Proceedings Institution of Mechanical Engineers
1880-9
key file
Francq, Léon
Reply on the discussion upon fireless locomotives. 37-43.
See also Volume 30 page 610 et
seq. Rueil and Marly-le-Roi Tramway. In reply to Tomlinson, it was
maintained that hot water could be applicd to work trains on underground
railways, where the length of line did not exceed 12 to 15 miles, and where
the gradients were similar to those of the Metropolitan Railway. Since 2000
litres of hot water were found to produce motive forcc sufficient to draw
a load of the gross weight of 36 tons over a line 9 miles long, 12,000 litres
would certainly do six times as much work, or more than sufficient to draw
a train of the Metropolitan Railway, which weighs 100 tons. Therefore, there
were really only two points to examine, (1) the power and rapidity with which
the engine can start, and (2) the possibility of storing 12,000 litres of
hot water on the engine. Now power and rapidity of starting may be obtained
in all cases with four cylinders, and perhaps on straight level lines with
two cylinders of large diameter. Again the author’s investigations showed
that it is possible
Browne, B.C.
On Brown's tramway locomotive. 44-56. Disc.: 57-81 + Plates 1-3 (5 diagrs.)
The conditions required to be met by a Tramway Locomotive over
and above those of an ordinary locomotive were:
(a) No visible smoke or steam, no visible fire, no noise of either blast
or machinery, and no visible working parts. The object of these restrictions
was to avoid frightening horses or annoying the public.
(b) The engine must work both ways, the driver being always in a commanding
position; it must be able to exert great power for starting and stopping
on steep inclines, and must both start and stop very easily; it must run
round sharp curves, and adapt itself to any inequalities in the road its
working parts must be readily accessible and easily repaired; its firing
and feeding must need no attention while it is running ; lastly, it must
be worked by one man.
(c) The Board of Trade requires beyond these a speed indicator always visible
to the driver, a governor, and a bell or whistle for signalling.
Having carefully considered these conditions, it was concluded that among
existing engines they were best and most economically met by the engine of
Charles Brown of Winterthur.
Riches, T. Hurry
Is automatic action necessary or desirable in a continuous railway brake?
100-12. Disc.: 113-51.
Larsen, J.D.
On permanent way for street tramways, with special reference to steam traction.
188-202. Disc.: 203-23 + Plates 15-18. 36 diagrs.
Cowper, Edward A.
Address of the President. 312-23.
His father saw Trevithick's locomotive running in Euston Square, and
noted that it derailed due to excessive speed. The Address was very wide
ranging,. but he did find space to mention Webb's adoption of the Joy valve
gear..
Stileman, F.C.
On the docks and railway approaches at Barrow-in-Furness. 324-9. Disc.: 329-35
+Plates 33-8.
Partly autobiographical noting that as a pupil of J.R. McClean he
set out the railway between Barrow and Dalton and Kirkby which opened in
June 1846 and was designed to transport iron ore and slate. Describes the
Buccleuch Dock Brisge with its sprung girders and hydraulic machinery.
Joy, David
On a new reversing and expansive valve-gear. 418-29. Disc.: 430-54 + Plates
57-69. 40 diagrs.
Strong, George S.
On a feed-water heater and filter for stationary and locomotive boilers.
539-45. Disc.: 545-51 + Plates 75-77 (7 diagrs. incl. 2 s. els.).
Great Southern & Western Railway of Ireland 0-6-0 and Metropolitan
Railway 4-4-0T.
Cowper, Edward A.
President's Address. 413-24.
Cowper was not a locomotive engineer, but was an astute observer of
Victorian engineering: thus the following verbatum quotations are significant,
especially as the Address was given in Newcastle:
It seems but a few years ago that George Stephenson, at a meeting in 1847,
proposed the resolution that the Institution of Nechanical Engineers be formed.
He was strongly supported by a large number of the mechanical engineers of
the country, and I had the honour of seconding the resolution that he be
our first President.... Locomotives have shared to some extent in the general
improvement in machinery. The boilers are better made, and are safer at the
higher pressures now carried than they were formerly with a lower pressure.
Several new valve gears of great promise have been brought forward, both
for locomotives and marine engines.
Amongst these Joy's motion should be again noticed, and I have in my hand
a note from Mr. Webb (who I am sorry to say cannot be with us to-day), in
which he refers to his promise of last year to report on the subject to the
members. He says, "The engine has been continuously at work ever since the
Barrow meeting, and had run 30,273 miles up to the 18th July, when wo had
it in for examination, and found the motion practically as good as the day
it went out of the shop, more especially the slides, about which so many
of the people who spoke at the meeting seemed to have doubts. I do not think
you could get a visiting card between the slides and the blocks; in fact,
the engine has been sent out to work again, having had nothing whatever done
to it. The first thing of course that will require doing will be the tyres:
as far as I can see nothing else will want doing for some time.
Automatic continuous brakes are now coming into use, adding greatly to the
safety of railway travelling; indeed, it has for some time been obvious,
that with tbe higher speed and greater number of express trains, some more
powerful means of stopping quickly than the old guard's brake van has become
absolutely necessary; and the advantage of being able to stop a quick train
in 250 yards is self-evident. Improvements have been made in the direction
of ensuring greater safety on Railways during the last dozen years, as the
"Block System" has become general, and interlocking of signals and switches,
and the use of switch locks, have become the rule instead of being the
exception.
Bell, I. Lowthian
On the Tyne as connected with the history of engineering. 425-47.
The following extract is informative as it presents the "Newcastle
perception" of how the steam locomotive developed and must have coloured
many subsequent studies.
It is supposed that the first idea of forming the railroad of cast iron occurred
in 1738 ; but 6he wagons in use on the wooden roads being too heavy, or the
iron rails too light to carry the load, it required thirty years before it
struck any one to diminish the size of the one, or to increase the weight
of the other. Such a rate of progress would appear indeed to justify the
belief that the development of mechanical engineering did not exceed the
‘’ contrivings ” referred to in the opening remarks of this
paper
For forty or fifty years the horse on the level, and on uneven ground the
steam-engine by means of ropes, continued to labour on the iron roads in
conveying coal to its point of destination; when a crude idea of
Trevithick’s was taken hold of by Mr. Blackett, of Wylam near Newcastle,
who, with the aid of his engineer, William Hedley, constructed the first
locomotive which ever did any work worthy of the name.
In a small cottage, situate on the railway along which Mr. Blackett’s
engine ran, but some thirty years before its appearance, George Stephenson
was born. To his ingenuity, and particularly to his confidence in the then
improved powers of the engine, the world owes a good deal in respect to the
period at which it received the gift of the locomotive, as we see it at the
present day. First at Killingworth, for the use of the colliery there, and
next at the Walker Iron Works for sale, locomotive engines were constructed
under his superintendence. These early engines, according to information
left by the late Nicholas Wood, and given to the writer by his son, Mr. Lindsay
Wood, cost £500, and weighed, exclusive of the water tank, 6 tons. The
boiler was 8 ft. long and 4 ft. 2 in. in diameter, with a single tube. On
a level road, and with a consumption of 16 cwt. of coal per day, these engines,
on the Hetton colliery railway, could draw twelve wagons of coal, weighing,
all included, about 48 tons, at the rate of four miles an hour. Upon this
slender foundation of experience, gained from our collieries and from the
first public railway in the world, the Stockton and Darlington, Stephenson
was able by his force of character to build an argument, which determined
the adoption of the locomotive on the Liverpool and Manchester line. An
experimental engine, the famous Rocket, was built within a stone’s throw
of this room, by means of which the then unheard and undreamt-of speed of
nearly thirty miles an hour was attained.
From the diminutive dimensions of this early attempt, the locomotive grew,
under the fostering care of the Stephensons, father and son, of the Hawthorns
in this town, and of other firms elsewhere, to a machine which is a marvel
of compactness, combined with mechanical strength and power. By means of
it something like 1000 tons of dead load can now be drawn on a level, at
a speed of 25 to 30 miles an hour. For this extraordinary amount of duty
we are indebted to the multitubular boiler, suggested by Henry Booth, and
first successfully applied by the Stephensons in the Rocket engine.
In less than twenty years after the celebrnted trial on the Liverpool and
Manchester Railway, the London newspapers were delivered by the locomotive
in Edinburgh on the evening of the day of publication. It needs nothing more
than to recall the existence of the many many thousands of miles of railway
at work in different quarters of the globe, as an evidence of the vast changes
which have sprung out of the northern coalowner’s attempts to economise
his cost of transport.
Crampton, Thomas Russell
On an automatic hydraulic system for excavating the Channel Tunnel. 440-50.
+ Plates 82-4
The successful completion of the Mont Cenis and St. Gothard tunnels
led to design of rotary boring machine to drive tunnel through chalk and
arrangements to transport spoil in the form of sludge (or cream) back to
base shaft by pumping. Based on lecture delivered at the Conversazione at
Lceds on 16 August, 1S82.
Parker Smith, W.
On the automatic screw brake. 500-8. Disc.: 508-18. + Plates 89-91.
Brake had been tested for a year on the Liskeard and Caradon Railway,
Cornwall. The apparatus consisted essentially (1) of a screwed metal sleeve
A, Figs. 1 to 6, Plates 89 and 90, loosely encircling an axle B of the coach,
from which, by means of a coned friction-clutch C, it may be rotated when
desired ; (2) of a part-nut D, contained in a cast-iron box, which, by means
of a cam E, Figs. 3 to 5, may be raised and lowered, so as to engage with
and be disengaged from the screwed sleeve. A lever F performs by its descent
and ascent the double duty of engaging and disengaging the part-nut ; and
also, when in its lowest position, acts as a wedge for forcing together the
surfaces of the coned friction-clutch, as shown in plan, Fig. 6. The action
of the apparatus is as follows. If the lever is held up in its highest position,
as shown dotted in Fig. 5, Plate 90, the part-nut is held up clear of the
screwed sleeve, as in Fig. 3, and the surfaces of the coned clutch are not
in contact. If the lever is permitted to descend by its weight to its lowest
position, shown full in Fig. 5, the part-nut becomes engaged with the screwed
sleeve, as in Fig. 4, and the surfaces of the coned clutch are also brought
into contact by the wedging action of the lever. Any downward pressure applied
to the lever in this position results in the screwed sleeve revolving, and
the part-nut being carried to the right or to the left of its central position,
according to the direction in which the axle is revolving. It will be seen
by the plan, Fig. 2, that, with the double inclines on the pair of horizontal
levers H H, a movement in either direction will cause the ends G G of the
two brake-rods to move inwards, and so bring the brake-blocks against the
wheels. For the purpose of obtaining downward pressure on the lever, and
of graduating the friction between the surfaces of the friction cones, there
is mounted loosely on the lever a sliding weight of about 10 lbs., W, Fig.
5. The lower the weight is permitted to slide down the lever, the greater
will be the friction produced between the surfaces of the cones; and as the
power which the screwed sleeve is capable of
Webb, Francis William
On compound locomotive engines. 438-62 + Plates 41-4 (9 diagrs.).
Discussion: W.E. Rich noted that he been requested by the Royal
Agricultural Society to report on the advantages of compounding and had concluded
that it increased by one third the time an engine could remain in service,
or the distance it could travel, or the work it could perform (J. Roy.
Ag. Soc., 1881, 17, 661). M.A. Gottschalk (449-50) noted that
marine application of compounding had reduced fuel consumption and wear of
the engines. T.R. Crampton (450-1) recorded that simplicity should be axiomatic
and cited Aveling's single cylinder traction engines. Furthermore, he accused
Webb of not comparing like with like when justifying compounding, but he
did agree with Webb's attempt to do away with coupling rods. D. Joy (452)
supported Webb on the substantial savings in fuel brought with compounding
(8 lbs/mile) and noted the free running achieved with the absence of coupling
rods. Druitt Halpin (455-8). Borodin (457) noted that Aveling had at the
last show at which he had exhibited (Derby 1881), showed a conipound engine,
and if he had lived no doubt he would have continued the practice. Alexander
McDonnell (458-9). William Stroudley (459-).
Cowper, Edward A.
On the inventions of James Watt, and his models preserved at Handsworth and
South Kensington. 599-631 + Plates 55-87.
First report to the Council of the Committee on Friction
at High Velocities; by Alexander Blackie, William Kennedy and A. Morin.
660-7.
Various authorities, including Fleeming Jenkin, A.S. Kimball, R.H.
Thurston, Douglas Galton, and George Westinghouse.
Marie, George.
On the consumption of fuel in compound locomotives. 82-101. Disc.: 101-25.
Webb made a written contribution, but the spoken discussion turned
towards criticism of Webb's compound locomotive from McDonnell, Ramsbottom
and Aspinall.
Decauville, Paul
On portable railways. 126-49.
Longridge, Michael
On the Moscrop engine recorder, and the Knowles supplementary governor. 150-66.
Savill, A. Slater
Description of the automatic and exhaust-steam injector. 167-89.
Bell, Lowthian
Address of the President. 202-26
Riches, Charles H.
Description of the new locomotive running shed of the Taff Vale Railway at
Cathays, Cardiff. 243-56.
Urquhart, Thomas
On the use of petroleum refuse as fuel in locomotive engines. 272-330.
Slater, Alfred
On the mineral wagons of South Wales. 415-43.
Timmis, Illius A.
On the application of electro-magnets to the working of railway signals and
points. 444-71.
Volume 36 (1885)
Richardson, John
On recent adaptations of the Robey semi-portable engine. 371-5 + Plates 43-9
(15 diagrs.).
Volume 37 (1886)
Borodin, Alexander
Experiments on the steam-jacketing and compounding of locomotives in Russia.
297-354
Sandiford, Charles
On the working of compound locomotives in India. 355-409.
Volume 38 (1887)
Brown. Francis R.F.
On the construction of Canadian locomotives. 186-273.
Geoghegan, Samuel
Description of tramways and rolling stock at Guinness's Brewery. 327-40.
Disc.: 340-62 + Plates 51-68.
Urquhart, Thomas
Supplementary paper on the use of petroleum refuse as fuel in locomotive
engines. 36-84.
Lapage, R. Herbert
On compound locomotives. 85-117. Disc.: 118-47 + Plates 23-35.
Experience of two-cylinder compounds in the Argentine. Also included
data on coke consumption of compound tramway locomotives on the Manchester
Bury Rochdale and Oldham Tramways and on the Rossendale Tramway.
Discussion: Samuel Johnson (118-19) wrote that
he had had no experience with" compound locomotive engines, but had watched
with considerable interest the records of the working of the Webb and Worsdell
compounds, the results of which he thought were such as were likely to be
obtained by the use of a higher boiler-pressure and a higher degree of expansion.
He had not yet seen any records of trials made in Britain between simple
and compound engines where equal boiler-pressures and the same kind and quality
of fuel had been used, and where the engines had been capable of taking the
same maximum load ; and to his mind comparisons made on other bases than
them were of little value. With regard to the experiments made by Adams on
the London and South Western Railway with both Mr. Webb's and Mr. Worsdell's
compounds, in neither case had he been able to arrive at any satisfactory
conclusion ; and he thought it would afford valuable information if these
experiments could be continued until something definite was arrived at.
The saving of fuel by the compounds was given at 15%. Some three years ago
he had made a number of locomotive boilers to work at a pressure of 160 psi,
and had employed the engines on the same duties as those working at 140 psi;
in every other respect the engines were of the same class. The result had
at once been a saving of fuel of from 11 to 13%. with the higher pressure,
a saving almost directly in proportion to the increase of 14¼%. in the
boiler pressure. From the 20 lbs. increase in pressure no inconvenience whatever
had been experienced in any of the working parts of the engines-cylinders,
valves, rods, or bearings. He had no prejudice either in favour of for or
against any particular design of engine, providing it was suited to the work
it had to perform; and he should be in favour of any engine which could be
proved to do an equal amount of mechanical duty to an ordinary engine, with
a smaller amount of fuel and at lower aggregate cost.
The question arose, how far could the ordinary boiler-pressure of 140 psi
in the simple engine be increased with advantage, and without inconvenience
in working ; and to what extent had tho compound engine an advantage, if
any, over the simple engine. It must be admitted there were several good
points about Mr. Webb's compound engine : - firstly, it got rid of outside
coupling-rods ; secondly, the fire-box and grate area could be made as large
as could be wished ; thirdly, there was only a single-crank axle, instead
of a double one. But on the other hand there were three cylinders and three
sets of motion to do the work, instead of two, involving a consequent increase
of friction owing to increased number of parts.
As a specimen of the working of heavy fast main-line passenger trains on
the Midland Railway, the results from a number of engines over a considerable
period on the Carlisle section showed a consumption of 29-3 lbs. of fuel
per train-mile with an average load of 133/8 vehicles, and
30.1 Ibs. per train-mile on the Leicester and London section with an average
of 14¼ vehicles : using in each case the ordinary coal of the district.
The booked speeds of these trains were from 48 to 50 miles per hour; and
the coal used included that for getting up steam, standing &c., in fact
all coal bookcd to the engine. The published consumption of Mr. Webb's large
compounds on similar duties he believed was 29.5 lbs. per train-mile..
English, Thomas
Further experiments on condensation and re-evaporation of steam in a jacketed
cylinder. 641-702.
First Report of the Research Committee on the Value of the Steam-jacket: tabulated results of previous experiments; Alexander Blackie and William Kennedy. 703-45.