What makes a locomotive's identity (headaches imminent)

[LNER Fan 60008]

It's probably been brought up before, but worth bringing up again.

What exactly makes a locomotive's identity? The nameplates? The frames? The boiler? The matter of such key parts being kept together?

I would have vouched for "the frames", until I learned so many locomotives (Talyllyn, Flying Scotsman, and so on) have had their frames exchanged at least once.

What are your thoughts on the matter? And sorry if there's already been a current thread about it.

[manna]

G'Day Gents

IMHO I would say that when the frames/wheels/cylinders are united with the boiler, that to me is when you have an Engine and not a collection of spare parts.........unless the loco has been dismantled for overhaul and all the parts kept in one place.

Then you could say 'That's' the 'Flying Scotsman' etc

Ducks for cover

manna

[strang steel]

Is a locomotive's individual identity of any interest to anyone but the enthusiast?

A railway company may say 'we have 150 express passenger locomotives, and for accounting purposes and operational convenience we have numbered them from 1 to 150', but does it matter to them if a multitude of parts is swapped between each one during an overhaul?

Is the Mallard in the national collection the same conglomeration of parts which ran at 126mph for a short distance in the summer of 1938?

[Bill Bedford]

The entry in the accountant's ledger........

[60041]

The normal convention was to have the identity with the frames, so a loco could go into the works and receive an overhauled boiler, wheel sets, possibly new cylinder block and come out a few weeks later with the same identity. This is fine until you realise that many LNER locos also received refurbished frames as well, so it is quite possible that some were running around without any major original components at all.
An extreme example of this is the Killingworth "Billy" locomotive at the Stephenson Museum where it has been suggested that the only original component is one of the wheel centres.
My favourite loco was always 60041 Salmon Trout, and as the boiler and some other components currently fitted to Flying Scotsman came from 60041, we could fit them to a new build chassis and technically have a rebuilt Salmon Trout; now that would be a nice prospect; but I'll bet that the pedants and purists would have plenty to say about it!

[Blink Bonny]

I once heard a retired painter from Crewe works say that he painted the number he was told to paint on the engine. This explains why the NRM's Super D had at least three identities superimposed on various layer of paint on its cabside.

It is tough because, taking 4472 as an example, she has carried three designs of valve gear and three designs of boiler, not counting the at least one set of new frames under K J Cook in the 1950s. Minor fittings are what walked out of stores first...

[Marvin]

Is the Mallard in the national collection the same conglomeration of parts which ran at 126mph for a short distance in the summer of 1938?

Well, the NRM seem to think so, as their reason for not resteaming it is to keep it authentic. But I can't help feeling that when originally preserved the idea was merely to recreate the appearance it held at the time of it's speed record - otherwise why not preserve the original boiler & tender when the locos they were then attached to were scrapped?

In general, what we're dealing with is a well known paradox known as "The Ship of Theseus" - at what point does anything that periodically has parts replaced cease to be the original object?

[Blink Bonny]

As my grandfather used to say: "I've 'ad this brush 40 years. Its only had two new handles and five new heads in that time."

Sadly, the NRM seem to be confusing railway locomotives with classic cars. Sure, an original, unrestored car in A1 nick will always be worth more than even the best resto job. But the resto job will probably drive better and be better rustproofed. Acronym: RUST - Rust, Usual Sixties / Seventies Trait.

There is almost certainly nothing left of the "Original" locomotives in the NRM with one exception: 92220 Evening Star wasn't in service long enough to have either a boiler or tender swap. Having said that, is 92220 "better" than any other angine in the museum? If I allow personal preferences to come into it (the 9Fs are my favourite engine, after all) the answer is different but looking at it from an impersonal view - no. It looks right, so it is right.

I get very annoyed about this.

Nurse!! The screens!!!

[Bryan]

When working on an LMS Jinty at the Mid Hants in the 80s I counted over 40 separate loco numbers stamped in the wheels.

[Autocar Publicity]

If I was being pedantic, I'd agree with BB's comment about the entry in a ledger (or a loco list). There's quite a case for the nameplates/numberplates being the key to an identity.

But thinking about the question with my rose-tinted glasses on, I'd suggest it is the way it handles and drives. Like sailors say about ships, especially sailing vessels, drivers and firemen know steam engines have a soul and personality, as daft as that may sound to some folk. I'd compare the boiler to a heart and the frames to a skeleton, and think you could argue for both to be key components, going a long way to defining an identity. But from what older drivers have said, sometimes you could change these and the loco would still 'feel' like the same loco. And other times, something much more minor could be changed and the loco felt like a different loco afterward. So, an indefinable, almost indescribable 'feel' that only footplate crews can understand?

Definitely a tricky one...

[60041]

[quote="Blink Bonny"].

There is almost certainly nothing left of the "Original" locomotives in the NRM with one exception: 92220 Evening Star wasn't in service long enough to have either a boiler or tender swap. Having said that, is 92220 "better" than any other angine in the museum? If I allow personal preferences to come into it (the 9Fs are my favourite engine, after all) the answer is different but looking at it from an impersonal view - no. It looks right, so it is right.

[quote]

There was a suggestion in the railway press recently that Evening Star had been the victim of an identity swap after withdrawal as a result of accident damage to the front end.

[Coboman]

Theres definitely compelling evidence to suggest that it might be another engine.

[Blink Bonny]

Theres definitely compelling evidence to suggest that it might be another engine.

Not sure about that.

When it was at the Worth Valley Railway in the early 1970s it was banned from propelling stock through platform 4 because its buffers were splayed. Not much but enough to give rise to potential buffer locking so, because these were pre-platform 3 runround days, there had to be a pilot engine at Kieghley for the 'Star. I seem to remember there was some bar on it even being hauled out coupled to the stock. Indeed, the NRM blamed the Worth Valley for splaying the buffers.

Surely if another engine was selected and identities swapped, wouldn't you have thought a better example could have been found, especially as the engine was, it was assumed, destined for a life of static display? The right hand running plate and smoke deflector were bent in the rough shunt at Cardiff and they're the "new" pieces on those pictures.

[Coboman]

Theres definitely compelling evidence to suggest that it might be another engine.

Not sure about that.

When it was at the Worth Valley Railway in the early 1970s it was banned from propelling stock through platform 4 because its buffers were splayed. Not much but enough to give rise to potential buffer locking so, because these were pre-platform 3 runround days, there had to be a pilot engine at Kieghley for the 'Star. I seem to remember there was some bar on it even being hauled out coupled to the stock. Indeed, the NRM blamed the Worth Valley for splaying the buffers.

Surely if another engine was selected and identities swapped, wouldn't you have thought a better example could have been found, especially as the engine was, it was assumed, destined for a life of static display? The right hand running plate and smoke deflector were bent in the rough shunt at Cardiff and they're the "new" pieces on those pictures.

And theres compelling evidence it isn't!
The article in RM was good as it looked at the information available from a very neutral point. Personally I think it is the genuine article, but not enough to stake my life on it for example.....
Jim

[mr B]

.

There is almost certainly nothing left of the "Original" locomotives in the NRM with one exception: 92220 Evening Star wasn't in service long enough to have either a boiler or tender swap. Having said that, is 92220 "better" than any other angine in the museum? If I allow personal preferences to come into it (the 9Fs are my favourite engine, after all) the answer is different but looking at it from an impersonal view - no. It looks right, so it is right.

There was a suggestion in the railway press recently that Evening Star had been the victim of an identity swap after withdrawal as a result of accident damage to the front end.

'evening scrap'