20th Century Steam Locomotives

Arransians have a reputation for being resourceful and innovative mechanical engineers, and in many fields this has served the country very well. However, in the sphere of steam locomotive engineering this tended in the 20th century to saddle the country’s railways with temperamental and over-complex designs that often could not really be said to be fit for purpose. A further problem was the generally poor quality of the country’s coal, which led to the very early adoption of wide fireboxes, and then to extensive experiments with compound expansion which never showed any worthwhile advantage over the simple equivalents.

It is very strange that the Navy had realised the superior thermal efficiency of West Brunswickian coal in the 1900s, and indeed until the general adoption of oil firing maintained substantial stocks of it for use during exercises and potentially in wartime, but the railways never used it to any significant degree until after the Great War.

The country had four large private railway companies, all of which constructed most of their own locomotives in their own workshops, and two substantial smaller companies, of which the Byrness Railway built some locomotives but the Lower Esk bought them all from independent builders, albeit to their own specification.

It is difficult to single out any company as an example of good practice as all had their idiosyncracies. The Great Central and the Danby & South Western, which were the most prestigious in terms of passenger working, also featured some of the most technologically over-ambitious designs, whereas the Eastern Seaboard was always short of money and had to struggle on with old and underpowered locomotives, many of which were two-cylinder compounds. One of the classic Arransian designs was the Great Central Class P11 4-4-2, originally introduced in 1902, which continued to operate many of the railway’s major expresses until the Great War, despite having been supposedly superseded by more modern and advanced engines. (This was a locomotive somewhat similar to the GNR Ivatt “Large Atlantic”)

In the 1920s the Chief Engineer of the Great Central was Edward Cleminson (1873-1950) who was regarded as a very talented designer, but turned out a series of designs that, while outwardly impressive, suffered poor reliability and could be challenging to drive well. Most notable was the impressive Class P17 4-6-4 four-cylinder compound of 1927, of which eight were built. On their day, these could be exceptionally fast, and indeed the type holds the official Arransian steam speed record on level track of 106.8 mph between Kirtlebridge and Dunsford. However, their frequent breakdowns gave them a poor reputation and, after the creation of Arransian National Railways, it was often the case that the best express trains were double-headed by P11s. The P17s were never used after the start of the Great War; one, No. 402 “Countess of Pentmark” is preserved but has not been run for over sixty years.

Between 1931 and 1933, the international depression caused all the six main railways to file for bankruptcy, the last to succumb being the relatively well-managed Northern Counties. They were combined into Arransian National Railways, but for the first few years of the new organisation, traffic levels and speeds were both well down on pre-depression levels. One of the first actions of the new administration was to build a batch of 30 new P11s (ANR Class C9) which were something they at least knew were robust and reliable. Two of these are preserved and, usually operating as a pair, probably form the greatest draw on the Sabrantian steam special scene. An equivalent number of the worst of the modern compound types were taken out of service, generally never to run again.

After something of a hiatus, in 1934 Bruce Watson (1891-1973) from the Eastern Seaboard Railway was appointed Chief Mechanical Engineer of ANR. He had held the position on the ESR since 1928 and, although he had not had the opportunity to introduce many new locomotive classes had the reputation as a forward-thinking engineer who was also a good man-manager and – crucially – had rejected the compounding principle.

Rather than being panicked into piecemeal new construction, Watson was given the brief to design a range of standard locomotives to meet the railway’s requirements for the next twenty years, which he duly did. The resulting engines – seven standard classes plus the X2 Garratts – were handsome, solidly built locomotives of distinctively “Arransian” design, all with three-cylinder propulsion (although not conjugated valve gear), all, except the two smallest, with wide fireboxes, and incorporating many modern aids to maintenance such as roller bearings, hopper ashpans and self-cleaning smokeboxes. They were also relatively expensive to build, but the government insisted that it wanted high-quality locomotives rather than a cheap stop-gap solution, and Watson, who was something of a perfectionist, was happy to oblige. Because of the cost, only just over 100 of these designs were built before the outbreak of war.

Before too long, it became clear to those working on the railway that Watson’s standard locomotives, while reliable and providing adequate performance, did not respond well to being worked hard. Watson was adamant this was due to inappropriate driving and firing techniques, as Arransian enginemen had become accustomed to thrashing small engines that were not really up to the job. In early 1942 he set up a special stud of six of the twelve Class A5 4-6-2s at Wrangle on the Eastern Seaboard main line and for several months had them running 10-coach expresses loading to 350 tons or more at average speeds of 55 mph with clockwork precision and diesel-like levels of reliability. Indeed it is probable that had Arransia enjoyed a few more years of peace Watson would have been able to get his standard locomotives working well across the network – but they were always thoroughbreds, not workhorses. Over a quarter of the ANR locomotives designed by Watson are still in existence and they provide the bulk of the motive power for main-line preserved steam workings. Obviously they are not called upon to work particularly hard on these duties and modern preservationists appreciate their easy maintenance features and solid construction. Proportionately, Arransia has preserved more than twice as many of its all-time construction of steam locomotives as any other country.

The exception to this was the Class X2 2-8-2+2-8-2 Garratt type, which was basically two of the standard Class P2 2-8-2s combined in one locomotive. With a different design of boiler and a mechanical stoker, these did not need subtle handling and quickly established a reputation of being able to cope with anything thrown at them on the difficult, steeply-graded lines west of Holborough. ANR still (December 2005) have six of these in commission, but since they have over the years replaced all the main mechanical parts they are to all intents and purposes new locomotives. One was destroyed in the war and one, No. 8801, the prototype, is preserved in something like its original condition.

The outbreak of war in 1942 inevitably disrupted the railway’s plans. Watson recognised that his standard designs were too expensive and complex for series production in wartime, and came up with a simplified two-cylinder version of the standard Class V3 2-6-2 as a proposed war standard. Two of these were actually built (and allegedly were better than the originals) but the Ministry of War Production felt they were still too costly. Instead, they picked on the Class J22 0-6-0, a design that originated on the Northern Counties Railway in 1904, but had been improved by the fitting of superheaters and piston valves. These were simple, cheap and reliable and, when the need arose, could show a reasonable turn of speed. Watson reluctantly accepted this and from late 1943 onwards no other locomotives (apart from a few small saddle tanks) were built. The official railway speed limit was cut to 50 mph in 1942 and 40 mph in late 1946, so speed was not a factor. In total, 153 J22s were built during the war, the largest ever class of Arransian locomotives, and even now a handful are still in service. They were a pragmatic solution to a difficult situation and did what was expected of them. By the beginning of 1949 a number of major railway bridges had been destroyed by bombing and railway operations had become fragmented, although the Danby commuter network continued to function relatively unscathed until the end.

After the war, Watson hoped that he could restart production of the standard designs, but he was overruled by the railway management who felt that a policy of adopting simpler locomotives based on the Brunswickian war standard designs would be more effective. Not surprisingly, this led to his resignation and replacement by Donald Beattie (1896-1965) who had been his deputy but was more of a production engineer than a designer. The subsequent well-known classes – the P3 2-8-2s, A6 4-6-2s, B14 4-6-0s and L2 2-6-4Ts – are classified as Beattie’s designs but in reality were lightly brushed-over versions of existing Brunswickian types.

This move did not cause any great controversy at the time as it was generally accepted that the new designs were cheap to build, sturdy and easy to coax good performances out of. They rapidly became far more popular with the footplate crews than the Watson designs, and all of the latter had been taken out of active service by 1964. (Also, to be blunt, most Arransians would consider a bear to be a better all-round example of an animal than a gazelle). The ten remaining A5 4-6-2s did continue to handle most of the Eastern Seaboard expresses until electrification to Barcaldine was completed in that year, and the five remaining examples of the bigger A1 4-6-2s hauled most of the international expresses between Danby and the Tri-Cities until that line went under the wires in 1960. A general steam speed limit applied of 60 mph until 1954 and 70 mph thereafter, so there were no opportunities to match the late-20s record feats of the P17s. The general adoption of high-quality Brunswickian coal in the post-war years also improved the quality of locomotive performance in general. This also meant that some of Watson’s designs had unnecessarily large grate areas for the power they were expected to develop – the V3 2-6-2 and B14 4-6-0 are of similar size and power, but a B14 will do the same work on about 15% less coal.

After his resignation, Bruce Watson became heavily involved in steam preservation and managed to ensure that examples of all his designs apart from the two-cylinder variant of the V3s were secured for posterity. Regarded by everyone he worked with as one of life’s true gentlemen, he never showed any signs of bitterness over the post-war situation and was at times heard to remark that Arransians had to accept that the Great War had changed everything, and look to the future rather than the past. However, there remains a feeling amongst some Arransian steam enthusiasts that Watson and the country’s engineering traditions were somewhat betrayed after the war. The contrast between the elegant lines of the A5 and the rugged purposefulness of the similarly-sized A6 is very obvious when placed alongside each other.

During the summer of 2006, No. 4 Countess of Hanwold, of the A1 class, which is owned by the Bruce Watson Trust, was taken to the west of Brunswick where there is a long, straight and lightly used stretch of line. On Sunday 23rd July, she broke the world steam speed record, achieving 115.2 mph along a measured mile westbound, and 113.7 mph eastbound, an average of 114.4 mph. Although Brunswickian and Colmarine locomotives have been recorded at faster speeds, none were achieved on level track under test conditions. A better vindication for the veteran locomotive and her designer could hardly be imagined.

Specifications of Current Arransian Steam Locomotives

Return to Home Page