Heritage Line Loco Power Requirements

I sometimes wonder if PH would have found Option A of the Serpell Report very appealing.

 

He was too much of an ultra, just as the W.I.B.N. crowd on N.P. are excessively ultra in their way.

PH

 

That's classic.

'We know Tom's secretly biased because he disagrees with me. Because Tom's biased, we should discount his argument. Therefore I'm still right".

Ever heard of 'confirmation bias'?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias

 

No

 

I had thought that Mr Hitch was being apologetically ironic; perhaps I was wrong.

 

Ironic certainly.

PH

 

The minimum requirement for the SVR and our 8 coach trains is a class 4. However not all of our trains are 8 coaches and an Ivatt 2 is quite happy on the 6 coach services which run daily in the summer.
The argument about certain locos being too big is a much more complex one. The heavy freight locos have small wheels so are quite happy running at 25 mph, not far removed from the speeds they are intended to work at. Being 2 cylinder locos they tend, if driven sensibly, to be efficient, and are not actually that heavy or harsh on the track (The big GWR tanks possibly excluded) where as an 8P will have three or four cylinders, consume more coal, water and oil, and being bigger will induce greater wear, they also don't like running at 25 mph, it's a bit like using an F1 car to nip to Asda.

 

Please don't do this again....

 

Just read the comments by various active volunteers on the SVR and ESR. They know the issues.

PH

 

So just because some of the posts by the aforementioned active volunteers agree with your views, "they know the issues" but posts from other active volunteers whose views are contrary to yours
are either dismissed or ignored as presumably in your view they don't know what they're on about.

 

Do you have any figures from the p.w. dept to back up the argument that a small wheeled, two-cylinder heavy freight loco causes less track wear than a big wheeled multi-cylindered passenger loco?
Logic would seem to dictate that bigger wheels = less revolutions per length of track and more cylinders = less hammer blow as forces are more balanced so less wear. I realise that logic doesn't always come in to it.

 

You would have thought that if the issues arising from running larger engines were so problematic then after 30, 40, 50 years or so of preservation they would all be consigned to the scrap heap. What gives???

 

i view Paul's stance as being that of the " preservation taliband" in that everything has to fit a pre ordained order, a bit like the ten commandments,
1 thou shall not enter into expansionist thoughts, for that is the way to WIBN
2 thou shalt immediatly remove buffet cars from thy service trains
3 Though shalt not have Thomas events for that is worshiping false idols
4 thou shall run no more than is needed , for it is beter to cram then in , than to give them space.
5 Thou shall run nothing bigger than a class 2, for the lord has declaired thats all you need
6 Thou shall remove all non restored stock from thy lines,for a linear scrapyard is another way into WIBN
7 Thou will forget all thoughts of extending thy railway, for that is the way to the abyss,
8 thou will deny thyself inpure thoughts of large engines, bigchufferitus is the way to WIBN.
9 thou must obey thy master in all things for he is the oracle,and the only true voice
10, Always be mindful that he is all seeing, all hearing . AMEN

 

The 10 commandments as applied to the IOWSR. If it is right for them, by extension, it must be right for every other heritage railway.

 

NO dont say it, the E word!!

 

Well, I'm one of these, although no longer on the footplate, but still within the mpd. I haven't noticed that my colleagues share your views to any great extent. Mostly, we use the locos we have available, and apply load limits if a large enough loco isn't available.

 

Said multi-cylinder express passenger locos are also heavier, and while revolutions of the wheel will affect tyre wear, as the same point on the wheel will be in contact with the rail fewer / more times, the same is not true of rail wear as each point still only contacts the wheel once.
I don't have specific figures on rail wear although the higher axle loading of an 8P over an 8F will have an effect on bridges, embankment etc, one part of our line dropping by several inches over last year's Pacific power weekend.
In terms of water consumption, 2857 can cover the length of the SVR on an 8 coach train on 600 gallons (I've done it on as little as 450) where as a Bullied Pacific uses in the region of 2000. I don't have the coal figures but you've got to boil that extra water somehow

 

Could it be that as suggested before the magic ingredient is a supporters association of many of the larger locos who raise funds to cover the gap between steaming fees and maintenance costs. Of course as time passes and supporters with direct memories of big main line steam who are happy to subsidise the operation of their favourites reduce we may see alternative realities creeping in. It is perhaps no accident that several groups with large engines seem to be struggling at present.

 

That and the fact that beggars can't be choosers, we've got what we've got and that's it, it's not like we can scrap a 7P or 8P and aquire a 4MT instead.