Build a new Turbomotive!

[D Williams]

Or resurrect the Class 22 Project!

The latest Dean Forest Railway mag has an article on the winding up of the class 22 project. The remaining funds have been distributed to other preservation projects.

 

[Ashley Hill]

There is a closed thread about the class 22. https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/class-22-new-build.229092/

 

[RGM654]

Hideously expensive to say the least.
There are a full batch of incomplete new-builds waiting for finance to get these anywhere near completion, so another huge money-pit loco design will only take funding away from the present new-builds. Just look at P2 to see what it costs for such schemes!
Secondly, for the cost of a Turbomotive, I would speculate you could probably build 2 smaller locos more suited to the current Heritage Railway needs [something like a Standard 5 would be far better to run and cheaper to opperate].

Sorry, its a no from me. Put the money towards GCR Reunification or the 15 inch gauge idea above.

There is precedent for a small-scale demonstration project for an unconventional steam loco: see https://advanced-steam.org/projects/the-revolution-project-a-new-concept-in-steam/

 

[Ghostbus]

I include "Tornado" in this: a magnificent achievement, but it's still "more of the same"; it's a big Pacific much like all the preserved big Pacifics in essence, and nearly identical

That's a common mistake. Tornado was actually built as next in class, not a replica, as if the works were still in existence and could take advantage of modern technology. That involves significant engineering cost. Arguably more than an actual replica, assuming it would have been allowed to run. Many of the changes were required to meet the objective of mainline certification.

As a project, it ought to be easier if anything than something like "Tornado", since you avoid a lot of very large and expensive parts - huge and complicated cylinder/valve castings, pistons, valves, motion parts and some at least of the massive and horribly expensive forgings for the rods. In place of that lot you have a turbine and gearbox unit which is not particularly large in itself, and is made of parts which are mostly of remarkably tractable size for a locomotive and are also very much still common parts in contemporary machinery.

This is actually where you'd struggle to replicate the success of Tornado as a heritage project. The costs involved in proving that an experimental turbine that has no record of mainline service would be safe, would be prohibitive compared to simply proving tweaks to a proven design.

And just because it's a turbine, doesn't mean there's the expertise or knowledge to prove that kind of turbine in the present day workforce/economy. Tornado's boiler was incredibly hard to source to the required modern standard, despire being pretty basic technology.

This is why we can't have things like the Vulcan bomber flying. Nobody will certify its (design life) expired engines or build new ones for less than a trillion dollars. But we can have it's predecessor, the Wellington, airworthy. You could get around this by using an off the shelf turbine, but then it would hardly be a Turbomotive, whether a replica or the next out the shop.

 

[Pigeon]

Not a mistake - a misinterpretation. When I said "a big Pacific much like all the preserved big Pacifics in essence, and nearly identical to some" I was speaking at a more general level which subsumes the "next in class" aspect, and referring to its basic technology being essentially the "Flying Scotsman" plus tweaks.

I disagree with the turbine design having "no record of mainline service" when it actually ran several hundred thousand miles!

I don't think the Vulcan is really comparable; as I remember it the biggest problem is that the airframe itself has accumulated too many flying hours for its expected fatigue life, which is kind of tricky to fix (and a major contrast with the Wellington).

 

[JLH4AC]

I don't think the Vulcan is really comparable; as I remember it the biggest problem is that the airframe itself has accumulated too many flying hours for its expected fatigue life, which is kind of tricky to fix (and a major contrast with the Wellington).

Both the age of the engines and wing structure was of concern, the wing modification to increase the fatigue life of the airframe was completed in 2014 but the engine and several other components required to continue to operate would have been prohibitively expensive to refurbish or reproduce which lead to the technical authorities withdrawal their support.

 

[Wyrleybart]

There is some irony in this thread. Turbomotive, effectively the third Princess Royal set of frames was built to the experimental design and was apparently considered economical and successful. Suffered a turbine failure in 1949 so because it waa a one-off it was stored at Crewe works.

Historians claim that of the Princess Royal and Coronation class pacifics, it was the former design that had the more efficient and freer steaming boiler. The Coronation however had the more powerful "engine" at the front end.

It was decided that 46202 should be significantly rebuilt as a conventional loco in Crewe Works using the "spare" Coronation "engine" and was outshopped in 1952. So at this point it should be noted that 46202 had the more powerful Coronation "engine" and the better steaming Princess Royal bolier. Sadly the Harrow & Wealdstone disaster saw 46202 damaged, but would have been repairable - in contrast with Jubilee "Windward Isles". Princess Anne" .

Unfortunately, A rather special class 8 pacific was being outshopped from Crewe works at that time. so some would have regarded it a little ignominious of British Railways to rebuild "super Stanier" "Princess Anne" which almost certainly would have outperformed "Duke of Gloucester" - cetainly in it's initial period of service. Sadly I am not sure any trials were held to discover just how much of a monster "Princess Anne" was in that short period of 1952.

 

[Indigo Soup]

Unfortunately, A rather special class 8 pacific was being outshopped from Crewe works at that time. so some would have regarded it a little ignominious of British Railways to rebuild "super Stanier" "Princess Anne" which almost certainly would have outperformed "Duke of Gloucester" - cetainly in it's initial period of service.

That would appear to be something of a reversal of the sequence of events, namely that 46202 was written off after Harrow & Wealdstone, and that 71000 was approved as a replacement, not being completed until 1954.

 

[Pigeon]

Historians claim that of the Princess Royal and Coronation class pacifics, it was the former design that had the more efficient and freer steaming boiler. The Coronation however had the more powerful "engine" at the front end.

I don't think that's right. The Princess Royals were one of Stanier's "nearly but not quite" designs (although this is more apparent now than it was when they first appeared and there were no Duchesses to compare them with), and one indication of this was that the draughting arrangements were modified following experience of the first couple of locomotives. Their reputation was one of being a bit shy for steam, although you'd have enough if you managed the fire and boiler properly. The Duchesses would produce steam as fast as the fireman could stuff coal in, or indeed two firemen in special cases; and since the front end was less restrictive they also had a greater capacity for using steam, which would make the absolute improvement in steaming ability required to produce the same relative impression of that ability correspondingly greater.

It was decided that 46202 should be significantly rebuilt as a conventional loco in Crewe Works using the "spare" Coronation "engine" and was outshopped in 1952. So at this point it should be noted that 46202 had the more powerful Coronation "engine" and the better steaming Princess Royal bolier.

The 6202 boiler was different again, with a larger superheater than the standard and also with altered draughting arrangements appropriate for the continuous rather than intermittent blast. I don't know what else was done to it when the engine was rebuilt as a reciprocating machine, but something would have been, since at least some degree of modification would have been a necessity. It might have been altered simply to be the same as the rest of the class's boilers at the time, of course, but there's no a priori guarantee of that.

Unfortunately, A rather special class 8 pacific was being outshopped from Crewe works at that time. so some would have regarded it a little ignominious of British Railways to rebuild "super Stanier" "Princess Anne" which almost certainly would have outperformed "Duke of Gloucester" - cetainly in it's initial period of service. Sadly I am not sure any trials were held to discover just how much of a monster "Princess Anne" was in that short period of 1952.

I doubt any were, since it wasn't intended to be; the point of it was straightforwardly to replace all the funny bits with boggo stuff out of the parts bin, to produce a reasonable approximation to a "standard" (not "Standard") locomotive.

The DoG had nothing to do with it; that only came into existence as a result of Riddles jumping on the opportunity provided by the loss of 46202 necessitating a replacement Pacific to insist on that Pacific being his new design - which needed a fair bit of insisting to overcome the objection that with dieselisation being the favoured policy there was no need for any new steam designs so why bother, but he seems to have been quite good at insisting. Had 46202 not been wrecked there would never have been a 71000.