RAILWAYS AND STEAM

Dominion, Volume 31, Issue 70, 16 December 1937, Page 3

RAILWAYS AND STEAM

Power Limit Not Reached SPEEDS IN BRITAIN In the opinion of Sir Nigel Greslcy, famous builder of streamlined Locomotives and chief mechanical engineer of the London and North Eastern Railway, the fifll potentialities of steam in the service of railway transport have not yet been developed. The people of the United Kingdom have the advantage of the most intensive train service in the world. Moreover, the recent all-round acceleration of a service in which an average of 55 trains a day pass along every mile of railway track lias only been made possible by the triumphant advances in the construction of steam locomotives. In the course of exhaustive experiments carried out by United Kingdom engineers, it. was found that Diesel engines were unable, to draw a sudicien! number of coaches nt high speeds. T'.e new streamlined steam locomotives of the "Coronation” type give a slmi'ii.” speed with greater carrying capacity and draw an average of nine coaches where a Diesel engine would draw only two or three. A number of these new steam locomotives are now in regular service in the United Kingdom, and, as a result, the time schedules have been lowered between the most important centres. The world’s record for the longest regular non-stop run is held by the “Elying Scotsman,’’ which makes the journey daily between London and Edinburgh—a distance of 392{ miles--in seven hours. In order to carry out. more extensive tests on locomotives of every kind, including those which are

being built for export, the world’s most up-to-date testing station is being constructed at Rugby, where engines will be tested on a roller bench at speeds up to 120 miles an hour.