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1014 County of Glamorgan

Discussion in 'Steam Traction' started by aron33, May 22, 2016.

  1. S.A.C. Martin

    S.A.C. Martin Part of the furniture

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    I quite enjoyed listening to that today!
     
  2. misspentyouth62

    misspentyouth62 Well-Known Member

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    crunching some numbers......
    of the 213 Locomotives that have left Woodhams Yard since September 1968, by my count 149 or 70% of them have now been returned to steam.
    Of those that have not been steamed so far :
    Two are used for museum display : 35029(sectioned) & 4248
    Three have been used for donor parts where frames have not been cut : 2861, 5227 & 7927 (frames used for County Class)
    Three have been used for donor parts where frames have been cut : 3612, 4115 & 48518
    One has reputedly had it's boiler scrapped but frames remain? 42859
    Hall Class 4942 is included and will return to steam in guise of 2999 Saint Class

    That leaves 54 out there that have not yet returned to steam a few of which are imminent such as 6989, 80097, 92134 for example
     
  3. michaelh

    michaelh Part of the furniture

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    4150 not far away too
     
  4. GWR4707

    GWR4707 Nat Pres stalwart

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    Quite an update in latest GWS Echo...
    • Springs, Brake Gear and some motion to be fitted to Chassis.
    • All motion parts should be delivered by end 2019.
    • Subject to funding boiler should be finished by Feb 2020.
    • Tender frames will be completed in 2019 at Didcot, tender tank construction should have been contracted by date of publishing article.
    Suggestion of steaming in 2022.

    I am nowt to do with the project so don't shoot the messenger, if you want to read it all yourselves either join the GWS or splash out £3.50 on the Winter 2019 Echo.
     
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  5. 240P15

    240P15 Well-Known Member

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  6. arthur maunsell

    arthur maunsell Well-Known Member

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    that's not the full story though. Of those restored, how many are now set aside awaiting overhaul or deemed worn out and regarded as museum exhibits only?
     
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  7. mdewell

    mdewell Well-Known Member Friend

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    The Locomotives Database at http://www.heritage-railways.com/locosdb/locos.php
    has records of 1433 steam locomotives, but only 434 are listed as Operational.

    I suspect the figure for operational may be a little high as people tend to announce locos returning to steam, but rarely publicise locos becoming non-operational.
     
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  8. arthur maunsell

    arthur maunsell Well-Known Member

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    that's a useful resource, but I can't see how you can list operational locos.
     
  9. Fireline

    Fireline Well-Known Member

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    Mark has the advantage of us. It's his database!
     
  10. mdewell

    mdewell Well-Known Member Friend

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    I use an Access front end to update the website data. ;):)
     
  11. 240P15

    240P15 Well-Known Member

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    I have read some place that the County class were build to replace the older Castle class, but did this actually happen?
     
  12. MellishR

    MellishR Resident of Nat Pres Friend

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    There was/is a suggestion that the idea was to have a 2-cylinder equivalent of the Castles, but does anyone know for sure why the Counties were built, beyond the fact that they could be built? Certainly the building of the Counties did not cause building of Castles to stop, as that continued till 1950.
     
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  13. Flying Phil

    Flying Phil Part of the furniture

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    News from the GCR is that the County smokebox is getting close to completion with the fitting of the door.
     
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  14. Jimc

    Jimc Part of the furniture

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    20 Counties built 8/1945-4/1946
    10 Castles built 5/46-7-46
    10 Counties built 12/46-4/47
    30 Castles built 5/48-8/50
    ===
    70

    ~26 Saints withdrawn 1945-50
    ~13 Stars withdrawn 1945-50
    1 rebuilt Star withdrawn 50
    total 40 (but many more Saints and Stars went early 50s).
    So basically Saints and Stars were replaced by Counties and Castles, but fewer Counties were built than Saints withdrawn. The picture is complicated by new Halls and by what appears to be a policy of replacing more lower power locomotives with fewer higher powered ones (Castles were considered cheaper to run than Stars for example due to lower maintenance costs).
     
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  15. 240P15

    240P15 Well-Known Member

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    Thank you very much for your information Jimc! :)

    Knut
     
  16. Hermod

    Hermod Member

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    A case of learning by doing maybe:

    After april 47 it is clear that two cylinder locomotives are not good for fast trains .
    They either thrash themselves or track to death.

    Boilers with 280 lbs shall not have copper fireboxes between frameplates.
    The County boiler maintenance costs were more than double of those from Castles.

    Mr Cox kept to 250 lbs but tried two cylinder locomotives again 998 times.
     
  17. marshall5

    marshall5 Well-Known Member

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    And the evidence for this is.........?
    Ray.
     
  18. 30854

    30854 Resident of Nat Pres

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    Maybe the clue lies in the mere 55 Britannias, 10 Clans and 172 class 5s knocked out after production of Big4 designs ended?

    Wot? I woz jus' tryin' to be helpful .... honest guv! ;)
     
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  19. S.A.C. Martin

    S.A.C. Martin Part of the furniture

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    Two cylinder machines make up the majority of steam locomotives in the world - amongst which are many engines that were rated for 75mph+ and did so without any kind of damage to the track.

    Railway infrastructure has largely got better at withstanding "hammer blow", locomotive design largely included "balancing" at front and centre of design to help eliminate this.

    This country physically could not have been without small and medium sized two cylinder locomotives; all of its modern steam fleet in the 50s (with one exception: Duke of Gloucester) were two cylinder and most rated for fast or semi-fast trains.
     
  20. Hermod

    Hermod Member

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    It is just a theory not in contradiction to the building list.
    I guess that Counties were cheaper to build than Castles (but not much).
     

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