Drift from the 6201 thread

Get Clan Line in decent nick!! It’s probably the best looked after engine on the network. Over 500 tons up Gomersall Bank from a standing start at Shalford or over Honiton is as good as the northern hills. Unfortunately as 28 is a DBC engine a swap won’t happen and it also won’t get its outings on the Torbays this year but hopefully BIL will.

Seriously Mr Bulleid designed an excellent boiler and I remember reading in Bert Hooker’s book about the time that no 17 first tackled Shap on the locomotive exchanges in 1948 ( Bert was fireman). The inspector advised the driver to take a banker at Tebay but the decision was his. As the were speeding down through Penrith Alec Swain, the driver, turned to him and said, ‘where’s this Shap place you’ve all been on about?’

 

Didn't the LMR want to take on the Merchant Navies in the mid/late 1960's for their top link motive power? As we are digressing though!

 

I believe there was some thought to transferring Bulleids to the LM to replace Duchesses but I think that was after they had been made redundant by Kent Coast electrification around 1960.

 

Why on earth would they have wanted to do that? The Princess Coronations were on top of their job until they were withdrawn. Bullieds might have had a bigger water capacity, but without scoops, they couldn't have covered quite a few diagrams?

 

Aye, cascade the old worn out stuff to the carrot crunchers oop north. Nowt changes, it's still happening.
Well we've got our own decent stable now thank you very much........a few Jubilees, a MN, a BIG red machine, Flying Scotsman (yes, Mr Riley is in charge), a very nice 8F, Black 5's ?? oh we've got them, and various others, we're managing quite well thank you......................

If you want to BORROW any of 'em...................show us the colour of your money.

 

What do you mean 'we've' ???????? All the loco's in your list are currently based in Lancashire, so keep your Yorkie mits off!

 

John, do shut up, we've got to join forces, to unite against the southern 'metropolitan elite'
And I like lancastrians..............

Anyway, it's beer o'clock................I'm off for my pint.

 

OK!

 

Wasn't it the other way round? There was a scheme around 1963/4 to transfer the remaining Duchesses to the southern as there was little work left for them on the LM. A couple of things scuppered it, lack of water troughs to replenish the 4000 gallon tenders, less than the MNs, and clearance issues around Southampton (I think).

 

Yes, I remember that, although why the SR would need more Class 8P Pacifics was less than clear.

 

I thought there was some issue with Battledown Flyover as well, although 6233 has gone over it in Preservation.

 

Don’t forget the noise machine 46115 due back soon an all

 

I’m not sure but there were a few odd ideas around at the time, perhaps being older the accountants could justify writing off the Duchesses. The one that’s always puzzled me is, with 110 light Pacifics to find work for, why the powers that be thought it was s good idea to inflict a batch of much inferior Clans on the SR. In both cases common sense eventually prevailed.

 

I think both ideas were put forward at different times

 

In later years, David Ward wrote that the he thought the LMR was under-supplied with class 8 motive power, and one can see his point. The LMR had 50 Princess Royals and Princess Coronations, against 84 A1s and A4s on the ER. In fact I am sure I have read that a handful of A1s were briefly transferred to one of the Glasgow sheds for working the northern end of the WCML, but for some reason they were eventually moved back to the ER. In Ward's view BR made a strange decision in building the Britannias - he argued that more Class 8s would have been better.

At the same time, it was well known that the SR was over-supplied with class 7 Pacifics, and in the early days of nationalisation serious consideration was given to transferring 15 of them to the ER for use on the GE section, which would have obviated the need to build some of the Britannias. For some reason it didn't happen in the end - I can't remember why now.

So with hindsight, perhaps there might have been some sense in not building the Britannias, and instead transferring a batch of MNs to the WCML, and distributing some of the light Pacifics around the ER and the LMR? Smaller motive power could then have been supplied to the SR to fill the gap; a larger batch of Clans might then have been built, or perhaps the old Urie King Arthurs and Drummond Paddleboats might have been given a life-extension (which would have been fine, since they only needed to be a stopgap until electrification). Even the Scottish region had a batch of relatively modern, but under-utilised, D11/2 4-4-0s which could have been given a new lease of life.

Of course, returning to reality, by the time of the Kent Coast electrification diesels were already coming on stream so it would have been too late for such transfers to be of much help.

Certainly it is fascinating to think about the different ways BR might have deployed its resources if the regions had been more ready to transfer their locos between each other. It would have made life very interesting for the spotters, although perhaps a little challenging for crews who were not accustomed to 'foreign' engines!

 

The main reason why the SR Pacifics were declined by the GE Section, and possibly the LMR too, was that in a time of difficulties in recruiting shed staff, the maintenance work and inaccessibility of Bulleid's masterpieces would have presented serious problems. One of the light Pacifics was sent to the GE on trial, and returned - very quickly - with thanks.

The shortage of Class 8P power on the LMR was very real and lead to Scots having to cover much of the work, and the sight of a 4-6-0 with sixteen and seventeen bogies hanging on the drawbar was far from uncommon. So 5XP Jubilees were therefore expected to fill that gap, and the loss of these Class 6Ps was covered by Black Fives, and however good they were, they were not express engines. J.W.P. Rowledge opined them as "... one of the leading locomotive causes of the chronic unpunctuality of the LMSR Western and Midland Divisions…’*

*Rowledge, J.W.P and Reed, Brian The Stanier 4-6-0s of the LMS (1977) David & Charles Ltd, Newton Abbot ISBN 0-7153-7385-4

 

Could you imagine the Stanier 4-8-2? And the cascades that could have meant ? Where would have that left something like the Jubilee's?

 

Ahead of the Patriots in the pecking order... and later ahead of the Clans perhaps

 

I would love to see one. However, the last Pacifics already had 50 square foot grates. Anything larger would have needed a mechanical stoker, with some loss of overall thermal efficiency. What would have been the benefit to operations? A bit faster up Shap and Beattock?

 

I think there was one planned, along with a 4-6-4 option, with a 70 sq ft grate and mechanical stoker.