Why didn't Britain do better......

[Jades]

the old fashioned tools and equipment in the various works around the company

Good point. RCTS's excellent series A Detailed History of British Railways Standard Locomotives goes into quite a lot of detail on the development of the Standards and the reasoning behind the choices they made. The old-fashioned works were the main reason why they had to abandon the idea of going with having the main frames made from forged or cast 4" or 5" steel bars. The works didn't have the machining capacity or handling space to produce or maintain them. Additionally, bar frames would have increased cost and weight.

What they did have, and Gresley would have dearly loved for himself, was the state-of-the-art testing facility at Rugby. Their testing procedures were also very thorough.

[drmditch]

A very interesting thread. When I started it I was being slightly tongue-in-cheek, and was particularly interested in the mechanical stoking issue. However, it seems to me that in what everyone has said there are a series of underlying issues. I tried to list these, and ended up writing a lengthy historical analysis. So here is the short (well shorter) version.

The economics are straightforward:-

A. A locomotive is one part of a transport system. A company offering transport by rail needs to have sufficient and adequate motive power for the traffic offered. The cost of
providing that motive power must be proportionate to the revenue that can be raised by hauling the traffic.

B. A steam locomotive can never be as thermally efficient as a diesel or electrically powered locomotive, and a coal fired steam locomotive, even at the height of its development in
the USA or Europe, never was and never will be able to compete with other forms of power solely on a ‘use of energy’ basis.

C. The efficiency problem in 2 does not matter, provided that the total cost of motive power. Including construction, maintenance, fuel, and labour to keep it running, still allows an
adequate return on what the traffic will bear.

D. The total cost of running a transport system (of which motive power is a part) must allow it to compete effectively with whatever other systems may be available.

The missed chances as I see them were:-

1. Failure to invest and modernise when the UK bulk export industries were at the peak of their prosperity in the early years of the 20th century. If the NER could persuade coal owners to use 20 ton wagons, why could the GCR and GWR not do likewise? Not even the NER was able to promote large scale use of large-capacity (40 ton) automatically braked wagons. If they had been able to do so then a lot of infrastructure would have needed changing, but the benefits in terms of track-occupancy and line speeds would have been enormous.

2. The small unit load pattern of bulk haulage and distribution made tacking this problem on a national scale apparently impossible. This was a critical failing. Imagine the benefits to the GNR (and later the Southern Area of the LNER) if the London coal trains had been train-braked block loads.

3. The failure, (and I don’t know as much as I would like about the development of the electricity supply industry), to proceed with main-line electrification in the first thirty years of the century. In this regard, I think Raven was right, even if it might have deprived us of some beautiful Gresley engines. It might also have encouraged the bulk haulage of coal trains on a national basis much earlier than it did.

4. Perhaps we should add here the failure of other companies to develop train-braked high speed freight operations with as much effect as the LNER did, and this links to:-

5. A legislative framework (and extensive Parliamentary distrust) developed in the 19th Century, which discouraged the railway companies from operating as true multi-mode transport companies, and thus to develop road haulage operations complementary and contributory to their railways. The NER had been doing this with local passenger and local freight transport prior to 1914.

6. Accountancy practices which discouraged ‘scrap and build’ locomotive policies, and encouraged the ‘rebuilding’ of items of stock which were technically obsolete. By 1947, how much of my currently being modelled J21 would have been original from 1889, after rebuilding with piston valves and eleven general repairs?

7. This meant that many of the improvements in materials technology, especially in metals and lubricants, as well as improvements in design could only be applied to relatively few ‘new build’ locomotives, and not to the vast bulk of everyday small units. It took the LMS ten years to overcome its inherited organisation and culture sufficiently to start this process, and the LNER couldn’t afford it.

8. It was not just the LMS which had its inherited cultural issues. Why did the main-line railways have to build the majority of their own stock? Were the major commercial locomotive builders all busy building for the Empire? I can well appreciate that each main-line had its own route and traffic characteristics (vs the difference between an A4 and a Princess Coronation), but surely some good could have come out of the standardisation discussions in 1918/19? (Not that I am not a partisan for the NER/LNER of course!)

9. Failure to educate and train footplate staff in general to the level of the French mecanicien, with consequent inability to make effective use of technically complex additions to the steam locomotive which might have (and in other parts of the world actually did) improve its thermal efficiency and perhaps more importantly, it’s efficiency in traffic.

That’s quite enough for now. I found a copy of ‘World Steam in the 20th Century’ by E.S Cox in the Shed bookshop at Grosmont on Saturday. After I have forgiven him for his 1942 report on 2-1 valve gear, it will make interesting reading.

[john coffin]

DRM
Your analysis is interesting but I think reflects a much younger viewpoint on things than allows you to actually understand the problem.

1/ Although the NER paid constant 8% and above dividends, most other railways did not, and the period around the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th Century was very expensive for railways like the GNR which was of course expanding its suburban business. The other really valuable thing to understand is that most of the mines were actually not that profitable, since they were quite old. They had short sidings, and tight points and curves which would have made it difficult for them to take and fill larger wagons, and maybe the economics of transhipping the coal from small wagons to large were also not right.

2/ Your thoughts about efficiency are not as correct as you might imagine. In reality the peak efficiency of the basic loco was reached around 1895-1905, later improvements were really only marginal, and many only worked with long distance non stop highspeed journeys. Like London to Edinburgh. The electric motor and diesel engine have really only come in to their own during the 1970's on, and they are neither of them particular efficient users of energy. Check out the actual efficiency of a petrol engine for instance.

3/ Some of the ideas about accountancy are interesting, but do not reflect the facts of the time,
Capital allowances and other such modern practices are exactly that quite modern. The real problem was that since railways had been introduced wages had grown as a proportion of their expenses, the other thing to remember is that parliament imposed quite severe restrictions on the charges railways could make for many of their services, and they were of course bound by the "common carrier" demand, but to dismiss their integrated transport is to miss the point. All railways by the end of the 19th Century were using their own vehicles to deliver to the end customer, but remember, at that time very few bulk products were shipped long distances. Most food for instance was shipped as individual, not pre packed items. I still remember in the 1960's cutting the bacon from a side of pig during my saturday job at Sainsbury's.

4/ If, as I have, you study the history of many British companies during the 19th Century, you will see that they were what we now call vertically integrated, because they often made their own machinery to produce ancillaries. It ensured better quality control, and also was a cost effective way of keeping overheads down. Also if you do study the beginning of the railways, you will know that there were literally 1,000 steam engine builders in total, let alone the vast number of carriage and wagon companies. However, many of them were one man bands who were made to sell products for mortgage bonds which might not pay out for many years, meaning their cash flow was stretched, so they went bankrupt with major regularity, to overcome this problem, the railway companies chose to build their own locos, carriages and wagons. Check out the way the LNWR evolved its facilities. Whilst what became NBL was not bad at building locos, it was not that good at designing stuff. Look at other contemporary industries and the way in which they also by 1900 had become quite "stuck in their ways". That is certainly true with shipbuilding, where one practice introduced by management was that of restrictive practices, where one trade only did one job. The original idea was to cut wages, but eventually it turned round and bit the managers in the bum, because the unions exploited it. It certainly would not have been good form to train drivers and firemen too much, they might actually have caused some proper improvements. Mind you, when you read about the complaints about the introduction of full cabs, or all the problems on the NER, you wonder whether education would have helped?

Tongue in cheek or not, your original post has led to some interesting knowledge points
Paul

[drmditch]

DRM
Your analysis is interesting but I think reflects a much younger viewpoint on things than allows you to actually understand the problem.

Paul

I think you may be flattering me as regards my age! My first Saturday job in the 60's (while I was on the waiting list for the Library) was at International Stores. Not as upmarket as Sainsburys! I remember stripping the cloths of large Canadian Cheddar cheeses. Stank of cheese all day!

Perhaps I should have included the historical analysis section. Yes, I am quite aware of the limitations of the pre-1914 coal industry. However, 1913 was the peak year for exports from the NE coalfields, and of course the NER had developed taking coal from pit to port. It was better fitted for this than some other railways. Obviously, and especially under Gibb, the NER had quite forward policies.

Since most NE coal went south by sea rather than by rail, my comments regarding the GNR main line would apply to the Yorkshire/Nottinghamshire coalfields. My point was that any change from small wagonloads would have required changes not only to colliery screens, but to the entire marketing and distribution system. It was a shame hopper wagons /coal drops were not more exploited further south. Obviously, transhipment would have been impractical, both by reason of labour cost and because of damage to the product.

I am not sure about your comments on accounting. The differences between capital and revenue accounts were strongly marked. Look at the problems the NER had in 1867 with Mr Trotter of Bishop Auckland!

As regards the legislative framework (not to mention Parliamentary and legal costs) I entirely agree. It had grown up in the rail monopoly environment of the late 19th century, and became a crippling handicap in the second quarter of the 20th. Parliament, politicians, and lawyers always seem to be fundamentally opposed to large, long-term, capital-intensive structures.

Vertical integration in manufacturing industry lasted, in my experience, well into the 1970s, and possibly longer. I do not agree with you however about industrial relations. Also in my experience, militant unions are only a problem where there has been a real and long term failure of management towards its employees.

One danger of any historical analysis is we credit 'what actually happened' with a degree of inevitability. It is very difficult to avoid saying that what we see in 'hindsight' should have been seen by people living at the time as 'foresight'. It can be fun however to look back and see how things might have been different. I do think that the railway companies prior to 1914 (even including the NER) showed all the signs of being mature and highly structured organisations, well fitted to their economic and social environment. As with any such organisation they were thus liable to be badly affected by changes to that environment.

That the railway industry survived as well as it did is perhaps surprising, but , in my personal view, attributable to :-

1. High motivation (on average) of employees, and a tradition of public service.
2. High standards of workmanship, even if it was constrained by conservative practices and some inappropriate management.
3. The basic flexibility and inherent spare capacity of the Victorian network (small unit loads and all) which would now be described as inefficiency, but which allowed it to serve the nation amazingly well throughout the two world wars and until our politicians were finally able to wreck it!

Now I must get back to the brake pull-rods on my J21.

[auldreekie]

Anyone feel up to starting a similar discussion on:

shipbuilding;
iron and steel;
textiles;
motor cars;
commercial vehicles;
machine tools;
coal;
aluminium smelting;

etc

?


auldreekie

[Andy W]

This has been a thought provoking thread and a bit of a sad one, for a constant theme running through the timeline mentioned has been the lack of available capital for "the railway" to do what it wanted, let alone needed. Repeating itself at various times during the twentieth century has been the need to cut back on both opex and capex at the same time, with all the problems that a short term fix like that eventually causes.

The failure of the larger railways to grasp the nettle of electrification for trunk routes is something that we can regret but not something that most of them could do anything about. The NER got nearest to it but the LNER couldn't afford to follow that policy through, until the 1930s schemes and then the war put them on hold for several years. By the time the Manchester-Sheffield scheme was actually completed we were on the verge of yet another new policy era.

If there is another constant theme it is living off the capital provided by previous generations without too much ability to be able to replace it in time for the next step change in the business environment. Too many times in the last 100 years the M&EE departments on the railway have had to beg for money to keep their existing fleet going, let alone get enough money for new build or significant modifications.
It wasn't accounting rules that stopped Victorian engines being replaced, it was the lack of cold hard cash. The businesses were just not generating enough.

[john coffin]

Andy you right, but there are a couple of more things to consider.

Electricity is by definition an on demand product, and it has taken a loooooooooong time to produce any kind of production system that allows it to be used in the way that railway engines really need. Hence the use of Diesel Electric etc. We still seem to be miles away from a proper storage and reproduction system for electricity. What the NER did and indeed the L&Y was really quite clunky and not properly invested in, because of the then reliability. However, the London Underground companies just had to make it work so they continued to invest and evolve, however, it still has not jumped between the tube and mainline trains, interesting.

Plainly the biggest unstated problem with the railways was the transition from lots of cheap employees to fewer employees in more skilled jobs. As the cost of labour dramatically increased the ability to invest elsewhere was diminished.
Also it is pretty difficult to mass produce steam or diesel locos in the same way that you mass produce cars. Yet, the initial evolution of steam engines coincided with the development of a number of amazing machines,like steam hammers and rivetting machines, let alone mega lathes. Wonder what they would have done with proper computers???

Paul

[drmditch]

This has been a thought provoking thread and a bit of a sad one,.....

Yes, it is getting a bit sad, which is not actually why I started it!

Since most of railway revenue in 1913 came from freight,including mineral, haulage - sorry I haven't looked up the numbers - it was I suppose inevitable that the effects of WW1 and the continuing decline in British exports, would have the effect of starving an old and by 1918 much abused system of the revenue needed to re-generate itself. Even without the war, the problem might have been encountered anyway, because Britain's relative industrial decline was already well in evidence by the 1890s. The next question therefore is whether a railway system should be expected to pay for itself, or whether it can only really exist as a public service and it's financial performance judged in the overall economic and social context. That however, is a different and continuing argument!

One could have lots of 'might-have-been' discussions about what would have happened if Europe had avoided the crisis of June/July 1914 in the same way that it avoided the Cold War becoming a very short and very hot war in the 1980s!

However, fascinating though such speculations might be, they are not the most appropriate subject for this forum. So, back on the track, given all the issues described above, and the vast improvements in larger and faster locomotives in the 1920s and 30s, what were the real requirements for freight and mineral operations?
Were the J26/7s and Q6s really the best because they lasted longest?
Was the Thompson O1 a real equivalent of a Stanier 8F, in the way that a B1 was of a Black Five?
And. most interestingly, could the Gresley P1 have been useful in a post-WW2 context, and how near to the 9F was its basic concept?

After all, this is an LNER forum!

[john coffin]

I am at the present reading a book called Fred Dibnah's Victorian Heroes by
David Hall, and one thing reinforced in that was the way in which our railways were built, and the expense of that.

Because early locos were badly underpowered, George Stephenson tried to make his railways as straight and level as possible, and because he was not educated and trained, most of his estimates were wildly optimistic and generally he went incredibly over budget. So from the get go, the railways were landed with quite expensive and troublesome Capital Debt, because during the mania, the chase for money pushed interest costs up. Also we forget there were a number of financial collapses during the period from 1830 to 1890, which delayed things and hence increased their costs.

The next thing we forget now is that there was an amazing amount of NIMBYISM even in the 1830-60's. The GNR was for instance held to ransom about routes into and out of Stamford. Land that might only have been worth say, £100 an acre was bought for about £1,000 purely because it was thought necessary to railway. All added to the overall debt which could not be spent later on constant updating.

As for the freight engines. Just because they were long lived were they the right item, difficult to know, for to me, the NER was a special case, unlike the GNR, it had a large number of Logo Engineers/Superintendents, and of course a number of different and for a long while independent works. Also, NER drivers and shed staff were pretty conservative, look at the problems that Tennant had.

When you think how long some of the Stirling 0-6-0's lasted, albeit with many rebuilds, I think it depends on the layout of the lines over which they mainly ran. Even in the period around 1866-1870, Stirling was building locos that were too big for the track available, and indeed that was one reason for the failure of the Sturrock Steam tenders.

For the GNR, I think an Ivatt J1/22 was the perfect freight loco. Good open motion, decent power spec and short enough to work on most of the railway subject to weight restrictions. Sadly, although I like the look the Long Tom was not all it might have been, maybe if the bigger boiler had been developed, there would have been no need for some of the Gresley 2-8-0's but we would all have hated that

Paul

[pete2hogs]

This has been a thought provoking thread and a bit of a sad one,.....

(...)

However, fascinating though such speculations might be, they are not the most appropriate subject for this forum. So, back on the track, given all the issues described above, and the vast improvements in larger and faster locomotives in the 1920s and 30s, what were the real requirements for freight and mineral operations?
Were the J26/7s and Q6s really the best because they lasted longest?
Was the Thompson O1 a real equivalent of a Stanier 8F, in the way that a B1 was of a Black Five?
And. most interestingly, could the Gresley P1 have been useful in a post-WW2 context, and how near to the 9F was its basic concept?

After all, this is an LNER forum!

Much great input to this thread, even if it did stray somewhat!

I would have said that the 9F was the same concept as the P1, adapted to post WW2 conditions - and had some of the same problems, like how to use a large engine of that type efficiently. The ER made very good use of them, no so much elsewhere. (The WR would probably have been better off with more 28xx's which is what it actually wanted).

Yes, the Thompson 01 was as good as a Stanier 8F, and it is a pity none were built new. The only question mark would have been its use at higher speeds, the 8F might have been more versatile, but it was not more efficient or cheaper. The Gresley O2 was as good as well but the third cylinder would have been unacceptable in 1948. In practice, the existence of the Austerities made the question moot, and a 'normal' freight loco was not included in the Standards.

The J26/7's, the Q6's (and Q7's, which where withdrawn for accounting reasons like the excellent LBSCR moguls) and of course the O4's were more or less indestructible as well as cheap to maintain. The only point in replacing them - as with the 28xx's on the WR - would be if circumstances had changed as they did in the 1970's-80's such that we no longer required cheap slow speed coal haulers, for which efficiency gains were difficult to obtain, given the time standing in loops, 4-wheeled poorly lubricated wagons, etc. etc.. Efficiency gains could have better been obtained in the 50's and 60's by replacing their shunting function with single-manned diesels while leaving the steamers to do the short-to-medium line hauls.

Had things not changed and there been no nationalisation the LNER would have done just fine gradually replacing the less successful and older short haul freight locos with O1's and K1's for the benefit of the easier maintenance and standardisation, but I suspect the above classes (and the J37's in Scotland) would have lasted a very long time, while for example the J39's and all the other pre-grouping classes disappeared.

Here's a question - the main line jobs the ER used 9F's on - would Thompson have used A2's?