Revisiting The Red Devil by David Wardale

I have been having another read of The Red Devil by David Wardale (2002 reprint) which gives a fascinating and interesting account of the final development of the steam locomotive with special reference to how its performance stacked up against the all conquering diesel. In some ways however I find it a difficult book to enjoy in that it has been printed in what is to me, a very small font size and in a format which presents a block effect mass of text on each page. There is probably a technical term for the use of right justified text but I find the overall effect most off putting.

On a technical level I find it intriguing that the USA did not take up the idea of a Garratt locomotive as it would appear to have been the answer to many of their problems especially when used with the 3 cylinder format. I was also expecting to see a discussion of a UK development based upon a Black Five/Class 5 chassis which I sure had been reported in the technical press at the time but could find no references to it in the David Wardle’s book.

I would be interested to hear other people’s views on the topic

I think steam hit the buffers mainly because it simply took too many bodies to run one

A diesel guy could stumble into work at 07:59 and have his train up and running at 08:00

It's a very good book and very interesting, I thought it might be only me that found it a bit annoying to read, glad there's another one! I just re-read "Chapelon, genius of french steam", which I see has been reprinted and has some interesting points on the end of steam on french railways and the introduction of diesels. Well worth a read if you are interested in the development of the steam locomotive.

Might be me but I always found Don Young's writing style a bit off putting, and hated all the bits in bold capitals, funny how something like that can put you off a bit.

However my wife does say I'm not quite normal.

Dave

There are 3 of us !   I have had several attempts to read this book and failed as like you I find the text too small and the style off putting ! It's a thick book that would, if a larger font had been used been tooo big or run to 2 volumes. If Formula 1 train racing had happened then Dante Porta would have been leading the top team ! The fact that a steam engine was so "simple" and would keep running even when the maintenance was nonexsistant was in part it's down fall as vast amounts of fuel and water were wasted. Only last evening I watched a clip of Garratts in Zimbabwe, piston rod gland and cylinder drains leaking badly ! but it still ran . I seem to remember that one of the latter day experts on I think the tallynin railway stopped all the leaks and made a dramatic fuel saving ! Ah well, Noel

As for deisel ! Steam max torque at stall, diesel requires a complicated transmission system of some sort that took years to get right, precisin engineered and needed very skilled people to keep it running !

Edited By noel shelley on 02/10/2022 11:36:25

Edited By noel shelley on 02/10/2022 11:40:15

Not really, don’t forget all the pre-departure checks.

Also providing the train or loco had not stood outside all night in mid winter and wouldn’t start.

Edited By V8Eng on 02/10/2022 12:20:07

If you're interested in diesel start-up procedures, Talking Pictures TV (Freeview channel 82) are showing the training film Driving the Train (1959) on 5th October at 05:40. Bit early, but set the recorder! They are running a season of British Transport films at the moment.

Rob

I will certainly record that it will be interesting to see the official view.

I worked on diesel maintenance for BR throughout the1960s (Apprenticeship plus about 7 post years), DMU plus classes 08, 35 & 52 then latterly class 47.

I remember many issues with prep for service and starting etc and the last hours of night shift was not funny.

Edited By V8Eng on 02/10/2022 17:11:43

Getting back to the original topic, I found Wardale's book a good source of info, but more than a little soporific. On the Red Devil:

the port area/swept volume was not as good as a BR standard even after he'd altered it, and he had all the complication of limited cut off and starting valves,

all the complication of steam cooled valves was pointless, because he got no more superheat than other modern locos

and the gas producer firebox only worked with one very specific type of coal and one fireman.

I've no doubt that the exhaust mods were worthwhile, but even then BR experimented with Giesel ejectors and didn't find any great improvement.

It's pointless comparing the latest steam locos, which had 120 years of development, with the early diesels. BR should have started diesel development in 1948, continuing the work of the LMS and SR. As it turned out they panic bought all sorts of junk from companies who clearly didn't understand that diesels engines need to be built to better tolerances that steam engines, wasting a great deal of money in the process.

Edited By duncan webster on 02/10/2022 22:44:14

My understanding is close to Duncan's. By about 1920 all the obvious engineering efficiencies had been applied to steam locomotives and their further improvement calls for a lot of complicated careful attention to details that don't deliver significantly better performance. But we like the idea that mavericks know better than expurts, even though loose cannons are rarely successful. Hence the myth that Red Devil was shutdown because it embarrassed SA Railways by proving their dieselisation policy was wrong.

Fundamentally, the best reciprocating steam engine can't compete with the best diesel except in the special case where coal and labour are both very cheap, or it's part of a heritage railway, or diesel oil becomes very expensive.

In 1955, as a nationalised entity BR bet the farm in on British industry being able to make reliable diesel engines, and British industry failed! I don't know why, but suppose Diesel engines are difficult to get right, other products were more profitable during the 1950s boom, and most UK manufacturing operated on a toxic mix of unwillingness to invest, dreadful labour relationships, and small-c conservatism on all sides. Unfortunately past triumphs are liable to become a drag in engineering: rather than cherish Stevenson's Rocket it's vital for engineers to meet tomorrows needs, which means forward thinking, not resting on one's laurels.

Nonetheless, the decision to dump steam locomotives was absolutely right, and we now live in a world full of reliable diesel engines powering trucks, cars, ships, and railways etc. Their time is ending too, which is why it's important to prepare for more change. Unlikely Diesel locomotives will be replaced by steam, but it's not impossible...

Dave

I don't think you can criticise the whole of British industry concerning diesel engines for BR as companies such as Paxman had been making successful diesel engines for naval use such as submarines from before the second world war, see here

Apart from the DMUs I was involved with Maybach engines and German transmission systems on the WR plus EE on the 08s followed by mainly Sulzer engines 

Like  Tricky says I do not think you can lump British industry together and am sure Napier, Paxman & EE plus others would be very offended by some of the comments.

I feel that much of BR think during initial dieselisation was hidebound and stuck in individual company ideology so instead of a unified way forward various regions ploughed their own furrow.

Edited By V8Eng on 03/10/2022 14:28:13

Edited By V8Eng on 03/10/2022 14:43:27

Not all the early diesels were junk, English Electric and Brush seemed to be not too bad, in fact the type 37 and 20 lasted a very long time, but anything made by North British seemed to be suspect, in fact BR refused to have anything more to do with them. Anyone remember Co-Bo locos? There was a suggestion that BR design the chassis/bogie/bodywork and let different companies fit their engine/generator /motor. This would have made a lot of sense, then unreliable bits could have been replaced instead of scrapping the whole loco. If they had started this development in 1948 they would have been 7 years down the road by the time of the modernisation plan. I'm not blaming BR, a lot of it was down to politicians who don't understand engineering.

Just because an engine works in a boat or stationary application doesn't mean it will work in a loco, they have to be 'tractionised'

The steam versus diesel debate surely has always been driven by the economics prevailing at the current times. To be fair to the US, with their massive reserves of coal the resurgence of interest in steam as a source of motive power especially for the haulage of freight came about in the 70’s after there had been a big hike in the costs of imported oil. With the successful introduction of fracking leading to an independency from foreign energy imports the situation would be unlikely to arise in today’s world.

In the discussion of using a Garratt as the basis for modern development of steam traction David Wardale give as one of their many advantages the fact that they can be run in either direction without the need for expensive turntables or the use of ‘Y’s as used in the classic days of steam.

I don’t understand however why he goes on to say that the extra water carrying tank car to be coupled to the Garratt would still need to be shunted forward at the end of the run and then run around to the front of the Garratt for the return journey. Can anyone explain why this should be so?

The context was Diesel engines for locomotives and the firms chosen by BR to provide them. The 1954 Modernisation Plan was flawed in many ways, but this comment about Dieselisation is typical. (From the BR Wiki.)

'Several large orders for hundreds of locomotives were placed while the prototype was still undergoing tested or even, in some cases, before the prototype had even been built. Accepting orders from a myriad of manufacturers also led to BR acquiring an unnecessarily diverse locomotive fleet, with large numbers of different but similar classes. This increased the cost and complexity of maintenance and led to operational difficulties (for instance there was no universal system for multiple working). The poor reliability of many of the locomotive designs procured under the Modernisation Plan led to much lower availability ratings than predicted and the large-scale withdrawal of several classes or the curtailing of planned orders, leaving BR short of suitable motive power in some areas. Some of the diesel classes ordered in 1955 were withdrawn before the steam locomotives they were intended to replace.'

Didn't help that British submarines had decent-ish engines. Someone decided BR had to buy British, and British makers took contracts without being able to meet the timescales.

Dave

You want the water tank just behind the loco, so it's not a simple matter of running the loco round the train

My understanding is close to Duncan's. By about 1920 all the obvious engineering efficiencies had been applied to steam locomotives and their further improvement calls for a lot of complicated careful attention to details that don't deliver significantly better performance.

SOD and Duncan, The work of Porta in Cuba would seem to contadict the above statement, where he used local labour and materials to achieve a significant improvement., or was he starting with a very poor loco ?

With one machine returning about 5%t thermal efficiency and the other nearer 40% only cheap local coal would alter the balance ! Noel.

I think that's almost always the case, you don't spend a lot of time and money rebuilding a good loco. I remember the discussion I had with a chap about Clupet rings, he reckoned they were the bee's knees as he'd taken an engine which leaked past the rings, rebored it, made new pistons and fitted Clupet rings instead of the original once round jobs. Surprise, it stopped the leaks. Clupet rings are great, a lot better than the originals! It never occurred him that reboring and fitting new normal rings would have achieved the same objective. Yes a lot of steam locos could have been a lot better than they were, but the later BR standards were probably as good as you were going to get without a lot of complication, and in the UK at least, complication never paid off. As I said above, perhaps the exhaust could have been improved, but they did try the Giesel with mixed results. It didn't help on the 9f, but did on the Bulleid Battle of Britain Fighter Command, but according to something I've read somewhere, the Bulleid exhaust wasn't all that good anyway

Just noticed that "Driving the Train" instructional film is being repeated on TPTV at 7:05 pm this Wednesday, 26th October, in case you missed it.

Rob

I think the problem with advocates of 'Modern Steam' is shortage of figures and successful implementations. Porta had lots of sensible ideas, like putting extra insulation on boilers, and I'm sure he was able to to improve performance and efficiency. Not least because theory and practice allow wiggle room - marine steam is far better than locomotive engines. The possibilities are tantalising.

Trouble is it's hard to fit efficient features into the space available to a railway engine, reliability suffers, and the extra maintenance is unwelcome. Lots of give and take too - increasing boiler pressure is a 'good thing' but the higher temperature causes the boiler to waste more heat by radiation, it's hard to insulate thoroughly, and the boiler has to be stronger. A condenser increases efficiency considerably but is heavy and bulky, requires clean water, and yet more maintenance. Double, Triple and Quadruple expansion are theoretically possible but difficult to fit to a locomotive and maintenance goes through the roof.

Other optimisations are highly particular and can't easily be adapted to other circumstances. A loco that runs on Welsh Steam Coal needs major modifications to run well on wood and vice versa. Reading about the Red Devil I get the impression the efficiency gains reported are very specific, including a need for the designer to supervise operation of the engine! Not very practical, when real locos are driven by differently skilled crews, and do stop-start, bends, inclines with a variety of loads and speeds. It's easy to improve efficiency over a narrow range and hard to do it in all circumstances. (Formula 1 cars are rubbish on public roads!)

A well-designed full-size steam locomotive is unlikely to be more than about 6% efficient and between 2 and 5% efficiency is more common. It's impossible for steam to beat an internal combustion engine where the operating fluid and fuel burn at high-temperature and pressure inside a closed closed cylinder and there's no heat-leaking boiler and pipework, and no heavy motion work, wire-drawing, scale or weak fire problems.

Small engines are worse than big ones - IMLEC winners typically achieve an efficiency somewhat over 2%.

The horrible truth is the Law of Diminishing returns applies. Steam locomotives were pretty much as good as they get by 1930, and although they can be improved, the results aren't spectacular. Certainly nowhere near the 35 to 50% thermal efficiency of a modern diesel or electric train.

Dave

Possibly some of the problems with early diesels stemmed from a lack of familiarity, so that applying steam locomotive techniques to a diesel engine and its transmission sometimes did more harm than good.

The two cat DMUs were powered by 6 cyindere AEC or Leyland engines mated to preselector gearboxes.

The three car DMUs were powered by 8 cylinder Rolls Royce C Range engines, driving into Twin Disc torque converters.

One of our service engineers.told me that he found Stratford Depot tightening cylinder head bolts by walking around the engine with a long bar on the socket, rather than the specified torque wrench.

Maybe, the then suppliers failed to provide sufficient technical support, or perhaps BR did not realise that it was necessary?

What was tolerable for a 2" BSW was not suitable for a 9/16" UNF, and the castings into which it fitted.

It took time to learn to work to much closer tolerances and clearances than those suitable for a steam engine.

When Foster Yeoman introduced the Class 59s, General Motors Electro Motive Division provided a lot of technical support, which ensured their success; (Leading to the Class 66s that now roam across Europe)..