SPEED ON RAILWAY

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 58, Issue 41, 27 November 1937, Page 5

SPEED ON RAILWAY

STEAM IS SUPREME. CASE O'F silver jubilee. Sir Nigel Gres ley, builder of famous railway engines and luxury, high-speed expresses, is a firm believer that even not yet have all the potentialities of steam in the service of transport been harnessed, says a writer in the “Observer.’’ The Coronation streamlined express which he fashioned in secrecy in his workshops at Doncaster has ben running between London and Edinburgh as the fastest service train in the British Empire. King’s Cross and Waverley are now linked, twice a day, in six hours. The run of 3922 miles with its innumerable checks, such as dips, hills, and curves, is not an easy one and to maintain an average speed of 71.9 m.p.h. between London and York, and thereafter of 61.42 to Edinburgh, js felt to be all that is desirable. “I do not see much chance of faster running to Edinburgh,” Sir Nigel said, in discussing steam locomotives and railway travel in general. And he is certain that the only land traction that makes the six hours’ run to Scotland technically and commercially possible is the steam locomotive.

How the L.N.E.R.-brought the singularly successful Silver Jubilee express into being, to be followed a little later by the more luxurious sister, Coronation, might well become a separate chapter in transport history. Sir Nigel told me of a run he made from Berlin to Hamburg in 1934 in the Diesel-elec-tric Flying Hamburger. It maintained speeds of 100 m.p.h. on the pancake plain of Germany. The Newcastle Run. “I was greatly impressed,” Sir Nigel said, “and decided to see if the Germans could suggest something similar for our main line: I saw the builders of the train, and supplied them with full data of gradients, curves and speed restrictions on the King’s Cross-New-castle route. “With their usual thoroughness, the German engineers made an exhaustive investigation, and decided that far a train weighing 115 tons, of three coaches for 140 passengers, the times would he 4 hours 17 minutes in the up direction, and 4 hours 151 minutes in the down.

“We were not impressed, and felt that one of our own Pacific engines, drawing a train of greater weight, capacity, and comfort, could do better, and .in a test run the mellow Papyrus reached King’s Cross from Newcastle in 3 hours 51 minutes 48 seconds touching the then unheard-of speed oi 108 m.p.h. “That showed what could be done and decided our policy. The Silver Jubilee was built, linking London and Newcastle in exactly four hours, and to-day, after nearly two years of running, it is more popular than when ’t first began to run.

“Without doubt high-speed trains have come to stay. The Coronation, heavier and of more capacity than the Silver Jubilee, will keep her daily schedule with the same exactitude. “The success of these brains is entirely due to the developed efficiency of the steam locomotive, which in a thermal sense is becoming more and more powerful. The whole question is one of acceleration and for acceleration steam is undoubtedly the best. The German engineers failed to produce a satisfactory schedule of running between London and Newcastle because of the comparative slow rate of Dieselelectric acceleration. The Cost of Steam. “For high-speed, travel and normal railway running I have no doubt at all that the steam locomotive will continue to hold pride of place. Coal and not' oil is our national product, and, apart from other considerations, the steam locomotive is much less at first cost than the Diesel-electric locomotive. “The public and business people in particular, want these extra high-speed trains, and are asking tor their adoption between other great centres, but until we have engines of still greater power the weight of the trains must necessarily be limited, as in the case of the Silver Jubilee and the Coronation. But if the demand for longer and heavier trains is pressed there is no insuperable difficulty in providing the engines. Density of traffic, however, is one serious drawback. Running difficulties iu England, Sir Nigel pointed out, are immeasurably increased by slow running goods trains. It is all a question of braking, and iu this Britain has failed to progress as have oilier countries because of the difficulty and cost of fitting all wagons with continuous brakes.

There arc approximately 1,560,060 wagons running on the British railways, of which about 700,000 are privately owned in the coal industry, “'.lo fit the 1,500,001) wagons with continuous brakes might cost about .630,000,000.” Sir Nigel points out, and lie agrees that it is difficult to justify this great expenditure. One interesting effect of the highspeed services is the, lessening demand for sleeping cars. This tendency is not unwelcome, for sleeping-car traffic is imremunerative. For the fee of £1 for a sleeping compartment to Scotland, each first-class passenger takes up the quite unreasonable train-space of four tons dead-weight.