Welsh Pony put to sleep?

News about Welsh Pony seems to have gone quiet. Can I assume that its resurrection has been put to death ? Or is it just in a coma ?

 

A project like that takes a while to get off the ground. A lot of work needs to be done before anyone even takes a spanner to the loco. I suggest you just wait and see.

In the meantime work is going into other exciting projects like Prince's overhaul, new slate waggon wheels, the heritage waggon storage shed, new double engine bogies, the sentry box brake van etc etc..... They all need support in various ways.

 

Pony, while it would be nice to see, it's definetly not a priority, getting Prince out for the next celebration/anniversary is higher up the list, are there any other Loco's being worked on at Boston Lodge currently ?, I dare say the Fairlies take priority when they need attention given they handle the bulk of the FR's traffic.

 

There are always locos being worked on at Blodge. And Dinas. 138 has priority at the moment as the Garratts do around 15,000 miles a year (and climb 1,300 feet every return trip). 138s bogies needed major attention and we need it back because, at the moment, we rely on 87 and 143 both being available for service seven days a week.

 

At the risk of going off topic, is there a 4th powerfull Loco for the WHR being worked on in earnest ?, 3 Garratts for a 2 train service with 1 being worked on sounds a bit close for comfort if anything unforseen happens, isn't there Garratt 140 around somewhere ?.

 

One of 140's bogies is under 143, which also has 140's boiler. Three Garratts is OK as we still have the two Funkeys as thunderbirds. NG/G16 109 is still at Pete Waterman's and NG15 134 could be running in the next couple of years.

 

News on 109 has been quiet for at least a year. That does seem to be in coma. I do hope that 134 will suffice for a 10 coach train. That class would be far easier to look after IMO.

For me, Prince and WP are just playthings and should always be way down the priority list.

 

Welsh pony i doubt will be worked on in the near future anyway as the best locos for the fr are the fairlys or lyd or mounteneer and for winter services blanche and linda as the Englands ie prince, palmerston and welsh pony are under powerd for the lines needs hence why only prince and palmerston were retsored and welsh pony and pricess where plinthed. Prince is the oldest easily restorable engine on the line hence why it has been overhauled and palmerston was restored for heritage puposes and the only reason to restore welsh pony would be to see how a large england compared to the small ones but as said before this is a bottom of the list job for the fr. 138 will return next followed by either 134 or 109 dependent if pete get moving on it. the funkeys are under review as rescue locos as it would damage then to take a loco and train over the whr so a new diesel or a rebuilt funkey is planned.
140 needs about 500,000 spending on it as many parts are now on 138,143 so it would be a similar job to what hapopend to 87 so thats a long way off .
thanks
Patrick

 

Errm no,

Based on your theory there would be no gravity trains, quarry hunslet triple headers, vintage trains, silly boats etc as they are all not necessary to run the front line passenger services. It is all those things and more that make it the best train set in the world. The FR has now reached a stage of maturity where although a great many things are left unfinished, projects like Welsh Pony can easily be considered. After all it is in a far better state than Palmerston ever was. I don't see what is wrong with restoring something just because we can. I thought it was railway preservation after all and some people built a L&B engine just because they could. Welsh Pony was always considered to be next on the list, all that happened was the list got a bit longer in the meantime.

As for everything else, I wouldn't hold your breath for 109 especially if Waterman is involved, 134 is a few years away yet, the funkeys are adequate for what they are doing at the moment. Their main issue is they are obsolete as far as getting spares is concerned. As for 140 I expect it will always be used as a kit of parts to turn the other two around faster at overhauls. 87 is non standard btw just to annoy the staff at Boston Lodge.

 

Are her frames the poorest of the three or is she just the unlucky one ?.

On a similar subject, would I be right in thinking most of the Fairlie components are individual to that loco apart from smaller items like bogies, motion, cab fittings etc ?, given they have differing tractive efforts, boiler pressures (not sure on that one in 2012 mind) and even differing shapes in EoM's case.

It's the Fairlies and Garratts doing the bread and butter work which make the pet projects like Lyd and the Englands possible (though Lyd seems to be proving it's worth given how often it's out).

 

Just luck I suppose. It was acquired separately from the other 2 for just £100 but had suffered some copper and brass theft in SA. The other 2 came supposedly as "overhauled" engines. They were so well overhauled Boston Lodge has been trying to sort them out since 1997. Quite a bit of work was done on it but then 143 suffered a failure that wrecked a cylinder. So a bogie was pinched followed by the boiler as it was thought to be the cheaper option.

The second question is very complicated. Forgetting the one at York which will confuse matters more. There are 3 boilers 2 started out the same but they have had differing repairs to combat the same problem with the fireboxes. I suppose though with a bit of work they would be swapped. DLG is the odd one out it is shorter and has taper barrels as opposed to parallel on the other 2. The taper barrels have a knock on effect of placing the regulators higher up in the cab with shorter handles. When combined with the higher boiler pressure this makes them quite stiff. Overall it is less popular than the other 2 among the crews. ME and EofM are both 160psi with a single row of superheat, DLG is rated at 200psi but actually runs at 180psi. It has double row superheaters. Taliesin is now back up to 200psi with similar superheaters to DLG. This and piston valves has somewhat transformed it from the rice pudding class engine it was before.

There are 3 cradle frames. Again 2 of them are similar but EofM has the bogie centres further apart than ME. DLG again is shorter overall. Superstructures are obviously unique to each engine. In theory nothing would stop you swapping EofMs of MEs but what is the point. ME and EofM are both 160psi with a single row of superheat, DLG is rated at 200psi but actually runs at 180psi. It has double row superheaters. Taliesin is now back up to 200psi with similar superheaters to DLG. This and piston valves has somewhat transformed it from the rice pudding class engine it was before.

The cab layouts are all different. ME has both injectors on the drivers side the others have one each side. The injectors on ME are also unique to that engine whereas everything else is largely standard as far as fittings go.

The bogies are essentially the same but different. If you can get a copy of FR Magazine 157 an article in that explains it far better than I ever could. In theory the bogies under the double engines can all be swapped in their pairs. On set does have steam operated rather than manual drain cocks however this would not be an insurmountable challenge. The bogie on Taliesin is an odd ball. Not only does it have piston valves, but due to a c**k up it has a slightly longer wheelbase. It will probably always remain under that loco. 2 more bogies are on the way just to confuse things further.

As for tractive efforts on paper the order is DLG, EofM then ME (EofM has smaller wheels). However both DLG and EofM are quite worn at the moment and ME has had a lot of work put into the valve timing lately. So it seems it can pull the other two inside out.

Lyd at least is settling in and earning it's keep now. It is a little fuel hungry and some features like the bunkers are quite annoying, but it is taking the pressure off the doubles. It remains to be seen if it is up to the 10,000+ trouble free miles a year that is expected of a Fairlie though. In an ideal world Linda and Blanche and the ALCo would pull all the trains of course.

 

@meeee
ermm yes actually
my theory is not that all heritage fr stock is useless as rolling stock can be used in the for of vintage carriages and the slate wagons but the fr are trying to now to use the vintage stock less hence why they are building 10 new super barns and in the currant economic climate you can no longer just restore an engine for the sake of it as with lyd it can pull full size fr sets where unless welshpony is rebuilt in a similar way to prince it will not be able to do so i hope that one day she is restored im just being realistic.
as for the funkeys they are underpowerd hence why a new diesel is being planned as it damages then to bull a full fr train let alone rescue one with an ng16 too.
for the fairlys here is a link to the musical bogeys articals on the subject which tell you the in and outs of the locos
Fairlie Appeal
thanks
Patrick

 

Thanks for such an indepth and interesting reply meeee