Heritage Line Loco Power Requirements

A flue tube collapsed whilst the loco was in use at Didcot. No doubt others can give more details but, from memory, the boiler had not been examined since it came out of traffic with BR. There was no legal requirement to do so as the only legislation relating to boilers was the Factories Act and a railway is/was not a Factory so no laws broken. This was before the days of H&SW Act. I think I'm right in saying that fortunately no one was on the footplate at the time. There was then another incident on the GCR where a badly fitted fusible plug blew out, injuring the crew. This led to HMRI producing their original guidance note PM18(?) on locomotive boilers, later superseded by HSG29. It was this that introduced the concept that no part of a locomotive boiler should go unexamined for more than 10 years, which aligned it with the Factories Act requirement to remove all lagging on boilers at 10 yearly intervals and conduct a hydraulic test. As a point of interest. the Factories Act never required tubes to be removed or a full internal examination to be carried out. Industrial boilers will often operate for thirty or more years without tubes needing to be removed but water treatment is usually much more strictly controlled.
Edit: My memory is not that good as the loco was in use and the crew were unfortunately scalded.

 

If keeping the boiler heated is really a major issue, then I think even on railways which only run on a few days a week, it should be possible to find volunteers to pop in for a few moments on the other days to keep the fire(s) going. It's not that big of a time/energy commitment...

Noel

 

Fair enough, but the argument may then go that if it's in steam then why not run a service? There is a cost-benefit analysis to be done of course...

Regards

Matt

 

Yes and no.

Steam preservation is a pleasant and harmless joke .Much like amusement parks.They need to make profit to stay alive.

 

Preserved railways are a 7 day business, even if your not running public services on all of those days, you have to steam engines for a multitude of reasons, after repair, when re setting safety valves, when testing engines after overhaul, you don't re metal axle boxes and not run some test mileage to bed everything in,
there can never be a one size fits all railway, every railway is different, every one has its sell points, and the bits we may not agree with, but celebrate that in 2017, 50 years, after the last fires dropped, we are still able to see, hear and smell working steam .

 

Steam preservation is a multi-million pound industry which employs thousands of people directly and provides employment for many thousands of others not directly related. Ask the businesses in Bridgnorth what things were like when the railway was closed for repairs following the flooding.

 

Disneyland and Legoland in Denmark make more money.
How many visitors will SVR loose if my favourite WD 2-10-0 takes steam instead of water at end of each journey?

 

I haven't done the calcs (and don't intend to) but my gut feeling is that a WD 2-10-0 converted to a fireless would have to make several lengthy stops for a refill en route, even with your suggested superheater arrangement.

 

We're talking a different market here. You could add in Premier League football. However successful they all might be, it doesn't detract from what is achieved in railway preservation.

 

The collapsed flue dated from BR days and the crew were scalded in the incident. I don't think 6697 has worked since. As received from BR it was apparently very well worn.

 

Boiler pre-heaters are another option.

https://www.national-preservation.com/threads/boiler-preheaters.881806/

 

Oh indeed, but you may be interested to know a year or two back we spent £100k unexpectedly on civil repairs and still turned a profit of some £2-300k on a roughly million pound turnover. I might be able to fish out exact figures if you're interested, they're in a cupboard somewhere.

At any rate there's no need to warn us about civil engineering costs, we are all too aware of them and why we are spending so much money and time on preventative measures. So if the folk who know these things aren't too bothered, then I suggest neither should you be.

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You had better look up what Disraeli said about statistics.

PH

 

That seems a rather disingenuous reply to me, and one perhaps, used when no other argument can be found. Fact is, GWSR know all about civil engineering costs, yet they're still happy to have P&O. That suggests to me that in the grand scheme of things, it's not that big an issue, especially as, as you and others like to point out regularly, it's only plodding up and down at 25mph.

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You had better not use it too often then, which at least will not waste as much fuel. The "grand scheme of things" is not to waste resources

PH

 

As I'm sure I must have said before, it's used in a way to maximise efficiency, operating in longer blocks than normal so the biggest difference in coal consumption, lighting up, is lessened dramatically. It was certainly wasteful the first few times it was out, but that was because all the safety valves were lifting for most of the day as the poor firemen weren't used to it! They're much better now my eardrums are happy to report.

And "the grand scheme of things" is to not look at small things such as the coal bill in isolation. On its own the cost of the extra coal used might look large, but when you compare it, it may well be comparable in size to one paintshop paint order, or one skip delivery for example. All a matter of proportion, as Tom @Jamessquared has tried to explain to you before, the extra coal is probably a tiny tiny proportion of overall outgoings.

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Hmmmm......I wonder what Disraeli had to say about information from un-named sources or from random strangers on platforms....

Sorry Paul, I couldn't resist!

 

But you've entirely omitted the point I made - and also taken it out of context! - which was that Sir Lamiel did not require the number of stops for water that our smaller engines did (still do) and therefore keeping to the overall timetable during a day was (and remains) easier with a locomotive like Sir Lamiel than it was with, say, 78019 or the Jinty the GCR now uses.

Ask the crews whether they prefer the ample power and relative peace of mind with the larger engine and capacity over the smaller engine on the timetable and I fear you'd not like the answer.

Not really borne out by the enduring and unique appeal of the many and varying heritage railways seen throughout Britain. A narrow minded and frankly pompous response at best. Not entirely surprised but there you go.