GSR 800

It is terrible but we must stay in the possitive.i believe we need something like the 071s ,maybe a bit smaller.Powerful enough for express duties but not huge and pointless.Kind of defies my signiture but in my opinion thats what we need.Also some new coaches.RIP mrk3s:((

All GNR fans! No131 has been steamed up for the first time (with Slieve Gullions tender).She will be painted in Glovers unlined Black and will enter service later this year:D

I think they look good too, i just dont think they look like the kind of train i am used to.But at least they dont look like these two!

I sure hope not!

Yes i think the big boy uses that sort of power.A very interesting topic,If this kind of steam loco was built it would set new standards.But it would not be adapted by most railways in my opinion.Still would love to see one!

Because there is no work for them. Who knows what IE will be buying in 30 years time.

Probably the planes without wings like the ones in Britain

Just as a matter of interest, how many of the 071's have been refurbished in the recent programme?? (IE Grey Livery)

I believe there are 11 or 12 roughly

Why would they buy new locos until existing ones need to be replaced and plenty are lying out of use in Inchicore?

Warbonnet i mean when they go out of service.And why are there so many in storage?

Just wondering,is Irish rail planning any new locomotives for the future?They have not had any new locos( not including DMUs and EMUs) since the 1990s. i know money is a big problem,And DMUs are more economical. but the money situation is getting better and the 201s are 20 years old now which is giving them another 15-20 years 30 at best.And if there are to be new locos,what would they look like?

How many times have you burnt yourself with the soldering iron?? No pain, no gain

One burn for every finger;)

That was architectural thinking worldwide, tear down the old and construct something 'new' and 'bold'. Look at what replaced NYC's classically inspired Penn Station...you used to be able to detrain and enter NYC like a king, after they tore it down, you scrambled out of a concrete 'thing' more like a rat coming out of a sewer.

So so true:ROFL:

Luckily Heston station is still as grand and as graceful as ever:D

I'd really love to know what they were thinking. Were they all a bunch of mad lefties with a chip on their shoulders against classical training or what??

That recent shot has not a jot of aesthetic worth. A big, unfocussed concourse, something Corbusier would have left behind on bog roll after a 10 pint exertion.

 

Glenderg, we need your input!!

I think in the 60s they hired the same architect for everything.They must have hated(for some terrible reason)the fine architecture of the victorians.Lokks like art deco that just lost even a hint of decoration.really just looks like a big box:((

They sound as bad as the Japanese Zero.Was it just to powerful for itself?

Ha! my sirname is Kelly and all!:DLove that movie too.That cheered me up

But do you think they will leave the station and yard at Mullingar in the state it is?Or do you think they will rebuild it to some extent? Surely the secondry base of the RPSI would need to be in resonable shape. When talking to one of the station workers he said the athlone waiting room roof was ready to cave in.He wasnt so sure about the shed but said that the turntable might be fixed up.

They did a good job with Cork Kents rebuilding

luckily the didnt tear up the track

i thought they were going to tear up the track and possibly turn the old station into a cafe/tourist centre.That is what i heard

Too right, what they did to Euston in the 60s was a thundering disgrace!

What did they do? some hideous modernisation?

.

Was one of the Ds part of the loco swap of 1911?

Back to the turfburner,have you ever seen the testbed?

And rightly so, I have to say. It's private property and still considered part of the working railway. Definitely not a place for an unauthorised/untrained/uninsured person to be wandering around.

Except they are made a cycling path there,which is public property.but they might have thought we were "up to something"

Hi

 

Live Steam!

 

A very powerful gas that can do huge work and be generated by simple means- it's just that the old boys that tinkered with engine design stayed old hat! When British Railways built their last boiler for their last loco 'Evening Star' although bigger it was not much different from Stephenson's 'Rocket' but with a superheater attached.

 

Bullied was the man, he was one of the first to adopted welded boilers, and welding throughout the locos construction, cutting manufacturing costs by half- he was before his time but to late in the competition with diesel and still slightly old hat. He was working with a grossly low thermal efficiency system mainly due to the boiler design. He was to early for new advances in the manufacture of water tube walled fireboxes and other more modern build methods which ultimately led to high thermal efficiency steam locos fired on oil and gas.... Most of this work carried on through the 60's, 70s & 80s in Africa, China & Brazil or Argentina- guys like David Wardale & Dante Porta.

 

How CIE ever thought that turf would work with the old boiler design, with it's low thermal efficiency using coal to start with!

 

About 2 years ago I with others did a feasibility study on building a replica steam locomotive- we do have dreams!, I spoke with a few engineer's in England and found a company who were involved in making the wheels for the 'Tornado' A1, a very nice helpful man- he even came back to let me know that they still had the mould blanks to cast the wheels we needed! He put me in touch with a company that manufactured steam boilers, the kind we put in office buildings and Hospitals to work heating systems run on gas or oil- very popular in Finland, high in efficiency. They manufacture a product which is mobile, a self contained burner and boiler in a small handy package that fits in a small car trailer, they gave me the spec of the machine and after a discussion with the engineering wheel man, a few calculations done he concluded that the system would produce plenty of steam, to much for what we wanted to push! It's a very efficient system, it works like a power shower- fires water into a container in front of the burner and instantly turns it into high pressure steam. No fire warm up time, just wait for a head of steam and your on the regulator.

 

The boiler company were to get back to me on the suitability for our application, the project sort of fizzled out and I never chased them up!

 

I know this is not the same as burning coal, making noise and getting a black face, but live steam in modern design systems is 2 to 3 fold more efficient than the old locos- what a pity the old boys couldn't in 100 years change from Stephenson's original design.

 

I still love them though, beasts....

 

Eoin

So are you saying this could be a new highly efficient steam engine?