BREAKING NEWS! Tornado's final main line test

Although I'm still plugging along with my LNWR post, I thought it might be best to quickly post up some exciting news that's just been posted on the A1 Trust website, concerning that wonderful engine, Tornado:

Tornado...will haul her final test train on the Network Rail main line from York to Newcastle-upon-Tyne and return on Tuesday 18th November 2008. This test train, sponsored by National Express East Coast, will consist of 10 carriages plus a class 67 diesel locomotive, equating to about 550 tons, and will run at up to 75mph. The new £3 million Peppercorn class A1 60163 Tornado will be wearing National Express livery for the test train as the train operator is the modern-day inheritor of the routes the class A1s were designed to work on.

So, let me just weigh in a brief statement: today, Tueday the 18th, will see Tornado in its LAST tests for mainline running, and thus getting closer to hauling its first main line official passenger train. To make it even better, we'll see it for the first time in a paint scheme other than the plain works grey we've seen it in thus far.

The full post can be read here.

Also, a reminder that the engine needs money to continue to operate, so please free up a little cash and donate something to the A1 Steam Trust! Actually, it would probably be a good thing to donate something to the other new build projects while you're about it too!

Surviving LNWR lovomotives

As a further pre-script to the LNWR 'Battle of the CME's' which I'm currently researching, I will present a short list of surviving LNWR locomotives- and I do mean a SHORT list. Only two pure Webb engines survive (no counted as well as a Webb/Ramsbottom rebuild, and an unusual engine I will mention later!) thanks to the sledgehammer that was Whale's arrival as CME and the later sickle of the Midland Railway faction in the LMS after the grouping. And what they didn't scrap, British Railways took care of later on.

From the 20th Century only ONE LNWR ENGINE survives, (for the reasons above). As it is, the Bowen-Cooke designed G2'Super D'0-8-0 no 49395 is a fine example of the Premier Line, and, incredibly, is back in operation after a protracted overhaul! The engine can be (at the time of writing) found on the Churnet Valley Railway.

The other engines are of course from the previous century. One of Webb's successful 0-6-2T 'Coal Tanks'from 1881 has survived, on the famous Keighley and Worth Valley Railway. Currently, it is out of service undergoing restoration, at Ingrow Workshops with work progressing well.

The other Webb Engine is 790 'Hardwicke', one of the legendary Webb 'Improved Precedent' 2-4-0s...but known to most enthusiasts and enginemen as the '6ft 6in "Jumbos"'. It is especially happy that this engine has survived, given its mighty performance in the 1895 "Races to the North". In a magnificent run from Crewe to Carlisle, no.790 reached its destination in just 2 hours and 6 minutes, at an average speed of just over 67 miles per hour! The feat is all the more impressive given that its route included the steep and difficult Shap summit in its path. ('Hardwicke', coincidentally, is not the only famed 'Jumbo', classmate 'Charles Dickens' worked the Manchester-Euston return express for over 20 years- and in doing so covered over 2 million miles- a record for steam locomotives that still stands today! It is unlikely to be broken, much like Mallard's speed record. Sadly 'Charles Dickens' did not survive into preservation, joining many other 'should-have-been-saved' engines). Number 790 is in the National Collection at the National Railway Museum, York.

The last official LNWR engine (not one that was absorbed from another railway company), 'Orion', is ironically, one of the much-demonised Webb compounds (in this case, the 'Alfred the Great' class). The reaction of most enthusiasts to this would be: 'what? they were all scrapped!ALL of them!!' which was true, except for this oddity. It is not, indeed, a full sized engine- but a minature built to run on 9 1/2" gauge track! However, it is still an official LNWR engine- and built in the same manner as its compound brothers. Here it is best to let the official owners, the Stephenson Locomotive Society, explain:

Although only a miniature locomotive, constructed to run on 9 1/2" gauge track, Orion (LNWR 1957 of the 'Alfred the Great' class) was built approximately 100 years ago by G.R.S. Darroch. Darroch was Assistant Works Manager at Crewe until 1941, and he bequeathed Orion to the Society on his death in 1959.

The size of the engine does not diminish this significance. Orion is the last surviving Webb Compound in the world to have been built at Crewe Works by the London & North Western Railway. Orion is one of only a handful of former LNWR locomotives surviving in preservation anywhere in the world, to any scale. Although built for private use by Mr Darroch all the parts of the locomotive were cast and machined at Crewe Works and the locomotive therefore qualifies as a genuine LNWR locomotive. There are undoubtedly other live steam locomotives built as replicas of LNWR prototype designs. The SLS-owned Orion is unique, this example is the only one built by the LNWR in its main workshops and therefore, as mentioned above, is a genuine LNWR locomotive survivor!

In 2005, 'Orion' was fully restored to working order, and can currently be found in the 'Locomotion' centre (owned by the National Railway Museum) in Shildon, County Durham). Thus, despite all the efforts by a number of factions to eliminate Webb's compounds entirely, one has managed to live on! As mentioned, even though it is a minature, it is built to exactly the same specifications as the larger originals! So, thankfully, we can still see one of the odd designs in action, although it was a sad act of history that none of the originals survive(particularly, in my view, the 'Teutonic' class legend, Jeanie Deans).

The other two survivors are not pure LNWR engines, coming into the company via another railway after its absorption into the Premier Line- in this case, the highly profitable Grand Junction Railway, who built the famous works at Crewe! The pleasant lined Columbine 2-2-2 no. 49 dates from 1845, and was the first new engine to be built at Crewe Works! After its retirement from express passenger work, this engine was used to haul directors saloons (having been given an LNWR cab, later removed in preservation) before being withdrawn for preservation at Crewe in 1902! It is currently in the National Railway Museum on static display.

The last steam survivor (an LNWR EMU from the pre-grouping days survives) is quite the oddity, although most visitors that see it at 'Locomotion' would not guess so! Originally built as a Crampton locomotive (with a very low slung boiler- and two MASSIVE driving wheels- 8'6"! Incredibly, these are not the largest driving wheels seen in the UK-according to H.C.Casserley, the Bristol and Exeter Railway had some 9 footers!) 4-2-2 by Francis Trevithick for the GJR. The design was realy an attempt to compete with the very large engines deisnged for the GWR Broad Gauge by I.K Brunel, although, according to O.S. Nock:

One cannot help feeling that these 'fancy' engines- 'Cornwall', the Southern Dividion 'Cramptons', the Stephenson long-boilered 4-2-0s and others- must have appealed to Brunel's sense of humour, not least in the flourish of trumpets with which they emerged from several works.

("The Premier Line", pg 27)

It was later rebuilt as a conventional locomotive by John Ramsbottom in LNWR days, the drawings done by a young F.W. Webb! Like 'Columbine', this engine was used to haul director's saloons, although it lasted well into LMS days- 1927! After this, it was withdrawn and preserved- currently, at the 'Locomotion' in Shildon.

There is a strange legend started by persons unknown, who claim that Cornwall travelled down the Madeley bank at 117mph! Nock's view on this ridiculous rumour is thus:

The tale of 'Cornwall' travelling down Madeley Bank is of course, just fiction, if she had been able to attain anything approaching such a speed with a loaded train, it is tolerably certain that with the primitive brakes [avaliable]..then she would never have stopped in Crewe. For corroborative evidence on this point, ask anyone who travelled on the "invitation Run" of the "Coronation Scot" in 1937!

("the Premier Line", pg 27)

As a side note here, the strange Crampton design has been covered by a number of authors, and a notable account of the various experiments with the odd types (not just by the LNWR) can be found in the book "Experiments with Steam " by Charles Fryer.

I think it best to leave the last words on 'Cornwall' once again to that celebrated railway writer, O.S.Nock, taken from his fine book The Premier Line:

As for 'Cornwall', it can only be described as a freak in its original 4-2-2 condition, with boiler below the driving axle. But the rebuilt 'Cornwall', which dates from 1856, is still with us today, and maintained in fine condition at Crewe Works, and is naturally the subject of great historical interest. The one certain feature of the original Cornwall handed down to posterity is that pair of lovely great 8ft 6in wheels...embodied most successfully in Mr Webb's rebuild of 1858. As existing today she has something of three engineers about her: [the driving wheels] of Trevithick, a modified Allan form of double framing, while her 'upper works' are pure Webb...One feels a debt of gratitude towards Webb for turning the wheels and chassis of a pretty hopeless freak into a handsome engine- and to later Chief Mechanical Engineers for preserving her from the scrap heap!

(pg 26-27)


It is sad that so few of the LNWR's engines survive, particularily mixed are some of the classic classes: the 'Lady of the Lakes' (also known as 'Problems'), DX Goods, the 'Cauliflowers', Whales 'Precursors', Bowen-Cooke's 'George the Fifths'...however, it could be worse- at least we are blessed with a few survivors- and remember that only around 11 LNER engines have survived, despite the advent of the preservation movement during the last years of its designs working life!

Next up, the mighty battle of two great locomotive men, Francis William Webb and George Whale, the CMEs of the LNWR and the final question as to whether Webb was a bad CME or not! (in this case, a preview- the answer is a resounding 'not!')