm afraid but not normally the most difficult of repairs either.

 

Here is one to set a heated debate..
What about a boiler without the thermic syphons? Would there be such a drop in performance on heritage railways? Is it our cycles of heating/cooling that create thermal stress that cause the issues or did these locos always suffer even in steam days?

 

According to D. W. Winkworth (Bulleid's Pacifics p. 26), BR experimented with a MN boiler without syphons in 1953, but he does not mention how it performed other than by stating that tests were 'inconclusive'. It wasn't taken up, so it must have been fairly detrimental to boiler performance, and indicated that Bulleid got it right. A single-nozzle blastpipe was also fitted to a member of the class during the same year, but this was similarly not taken up, as it could not match the performance of the five-nozzle design as originally fitted to the class. He raises an interesting point that when compared with data from the 1948 trials over the Waterloo-Exeter line, the original MNs ran at an average rate of 3.52 lbs coal per d.b.h.p./hour, making them slightly more fuel-efficient than the rebuilds, which consumed 3.56 lbs coal per d.b.h.p./hour over the same route.