Sir Nigel Gresley - The L.N.E.R.’s First C.M.E.

No, because it is also a one off locomotive: it is an entirely relevant point, both prototypes that were one offs, yet one entered service and did work, albeit in two forms, and the other simply didn't.

If you really want to play that game, the original did better mileage in its seven years than Chapelon's one off too. In either form it did more work as a locomotive for the LNER.

I don't remember using personal commentary to undermine other people in the manner being aimed at me though. Debate is good, play the ball, not the man. Accusing me of being disingenuous, and the stuff aimed at me at the weekend, is ridiculous.

I am well used to some patrons of this forum using the different research threads to play the aggressor and the victim but frankly some of the things posted the last week have been infantile.

Debate by all means but maybe everyone should give the personal, snide asides a rest for a change.

 

Money earner, obviously. To suggest otherwise suggests you are not familiar with the work they did throughout their working lives. Happy to give more information if required.

I would be interested for a source for this.

The very first paragraph on that page reads:

"Designed in part by engineer André Chapelon , these mixed-service compound locomotives, equipped with a stoker , proved to be water and fuel efficient, while being mechanically delicate".

Efficiency surely takes into account mechanical reliability?

 

Hang on, I was just making a point.

 

The wording was “water and fuel efficient”. Those parameters would not take into account mechanical reliability.

 

Not really, in the context it was a thermodynamic efficiency that was being claimed. Though there are plenty of examples in history of locomotives of superlative claimed efficiency by contemporary standards but dubious economic value in total cost of ownership. Railways sometimes shuffled between extremes: Beattie on the LSWR built locomotives with a n array of patent fuel saving gadgets, all of which came off as Adams rebuilt or scrapped his locos. Mr Drummond then arrived with particular ideas on how to extract the most effort possible from every ounce of coal, and Mr Urie promptly scrapped - ahem, rebuilt - the lot of them along sound principles of easy maintenance. Generally, in Britain at least where coal was cheap, those who promoted low maintenance cost over better fuel efficiency generally had it right, in my opinion.

Tom

 

I certainly would not describe the A4-class as a "plaything". While they were certainly of high publicity value for the LNER, they also did serious work on heavy trains for 30 years.

I think the Belgian train service was that from Brussels to Ostend, covering the Brussels to Bruges stop (57.7 miles/ 92km) at a speed of 75.3mph/ 121 km/hr in 1939, hauled by the Type 12 Atlantics (Figures from Gerard Vuillet - "Railway Reminiscences of Three Continents")? I think it has remained the fasted-ever European steam train, but the world title would later be taken by the "Twin Cities Hiawatha" of the USA Milwaukee Road. Interesting to compare the SNCB Type 12 with the LNER A4.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SNCB_Type_12

The 4-cylinder compound SNCF 141P certainly appears to have been the world's most thermally efficient steam locomotive, but Gerard Vuillet makes some interesting comments, comparing it with the American-designed 2-cylinder simple 141R engines that were purchased by SNCF to help recovery from World War 2. As expected, the 141R burnt a lot more coal (or fuel oil) than the super-efficient 141P. But when used on heavy trains, the 141R showed lower "costs per tonne hauled" than any of the native French types, because simpler maintenance and high availability offset the extra fuel cost. Issues of maintenance and availability bring us back to issues highlighted in Simon Martin's book on Edward Thompson. Thompson didn't seem to like 2-8-2s, yet the 141R seems to have qualities that he would have endorsed.

 

Apart from the use of the Gresley valve gear on the GNR & LNER, there is also the issue of its use by a number of overseas railways, mainly in USA, Japan and Australia. Royalties may have been due to Gresley (or to the LNER?) for such use, but then both international agreements and local laws come into play.

 

Unlike France which had no supply of its own steam coal, which had to be imported. Fuel efficiency was a high priority.

 

On the subject of who gets royalties, ISTR that when Holcroft demonstrated his original conjugated gear model to Churchward (who had GWR staff assist Holcroft in getting a patent registered) Churchward is supposed to have said something like 'Now young man, you just need to get one set of valve gear to work for two cylinders and your fortune's made.'

 

The ideal locomotive for any given duty is cheap to build, cheap and easy to maintain, lightweight, thermally efficient, etc. There are bound to be trade-offs between those aspects. It seems to be generally acknowledged that thermal efficiency was more important in France than in Britain because of the respective prices of coal; and also that French drivers were trained to get the best out of compounds. Given those circumstances, the differences in the general run of locos between here and there are hardly surprising. The USA was of course very different again. Chapelon clearly went very far with both thermal efficiency and power-to-weight ratio, apparently at the expense of some of the other aspects.

Didn't the 141Rs remain in service longer than the 141Ps? What would a loco with American robustness and Chapelon thermal efficiency look like? Did Porta or Wardale achieve better compromises? If diesels and electrics had taken another 20 years to become dominant, what might the most modern steam have looked like?

Edit: Should I have posted this in the Locomotive Performance and Tractive Effort Discussion thread?

 

The "scissors" arrangement on the first of Churchward's 4-cylinder locos is about as far as you can go with piston valves. With poppet valves and rotary cams you could have just a single drive from the driving axle, but you still need a set of cams for each cylinder.

 

How is that personal commentary? Because all I have said there is I think you are wrong - whereas, as I said to you by PM, you made some unfair comments which were definitely personal.

Look, nobody has the time or patience for stuff like this. Maybe do the right thing in future and not drag other unrelated things into a thread, and take a moment to reflect on the fact that much of the unpleasantness we have seen originates from you being told by someone else that they felt you were wrong.

I will leave it at that, I am not expecting you to retract your comments from last week (why make them though?)

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What I am reading of the 141Ps is that they were "mechanically delicate" - ergo, we are back to a discussion between a robustly designed locomotive that might be more fuel heavy to something that may be more fuel efficient but spend less time doing work or being available for work.

My gut instinct, looking at the tiny number of steam locomotives Chapelon actually did design work on/were built based on his re-designs (there are no new locomotives built to a Chapelon out and out new design, as far as I can see - it has been recorded above that new locomotives were built to his re-designs, which sort of puts them in a Thompson A2/2 and A2/3 category frankly), is that one could make a cogent argument that where the elevation of Chapelon has occurred, it is with individuals concerned only with the ultimate performance of the steam locomotive, and not the running of a railway company.

That being the case, I think it's pretty clear that Gresley, whatever influences he derived from Chapelon, was by far and away the superior locomotive engineer: and a highly effective C.M.E. at that, for the simple reason that for all of Chapelon's designs, minimal in number, there was over 1500 Gresley designed, Gresley rebuilt, or Gresley inspired (Thompson/Peppercorn) locomotives doing work somewhere in Great Britain at that time. Which was the better locomotive engineer? The one who actually had his locomotives doing work, in my view.

No, I think it is relevant. We are talking about the comparisons made between Gresley, Chapelon, and other engineers, after all.

 

The last 141Ps were withdrawn in 1969, the last 141R in 1973. Most of the last 141Rs were oil burners. Chapelon modified about 100 141Rs with improved superheaters, enlarged steam circuit and trapezoidal exhaust ports (to reduce the overly strong initial draft on the fire at the point of release) which reduced coal and water consumption per drawbar horsepower across the board by 15%.

Another interesting point of comparison was the riding qualities of the two cylinder 141.R class vs. the four cylinder 141.P class. The former were found to be rough riding and hard on track and were thus limited to 62 MPH. The latter rode very well and could easily reach 78 MPH.


SPEED 141.R (US Front End) 141.R (Kylchap 2nd batch) 141.P (Chapelon Rebuild)
25.0 MPH 2197 HP 2269 HP 2142 HP
37.5 MPH 2600 HP 2737 HP 2970 HP
50.0 MPH 2633 HP 2928 HP 3300 HP
62.5 MPH 2509 HP 2700 HP 3223 HP

 

318 141Ps were built and served almost until the end of steam in France! Here's a list of other locomotives produced in quantity to which Chapelon made at least some contribution:

240P 25
241P 35
141R 100 modified
231E 48

So the engineer that built the steam locomotive with the highest power to weight ratio in Europe (240P) and also Europe's most powerful steam locomotive(242A1) must be (at best) second best?

Would Gresley have held the World steam speed record if he had been based at Swindon with all his staff, locomotives etc.? Before you ask, nor would Churchward/Collett have held the same record if they had been based at Doncaster because of the plain bearing eccentrics of the Star/Castle/King!

 

But if Gresley had been at Swindon and Churchward/Collett at Doncaster we cant tell given the different requirements of the two railways how things might have worked out

 

Yes, but that's part of the question. The LNER was the the only UK railway (apart from the LMS possibly) that had a suitable race track.

 

Yes, and they are based on the original 2-8-2s 141 class, with - some, arguably minor, the boiler probably quite major - modifications made by Chapelon for the locomotive's partial re-design. How much can be attributed to Chapelon is probably around 50/50. So my statement above still stands.

In the first case, you have outlined it did under 40,000 miles in its working life, no? So a poor return on investment.

In the second case, I note from the official French record that 242A1 only recorded 65,000 miles over its entire working life. So again, 242A1 represents a poor return on investment.

We're not speculating though. He wasn't based at Swindon, he worked for the LYR, then GNR, and then was head of the LNER.

The speculation is not necessary because the point of having this historical debate is to put into context the true history.

Frankly it's a red herring.

 

I think this sums up my feelings on the comparisons between Chapelon and everyone else:

I don't buy the idea that finding the ultimate in performance is what locomotive engineers should have been doing.

Chapelon perfecting the steam locomotive when electrification and dieselisation were getting into full swing on the continent probably highlights the futility of the exercise, whereas in Britain, Thompson/Peppercorn/Hawksworth/Ivatt/Riddles were all developing locomotive designs to be rugged, do a job, and do it with more minimal maintenance and likely have a much shorter life-span as the other modes were getting into full development and underway.

Fundamentally, Chapelon might have been an innovator, but I question if he was an excellent locomotive engineer.

 

Maybe you don't but I'd argue it was within their field to do so, especially as France did not have supplies of cheap steam coal. Chapelon wasn't the first French steam engineer to seek ways of improving thermal efficiency of their locos. As for you questioning Chapelon's credentials, some of his ideas were adopted by Sir Nigel and that's good enough an accolade for me.