Current and Proposed New-Builds

For what seems to be a works photo you'd think that they might have posed it on a rather more convincing piece of track. I'm sure that those with views on Brexit might be able to think of an analogy or two...

Steve B

 

Nothing I'd consider posting where children might see it!

 

Of course, we would have to get it built by the Germans, but it would never be finished as we'd be unable to specify what we actually want.

 

the only difference between that and Brexit is that the loco would actually work!

 

If that is the Brexit loco, how about naming one end Turbocapitalism and one end Protectionism and having them both pull towards the chimneys

 

How presumptuous!

(Remind me not to post in "The Queen" thread!)

 

Must be why they call his position "Heir Presumptive" (queue drum roll and tiddy-boom).

 

Maybe NBR number 224 is a better Brexit metaphor?

 

Frankly, I think folks could keep their Brexit humour to themselves - preserved railways have enough politics as it is...

 

Not sure if 10 years is left in my old carcass May not get to see it.

 

I can think of one person in particular who may be thinking the same way..........................

 

I really wish a group could be formed at the Strathspey railway to undo this injustice:

 

Goodness me, yes. That fate really was appalling.

 

Regrettable indeed but understandable.

It was the nearest thing then surviving to the major landmark design that Dugald Drummonds Abbotsford of 1876 was.
Which developed gave running as remarkable as it was widespread particularly on the Caledonian and the LSWR with
major public achievements in the London to Scotland railway races. The inside cylinder 4-4-0 simply became the standard
British express engine.

But Ben Alder had been rebuilt with a standard Caledonian Railway boiler and cylinder block and when the selection for
preservation was made - which was quite a large number of locomotives - it wasn't original and it obviously looked so.
One wonders if it might have survived if it had kept the original Highland Railway funnel and the wing plates
that widened the front view at the bottom of the smokebox out over the running plates, echoing the width
of the buffer beam.

The regret is that had it been somehow kept and was running now like City of Truro - which with a superheater and
quite different cylinders is not in original state as it was on the Ocean Mail but does not look obviously different -
it would simply be a great success. And if it wasn't running it would not be a huge engine to keep in the dry.

Tantalising: so near but not quite. Very possibly it could not quite be squeezed into Clapham, it was kept for a bit
but there was no initiative for it to go somewhere else. Like the last Midland Great Western locomotive in Ireland.

 

This is a very fair resume. Possibly it would have been of some use to the Strathspey line which was not then envisaged.

Just one point. Drummond did not originate the inside cylinder 4-4-0. If the bogie, as fitted to his passenger locomotives, is not taken into account, many Drummond features originated with Stroudley. A number of these features, such as feed water heating, re-occurred, at various times during the younger man's career.

PH

 

Thinking about it, the Adams bogie is a significant enough development to feature on the "10 locos" thread.

Still a damned shame about "Ben Alder" though. Those were dark days indeed.

 

Eric Langridge, who should have known a thing or two about it, thought that the standout feature of the (LSWR at least) Drummond classes was the standard inside cylinder block with double slide valves and wrap-around exhaust passages. Used with bore variations on pretty much everything from the M7 upwards, except the more successful 4-6-0s (this is extremely relative) and the D15s, which had clearly outgrown it. It later worked perfectly well with superheated steam on a host of classes, with free enough steam passages and valve events to give the T9s their Greyhound name.

 

Drummond designs were extremely Stroudleian, Drummond took what was sound about Stroudley and put it on a wheel arrangement better suited to future needs. See here:
http://www.national-preservation.com/index.php?posts/2035580
Early Drummond (and even most of later Drummond) was fundamentally sound. Dugald gets a bad rap because a) he could be erratic, especially later, b) he wouldn't let his hobby-horses go, even if they didn't work, and c) he followed Adams, who was superlative (the greatest underrated LOC superintendent of them all). Ditto pretty much all the above for Peter, but substitute Manson for Adams.

 

I get the impression from the literature that the Drummonds were not exactly easy people to work for. I seem to recall Peter being described as 'hated'. Perhaps the perception of their personalities has somewhat clouded the assessment of their engineering abilities.

Maybe there needs to be a Drummond re-appraisal and new build society - a Ben and the Bug

 

I'm surprised to hear Peter called 'hated': he was apparently much milder than Dugald. He was loathed at first on the GSWR for introducing big heavy locos which didn't steam so well and had feed water pumps and the driver on the wrong side... But mainly, I think, for not being Manson. By the end of his (fairy short) time there before his death he produced some good locos.
On the Highland his locos were all pretty good, although (Castle aside) quite different from Jones's, despite both being heavily influenced by Stroudley.