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Greatest Mileage in Service

Discussion in 'Steam Traction' started by GWR4707, Oct 1, 2019.

  1. GWR4707

    GWR4707 Nat Pres stalwart

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    Prompted by the below taken from the GWS Facebook page today...

    On this day in history – 1 October 1953, the last Saint hauled passenger run (until 2019!!) took place on the 7.45 am from Hereford to Worcester. The loco was No 2920 ‘Saint David’ which was the last survivor of the class. This photograph, by Ben Brooksbank, shows No 2920 at Cardiff on 27 July 1950.

    Soon after 2920’s last run on 1 October 1953 the loco was reported at Swindon with name and numberplates removed. ‘Saint David’ held the record for the greatest mileage recorded by a Great Western locomotive, at 2,076,297 miles between September 1907 and October 1953. The other two Saint class survivors ‘Clevedon Court’ and ‘Hillingdon Court’ had been withdrawn in June 1953.

    https://www.facebook.com/DidcotRail...517012308528/3067929333233934/?type=1&theater


    Are there other examples of the highest attained mileages from other regions?
     
  2. 30567

    30567 Part of the furniture Friend

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    Five mins Googling from RMWeb gives

    1. 60106 2,642,860
    2. 60059 2,523,843
    3. 4037 2,429, 722

    The Saint might have had the highest GWR mileage in 1953, but was overtaken by 4037 and others by the end of steam.

    All precise mileages taken with a double dose of salt especially in the last years of steam!
     
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  3. LMS2968

    LMS2968 Part of the furniture

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    Go back a lot further to 1902 and the LNWR. No. 955 Charles Dickens, one of F.W. Webb's Jumbo 2-4-0s, completed its second million miles in traffic on 5th August. She had completed her first million on 12th September 1891. She worked the 8.30am express from Manchester to London Euston and the 4pm return daily for twenty years. 100,000 miles per year was the aspiration of the engineers at the start of BR, yet here it had almost been achieved.

    I haven't been able to find details of her withdrawal date, but lasted beyond the above dates so her mileage would have increased from this..
     
  4. 35B

    35B Nat Pres stalwart

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    I have a figure of 183 1/4 miles for that run, assuming it went via Hixon. Working 5 days a week, 52 weeks per year, would give about 95,300 miles. To have done a million miles in just under 11 years would have required that mileage to have been run year in, year out, throughout that period.

    I've no knowledge of LNWR workshop practices, but am struggling to believe that a locomotive running such a prestige duty would not have time out for workshops attention over those 20 years - if only to keep the paint up to condition.

    Unless I'm missing something, it feels like someone worked out what the average mileage would be, then claimed that for the real mileage.
     
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  5. LMS2968

    LMS2968 Part of the furniture

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    The engine was used every day for those years and, presumably, kept in top nick at weekends. There is no mention of fill-in turns, but who knows? However, the figures come from official LNWR letters to the press. I doubt very much that they would have falsified the claims; they seem to have come from Mr Webb himself, and whatever his reputation as a martinet, he was, like many Victorians, an honourable and honest man. You can argue it out with him.

    For more details, see 'The LNWR Recalled by Edward Talbot (compiler) (1987) OPC ISBN 0-86093-392X.
     
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  6. Jimc

    Jimc Part of the furniture

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    Unless, of course, the nameplates were the only part of the locomotive that did the trip every day...
     
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  7. 35B

    35B Nat Pres stalwart

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    I'm afraid, unless @Jimc is right, the statistics just don't quite work for me. Would a locomotive really have been able to run solidly for 20 years with all major maintenance being concentrated on weekends?
     
  8. flying scotsman123

    flying scotsman123 Resident of Nat Pres

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    Perhaps the name plate did a million miles, but not necessarily attached to the same set of frames!
     
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  9. LMS2968

    LMS2968 Part of the furniture

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  10. Jimc

    Jimc Part of the furniture

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    Oour ancestors could be just as dishonest as we are - or shall we say just as economical with the truth...

    https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00014788.2019.1610591
    https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/-/m...ly-bulletin/2016/the-demise-of-overend-gurney

    The claim that any steam locomotive could ever, and especially at that era, run a long run 5 days a week with no breaks makes Collet's roughly 120mph Saint claim seem a model of credibility. Not only does the figure exceed the annual mileage BR engineers could obtain, it also way exceeds the availability they could manage. I also note that some years later Cox was saying that LNWR 4-6-0s were good for 40 - 50,000 miles per annum. (Chronicles of Steam p33). Either LNWR engineering capabilities had spectacularly collapsed in the intervening time period, or else there was a little misleading going on.
     
  11. Jamessquared

    Jamessquared Nat Pres stalwart

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    We've had this discussion before ...

    About that claim: There is a reference on Steam Index to the number and nameplates being switched round amongst other members of the class; hard to see otherwise how it could have run 100,000 per year non stop for 20 years as is suggested, without any downtime for overhaul. So possibly truer to consider that a collection of locos bearing the name "Charles Dickens" achieved that feat!

    Rowland, D.P. Locomotive masqueraders [letter]. Railway Wld, 1960, 21, 160.
    Captain Black told letter writer that as a young man at Longsight he had overseen switching of number and nameplates of Charles Dickens with other members of the class.

    From www.steamindex.com/locotype/lnwr2.htm

    Tom
     
  12. Jamessquared

    Jamessquared Nat Pres stalwart

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    It certainly would have required Crewe to get cylinder and firebox replacement down to a fine art! (Don't know what the LNWR were getting out of cylinders at that time, but the southern companies seemed to be getting a few hundred thousand miles; so they would probably have needed half dozen or more cylinder replacements alone).

    Tom
     
  13. huochemi

    huochemi Part of the furniture

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    You have a short memory Tom, we also had it in 2014.:cool:
     
  14. 30567

    30567 Part of the furniture Friend

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    Bit tough on the spotters though. How come no-one has ever seen number 956?
     
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  15. Cartman

    Cartman Well-Known Member Account Suspended

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    LNWR numbers were all over the place and random. Only really the Midland had a logical series where all of the same class were together, among the pre group companies. I think the LBSC were reasonably organised on this too.

    Also, isn't the Manchester to Euston distance 188 and a quarter? I went to Manchester on the train on Monday and the 188 milepost is just outside Piccadilly
     
  16. 35B

    35B Nat Pres stalwart

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    I believe that mileage is based on the mileage via Crewe, not the more direct route via Stoke. Either way, the difference is in the order of 3%, so wouldn't change the underlying question in my mind about the statistical probability of such high mileages.
     
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  17. Cartman

    Cartman Well-Known Member Account Suspended

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    That's the route I came in, from Handforth on the Crewe route.
     
  18. 30567

    30567 Part of the furniture Friend

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    I was being a bit metaphorical. Yes, maybe 956 was a Cauliflower.
     
  19. LMS2968

    LMS2968 Part of the furniture

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    You need to take mileages with a pinch of salt wherever they originate, although those recorded were probably more accurate in pre-Grouping days. Once Sir Guy Granet started his efficiency drive on the LMS pre-war, mileage became a statistical tool which could make or break a shed's management, so some juggling of figures became the norm. For instance, a particular loco might be so run down as to be dangerous on the main line, but the shopping proposal rejected until a higher mileage had been accumulated. What to do? Well, said loco would spend several months sitting at the stop block while nominally at the head of daily trains, its mileage being clocked up by different engines, until it was sufficient to satisfy the workshop authorities.

    As to exchanging identities, where to begin? On the LMS Crewe and Horwich stencilled even small parts with an engine's number to ensure correct return; I don't know about Derby but St Rollox would and did fit anything to anything. LNER practice, I believe, was to maintain a large stock of spares of everything, and just swop as needed, including frames (Crewe did this with Black Fives too). On 10 December 1937 Pacific 2744 was involved in a very heavy collision at Castlecary. After rerailing it was towed to Doncaster for repair. In a remarkably short time it was seen leaving the yard in its bright new paintwork, on the way passing a similar if somewhat battered engine coincidentally bearing the same number.

    So while you might be correct that it might not have been 955 which clocked up all those miles, I put it to you that you cannot be sure of the mileages claimed for 60106. 60059 or 4037 either!
     
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  20. Jimc

    Jimc Part of the furniture

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    It would be instructive to see the LNWR equivalent of the engine record card, although its probably long gone. We should remember that the specially posed publicity pics are just an edwardian photo op, not works documentation. We might also note that this happened not long after a certain notorious publicity run on a rival line.
     
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