Anybody looking for a GWR project ?

One problem that surfaced in Australian use of these locomotives was crankaxle failure. You might find that happening if either No 5 was used on the NYMR or any other relatively taxing line. The crankaxle from JABAS 8 was saved as a spare for No 5 for that very reason.

 

Anyone got any dimensions for this ? Would be fascinated to know how wide and long it is given it wheel arrangement.

 

I assume that you refer to the Mersey Rail 0-6-4T, if so, all of the info you seek, plus much more was provided in post #62 by Houghtonga. Always worth reading the whole thread....

Cheers

alan

 

Here's a few more dimensions :-

Centre of driving axle to centre of leading coupled axle 7' 3"
Centre of driving axle to centre of trailing coupled axle 4' 9"
Journals on driving axle , inside 7" long x 7 3/4" diameter, outside 9" x 7"
Journals on leading & trailing axles , inside 9" x 7" , outside 9" x 7"
Bogie 9" x 5 1/2"
Height from rail to drawbar 3' 5"

Locos were designed to run on coal or coke.

Bob.

 

I've heard today that 'The Major' has been , or is being, sold to somebody in England & that preparations are being made to move it.
Anybody heard anything on the grapevine ?

Bob.

 

I hope it does. I would love to see it at Llangollen! Being close to liverpool and getting many scousers visiting!

 

Very interesting. I hope it is correct.

 

Well, if that loco was one of my historical artefacts, I would be very embarrassed about allowing it to get into the state that it is in.

 

We have similar if not worse in this country on lots of railways and heritage centres, I was poking around one such loco today. The Major was at the end of a very long queue and hasn't really deteriorated much in recent years. That said, my colleague at Thirlmere hasn't said anything about the loco being on the move and we've talked over the matter a lot in recent years.

 

Indeed, this year has seen the scrapping of at least one British mainline steam locomotive... On top of that we still have large numbers of unrestored Barry wrecks out there. If we can guarantee the Aussies that the loco will be looked after better and treated with more respect than in Australia than I have no qualms about the loco being brought over, I am just not ovely convinced that will be the case seeing how the recent batch of Turkish 8Fs and the last Australia loco have fared over here.

 

The Major is probably far less prone to deteriorate in the open air where it is due to the drier atmosphere. If it does come over here I would expect it will need properly conserving before it leaves Australia. If someone was serious about one of these locos then why not take on Cecil Rakes?

 

Enquiries about Cecil Rakes, admittedly over 10 years ago, were given the short statement that the future of the loco was based in Liverpool and funded only through the museum.

 

and still hidden away from the general public!!!

 

"large numbers" of unrestored Barry wrecks? Really, a hundred ? A thousand? I think you'll find its maybe a couple of dozen (if that) which have not been worked on. All of them from classes otherwise represented.

Do let us try and avoid hyperbole. I'm as upset as anyone that a couple of locos have been lost, but compared to what has been saved we do need to keep a sense of proportion.

 

Using the list of Barry Survivors yet to steam from In the Works, I count 69 locos that have left Barry and have not been restored to working order yet of which circa 29 have had little/no progress since leaving the yard as well as those which are being restored so slowly they are not even keeping the ravages of time at bay. However, as you rightly point out most of the locos cut up and unrestored are already well represented in preservation anyway.

To steer this to the point at hand, the point I was alluding to was that the criticism of the Australians' care for their rare locos seemed a little unfair seeing as we have many unrestored locos and there is a strong chance that anything we would 'liberate' from Down Under waiting in the same queue. If there was anywhere that it would be worth saving locos from it would be South Africa where there is a very real threat that they will be cut up/pillaged unlike the Australian locos basking in the sun.

 

Those of us of a certain age will remember the BTC list of preserved locos which was printed in our ABC locospotters books. John Scholes drew up this list in the 50's and it formed the basis of what became the National collection (IIRC it was reprinted in SR or similar a year or two back). Interestingly it included some locos eg. Duke of Gloucester and Ben Alder which were subsequently sold for scrap. I no longer have any ABC's to check but I'm pretty sure that 'Cecil Raikes' was also on that list and I have a photo of it in store at Derby in the late 50's. However, by the mid 60's Cecil seemed to 'belong' to Liverpool Museum and was "in store" at the City Engineers depot in Kirkby. Does anyone know when, and under what circumstances, ownership passed from the BTC? Ray.

 

Buonasera Adrian,

Lungo tempo senza parlare. Hope that you are well. I'm sure that I read something recently about "Cecil Raikes" being available if the right proposal was made for it's restoration, It may well have been on this forum. I will make inquiries and find out the facts. This is one loco that really does deserve a better fate.

All the best

Alan

 

Found the ref to "Cecil Raikes" here on this page, post 34 :

http://railways.national-preservation.com/threads/historic-locos.301374/page-2#post-882723

The poster, Anthony Coulls, may well be closer to the action than most of us. I would suggest that any SERIOUS enquiry about "Cecil Raikes" may best be channeled through his office.

Cheers

Alan

 

Liverpool Museum (or Museums on Merseyside or whatever their current title) are, or certainly were, very parochial. Cecil Raikes, the 'Baby Grand' and other items were only loaned to Steamport because we were in Merseyside. When we moved to Preston, IIRC, Cecil had to be returned as the RSR was over the border in Lancashire, not withstanding the fact that when Liverpool Museum acquired the loco they were in Lancs! Unless a group with the necessary skills and lots of money sets up within Merseyside I don't see them lending it to anyone for restoration. I'd still be very interested to know how Liverpool Museum gained ownership as I recollect that the NCB donated it to BTC for what became the National Collection. Perhaps Anthony can shed some light on it. Ray.