Why Was The UK Late To Run Diesels Compaired to Europe

[Taunton]

BR did seem to persistently underestimate the power output required of a diesel to match a given class of steam, which is a bit odd,

Gerry Fiennes understood the need to avoid skimping on diesel power output but not a lot of other people did. He kept asking for a 4000hp locomotive, but they never gave him any.

In fact they were just constrained by what was commercially available from the main manufacturers. You can't have what you can't buy. The USA overcame it by adding multiple locos to the formation, initially four was a standard, and the earliest US passenger diesels like the E-units had two engines in each, but the costs and waste of space are considerable.

In Britain for some rerason double-heading by large diesels never worked out. The Western Region had a couple of shots at it and found that it only knocked a few minutes off. Likewise Crewe to Glasgow while it was being electrified, if one of the pair was unavailable only a small delay. The only area where it worked out was Scotland, where for a generation Inverness to Glasgow/Edinburgh normally ran with double headed Type 2s, and the well-known Edinburgh-Glasgow push-pull. This was all because they were not given adequate main line locos, and when these became available they ran in the same timings.

Gerry Fiennes actually wrote that he was asked why not double head, and pointed out that on a terminus turnround at Kings Cross in the space available you would end up with just a couple of coaches in the train. The thing about adding units is that it only benefits you in initially accelerating to line speed, which on a long nonstop run is not very much, but you have the costs of the second unit throughout the trip.

The mechanical radiator shutters on GM locos was only on the FT model from 1939 to 1946. They later went to AC motor driven fans from 1947 onwards.
The early 567 engines did have water leaks that were eliminated on the 567C model engine.

Took long enough; the 567C didn't come along until the mid-1950s, more than 15 years after the 567 introduction and by which time much dieselisation was completed. GM did offer a B-C conversion for those with fairly new 567B engines, but it was quite an expense with a substantial variation to the cooling, and GM priced such that trading in for a complete new loco looked equally attractive.

The FT was produced with so many units that there were plenty still running round in the 1960s. Unlike being in the heated cab (or likewise, in "winterised" steam loco cabs), the fireman running up and down the units as the train ran at speed with the Midwest harsh winters blasting in at -20C through the extensively louvred loco sides, through all the leaked coolant now frozen, was not for the faint-hearted.

And we think the Co-Bo was bad ...

 

[AM9]

The more successful type 2 designs such as classes 24,25,26,27 would be more akin - and probably slightly superior to - a steam class 5, with class 40 perhaps superior to Royal Scots, Jubilees and V2s and noting on the West Coast Main Line they did replace Stanier Pacifics

Similarly, the class 40s were replacing the Britannias in the '50s running the same times to Norwich. The 47s with their extra power (and slightly lighter gross weight) came in time for the heavier MKII formations allowing slightly faster regular timings on the route.

 

[Mollman]

The LNER did continue it though - it's just that WW2 got in the way.

Don't forget Woodhead and Liverpool St - Shenfield were LNER plans which were scuppered by WW2 and then completed post WW2 by BR.

True but the NE was planning to electrify the ECML between York and Newcastle and had a prototype electric loco built for it.

 

[Irascible]

In fact they were just constrained by what was commercially available from the main manufacturers. You can't have what you can't buy. The USA overcame it by adding multiple locos to the formation, initially four was a standard, and the earliest US passenger diesels like the E-units had two engines in each, but the costs and waste of space are considerable.

Mostly constrained by the electricals - AIUI until AC main alternators you couldn't really go bigger than 2600-2700bhp without excessive flashovers. A pair of 40 ( or uprated 37, at least ) engine/gens in one installation seems, um, challenging! the bigger Deltic & Maybach installs ( which would be a bit lighter ) still seem rather excessively heavy for our use in pairs. DP2 being swapped in for Deltics without issues seems to cast a bit of doubt on how effective adding more power would have been anyway ( although admittedly I think there was a fair bit of advancement in electricals there ).

 

[MarlowDonkey]

Gerry Fiennes understood the need to avoid skimping on diesel power output but not a lot of other people did. He kept asking for a 4000hp locomotive, but they never gave him any.

Achieving that level of power with the idea of top and tail came in with the prototype HST in the early 1970s. Could it have been adopted earlier? Restrictions on the number of carriages that could be propelled may not have helped.

 

[Peter Sarf]

As far as I have read - and probably not the definitive reasons - there are a combination of reasons, some mentioned above:

- Loads of coal.
- The desire to retain the jobs of coal miners - especially as (mentioned in a previous post) the switch away from coal would have been to diesel and not electricity. Had we gone straight to electric locos, we may not have been as worried about the coal-miners’ jobs as said coal would have gone to the power stations.
- A *relatively* under developed national grid system that was still evolving, which punished electric trains further from the agenda.
- BR management being somewhat stuck in the past and backward looking. We were epically good at making steam locos, so why not carry on making them?

Plus the things mentioned but others. Although not sure about the need to rebuild post-war not applying to UK. Our railways were in a shocking state after the war.

Just things I’ve picked up over the years from TV and books.

Britain's Railways were indeed very run down by the end of the war BUT in Europe there was total obliteration !. I think a lot of the infrastructure that would need altering to allow clearances for electrification had been destroyed. Plus the European Loading guage is more generous any way.

 

[Pigeon]

In fact they were just constrained by what was commercially available from the main manufacturers. You can't have what you can't buy.

There was the Brush prototype "super-Duff" that eventually went to Russia because they couldn't get BR to buy it... There was also a "super-Western" proposal, but of course that was doomed before it started because it had the hydraulic cooties. The Deltic engine used in the locomotives was about the lowest power variant of the Deltic they made, and the first increments on power output from that were achieved by increasing charge density rather than capacity, so would have made little difference to the weight, although there were initial reliability problems with those engine variants so maybe it's just as well...

In Britain for some rerason double-heading by large diesels never worked out. The Western Region had a couple of shots at it and found that it only knocked a few minutes off. Likewise Crewe to Glasgow while it was being electrified, if one of the pair was unavailable only a small delay... The thing about adding units is that it only benefits you in initially accelerating to line speed, which on a long nonstop run is not very much, but you have the costs of the second unit throughout the trip.

Similar to the HSTs being able to keep going on one power car and it doesn't matter too much, or the hydraulics and Deltics with one engine out. Seems to me you could reckon that the additional resilience from having a spare engine always with you could be the more important advantage.

Indeed, high top speed and high acceleration are not as important as simply not slowing down in the first place...

There was also often the problem that you needed two crews, with the hydraulics and some other types not having MW equipment at all, and it often not working on ones that did have it.