LNWR locomotives

To say the least. Scathing might be a better word! Agree that Cox needs to be treated with caution on any pre group subject or anything involving himself.

 

To be fair to lesser builders, W11 is a Brighton product!

 

Mr Nocks Precursor book on page 21 has a picture of said mid bearing and support.
If it had supported midbearing against piston thrust of say 30 tons it would have bent the slidebars horizontaly.
Two times per revolution.
Adrian Tester explains that fatique takes time.
That LNWR frame cracking became epidemic after centre bearing removal was time coincidence and not casual.
Mr Coxses own Britania took some time but then became good frame crackers as well.
One named Rudyard Kipling had one frame side crack clean through.
But a shame that no George V made it to preservation.
It competed with Adams X6 being best looking british 4-4-0.

 

The maximum theoretical piston thrust of a PoW with 175 p.s.i. boiler and 20.5in cylinders would be 31 tons. However, this thrust acting directly on axlebox and horn cheeks would be available only at the admission end of the stroke and when stationary or moving dead slowly with the boiler at full pressure; once moving the time to admit full pressure wouldn't be available and an increasing proportion of the thrust dissipated in turning the crank and wheel. Secondly, the centre bearing would absorb and transmit only a proportion of that thrust, probably 50%, the rest going through the axleboxes and horn gaps in the normal way.

You underestimate Frank Webb and his design staff, J.N. Jackson and Tommy Sackfield. All were first class engineers, and while they did not have modern F.E.A. to aid them, they understood and could determine stresses and strength of materials by both calculation and from empirical results. They designed the centre bearing specifically to perform the function described and you'll need to come up with some hard evidence if you wish to prove it was ineffective, difficult after this passage of time.

This doesn't mean that problems might not have arisen as the aging process progressed: LNWR locos were lightly built and worked extremely hard, but whether or not they would have been as extensive as they became is different matter.

 

There is a group working on Prince George (a LNWR 4-4-0) and they must have debated to centre bearing or not.Does someone know the outcome?

 

Good question! Presumably they have access to all drawings and material specs. They might though just include it without the F.E.A. as an original component and therefore historically significant.

 

That sounds awfully simplistic. Especially as Fowler is on record as saying he wasn't a locomotive designer. I find it very difficult to envisage that one day Fowler was sitting at his desk looking at LNWR general arrangement drawings and said "I know, lets remove that bearing". Yes he was the CME, so the responsibility was his, but I bet there's a lot more to the story. Whether it was ever recorded and if there's any way we can ever know what the back story was is another matter...

 

Possibly not Sir H personally, but as you say, he was responsible. He might not have been a loco specialist, but he was a mechanical engineer and a highly qualified one; he had previously been the Midland Railway's CME so must have had more than a passing knowledge of the subject. But the decision did come from Derby.

 

There must be a number of reasons why the LNWR gets a fairly low share of enthusiast interest and following. One reason would be that nearly all of its locomotives, apart from the 0-8-0s, had been withdrawn by the mid-1950s.

Perhaps another issue is that the LNWR did not have a large number of scenic branch lines, waiting to be closed by Dr. Beeching and then re-opened by enthusiasts. So there aren't many heritage railways sat on LNWR routes and promoting its memory. I can only think of the Nene Valley (remote from LNWR core territory) and the Battlefield (LNW/Midland joint). Are there any others?

 

I think it depends on the frame of reference one selects. The LNWR has some very enthusiastic followers, and the LNWR Society seems to be active and sponsoring new books. LNWR railwayana also has an enthusiastic following. Perhaps LNWR enthusiasm is more wholistic than say LNER interest which one suspects is often confined to the "modern" loco classes?

 

Blaenavon.

 

A few yards at Corwen.(LNWR / GWR joint)

Bob.

 

Northampton and Lamport Railway.
(Northampton to Market Harborough line)

 

Perhaps more likely to have been James Anderson, who wore the pants at Derby throughout Fowler's period as CME. Anderson was a known meddler, who obviously favoured "his" Midland designs over those of any other companies' locos...
This situation was finally overcome when Stanier came to the LMS, and Stamp had Anderson removed from his post.

Richard.

 

It was a thought that occurred to me too, But Anderson was Motive \power Superintendent and was not involved in works overhauls. Of course, in theory he wasn't involved in ordering new locos either . . .

 

Having read various histories of the MR & LMS, I get the distinct picture that "what Anderson wanted, Anderson got", something which both companies let him get away with for far too long.
I love Stanier's polite riposte to Anderson's request for "more locomotives of the xxxx type", which was "You let me know your traffic requirements, and I'll sort the motive power"... Now why didn't anyone at Derby have the balls to say that years (decades) earlier?

But, it would not surprise me in the least to discover evidence that Anderson had an interfering hand in other areas of Derby too, ie. the Works Overhaul process.

Richard.

 

I suggest that one reason that Henry Fowler became CME of Midland Railway, and subsequently the LMS, was that he was an acquiescent character, unlike his predecessor, Richard Deeley, who stormed out due to interference in his responsibilities by the MR Directors. They didn't want that again!

 

One wonders how much of a loss it was to the MR (and later the LMS) that when James Clayton was passed over for promotion to Chief Locomotive Draughtsman, he took up the opportunity to return to the SECR. Derby’s loss was Ashford’s gain, I would suggest.

Tom

 

quite simply - they made the Compounds look bad . without the centre bearing they ran hot and cracked frames

 

I think hindsight is a marvellous tool, sadly unavailable to use when you really need it: before the event.
In the 1920s, Fowler's locomotives were as good as most locos on most railways in Britain, and better than many (if you measure "good" as "will do the job their intended to do efficiently").
The real issue with LMS motive power at this period was the application of good ideas at the wrong time/place.
The LMS traffic department wanted to move from fewer heavier infrequent trains to more lighter infrequent trains. This is exactly what we now have on the WCML, but with the postwar changes and then the post crash changes the time wasn't right.
Similarly the Derby policy of standardisation of parts was fundamentally sound but sometimes misapplied.
I still think that, even before Stanier, the LMS was pretty well served in loco matters.
The pre-Stanier period is often portrayed as more chaotic and difficult than it really was, mainly because it's a more fun story that way (white knight from Swindon, etc.).

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