Flying Scotsman

Only if you are a limited company.

 

It will be a long time before we find out what happened and why during the last overhaul and the period of ownership that followed it. If the NRM is unable to find out then they are in the position of slowly working their way through the locomotive and prioritising what they find and the journey will take them back even further into the locomotive's past. It would help if some people would talk but that is unlikely in the forseeable future. I also wonder about the final years on B.R. with steam coming to an end was the work carried out on an engine quite as thorough as it had been some fifteen years earlier?

The money spent in the past is gone, it isn't coming back. The HRM acted under pressure to secure the engine but had neither the people nor the facilities to deal with what they had bought. It was an expensive lesson to learn and the same mistakes will not happen again.

The real loser in all this has been the engine and the events will only fuel the vitriol of those who believe that the locomotive is peculiarly expensive to run. It isn't the engine, it is the people involved with it, past and present, that take the decisions and the actions - the locomotive is an inanimate (though much loved) object. It is only as good as people make it.

 

It wasn't a mistake to secure the loco for the National Collection but it wrong to promise to run it. It would have been nice if some of the millionaires who owned FS in the past had gifted her to the nation once they had realised she was mechanically very run down rather than then sell her to the highest bidder. But as many have said on this thread 'we are where we are'.

 

Mike, if you look back just 2 days to post 2106 you'll see that FSS was supposedly 1.5 million overdrawn so I hardly think that they were in a position to give it away. It is sad that FS managed to bankrupt two of its former owners. Ray.

 

Marchington wasn't the owner when she was bumped across Australia then trailered around the UK to shuffle up and down various branch lines culminating in the Llangollen derailment. I think those pre Marchington years have contributed significantly to the locos current state.

 

Happy to be corrected on those points: the tender handbrake being cut still stands amongst other bits of information gleaned from the various reports over the years.

 

Just looking at the effects of the boiler and cylinder mods ....

The A4 boiler was set to operate at 250psi vs the standard A3 pressure of 220 psi - an increase of 14%

The cylinders were bored out to 20" vs the standard A3 size of 19" (when unworn) - an increase of 11% in area

It wasn't the fitting of the A4 boiler that caused the problems, it was running it at 250psi, not 220 psi. And of course running a boiler 30 psi below its design operating pressure would have done wonders for its life span too.

As for the cylinder liner bore, I don't know what the rebore limits were in service, but certainly not an inch I would have thought?

 

And Sheff thats what so puzzling, there were at the time plenty of people who would have worked on the A3's in service and i am sure if asked would have offered advice based on known facts, there must have been a very good reason for reducing the boiler presure on the A4 boiler to 220psi, was advice ignored? if i am honest i dont think the truth will ever be known, unless someone takes the story and runs with it,
peoples reputations are strange things, you either gain a reputation based on what you know, and have prooved to be correct, or its one based on what a person wants to portray, in this case the reputation would have appeared to have been a fause one but if thats the case how does someone remain as engineer when maybe they shouldnt be if their actions are damaging the assets. for 4 years 4472 shook itsself to bits, if this was all known then someone in FSS ignored what was happening , but if they had said something, would the gravy train had hit the buffers for them also?

 

At the risk of repetition, there's evidence in Cook's Swindon steam that the GWR, in some circumstances at least, found an inch to be acceptable.

 

Martin, the reason for the boiler pressure reduction is quite simple. Working the boiler at 220 psi maintains the tractive effort at the level that the A3 was designed for.

 

Thanks, that's interesting - how thick were their liners then?

 

Insofar as it was designed for that tractive effort at all of course, having originally been built for a 180psi boiler. But without knowledge of the original engineering decisions how can we know what was significant? Surely the adhesion factor must have been at least as important in a decision to reduce tractive effort with smaller cylinders as component loads. My knowedge is almost completely restricted to GWR design, and strictly amateur at that, so I can't comment very much, but I do note that many classes seem to have had big boiler pressure increments over their lives. Of course if increased TE did, as one might expect, lead to a greater incidence of slipping, that too might be a factor increasing excess loads on the structure.
Reading those reports though it seems to me that the poor old girl really needs a brand new set of frames and a brand new set of cylinders...Easy for me, I don't have to find the money or make the moulds...

Oh yes, off hand I don't know how thick GWR liners were. There must be people hereabouts who've handled the things and know though.

 

Hi sac martin and martin butler you may may see and dont know but may ask Peter Townend if he knows. FISH7373 81C

 

I've read this through a few times and am not entirely sure what you saying. Could you elaborate, please.

 

Like everything else GW, Thicker than everyone elses, BrR standards cylinders apparently ' flimsy' in comparison.

Also Boiler pressure/ starting up, not that much of a connection, surely its the pressure in the steam chest thats the relevant factor, control of whch is determined by the type of regulator and how its handled...

Am i right in Saying that the boiler 4472 now has is a genuine A3 Boiler which has only been designed for 220psi, so 250 really isnt an option going forward...

 

In all of this your have to take off your hat to the NRM, it isnt easy to admit you,ve made mistakes, and to admit them, even if it has taken longer than some of us would like.
Something in my opinion the persons associated with its former owners should take leasons from, but whats inportant now is for who ever is awarded the contract to finish off the engine gets given the chance to do it without further snipping from the press and internet at least under the NRM the engine, not its earning potensial is whats inportant ,at least i hope so, the faults have been identified and the causes for them are now full understood, in time the full story will come out but not i expect for several years , 4472 will return to steam, that alone is better news than i expected and i for one am happy to have been prooved wrong

 

Steve, this post makes a valid point and may not be far from the truth. Unfortunately however I don't think we will ever find out if this was the case or not.

 

Is a fair point, but unlike the private sector, the NRM has no choice. People perceive massive numbers of failures in the public sector, but only because they see them, because the public sector has a duty to transparency.

There are good commercial reasons why private suppliers aren't so open (different loco owners are in competition with each other, after all) do I don't presume that the different approaches aren't justifiable, but they do need to be borne in mind.

Simon

 

Re: Scotsman Overhaul updates - NRM says she WILL steam again .....

Article from the Northern Echo -

"Flying Scotsman WILL take to the tracks again - as museum bosses pledge to complete costly restoration"

Though not quite as definite as the headline proclaims when you read it in full - includes "break clauses" if further defects found cause large cost escalation ...

Flying Scotsman WILL take to the tracks again - as museum bosses pledge to complete costly restoration (From The Northern Echo)

 

Just out of interest is this matter of having to remove cylinders to check wastage and cracking in otherwise unacessable parts of the frames is becoming more commonplace , after all most frames sets must by now becoming towards a time when checks have to be made i for one would expect to see new frame sections being let in during overhauls in future overhauls on engines
So in some ways the cylinder issue whilst a set back, could be viewed as an opertunity to assess fully the state of the frames and will enable the NRM to know what will be needed to be tackled .