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4 Cylinder Valve gear and 'get you home' links

Discussion in 'Steam Traction' started by Jimc, Apr 11, 2017.

  1. Jimc

    Jimc Part of the furniture

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    The prototype Star had an ingenious variation on Walschaerts valve gear which used no eccentrics, but a cross connection from the other side of the locomotive via a pair of levers that crossed each other - known as the scissors valve gear. It wasn't repeated, and there are a number of tales why this was so, varying from claims by Deeley of the midland that it breached his patent, through to semi conspiracy stories that it took days to adjust the valve timing. However the 'official' GWR line is that it was because in the even of a failure on one side of the locomotive it would be impossible for the Loco to limp out of the way on the other side, and as confirmation of this the GW sources note that a special link was provided to hook this up.

    Without going into all the other tales, what I was wondering was whether such a "work home" capability was provided on any other 4 cylinder locomotives on other lines - Duchesses spring to mind. There's some discussion of the setup on p8/9 in this Swindon paper http://kesr-mic.org.uk/resources/Favourable+Points+in+Four+Cylinder+Locomotive+Design.pdf , helpfully put on lime by the KESR folk.

    Jim C
     
    Jimc, Apr 11, 2017
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