A. K. Astbury

“ I think I may safely say that Britain makes the best steam engines in the world. We still pin our faith mainly to steam engines, for economic and other reasons, but that is not to say that British Railways avoid using other forms of power. Diesel and diesel-electric engines are in constant use, and the line from Manchester to Sheffield, for example, when it is electrified, will be run entirely by electric locomotives... ”

“ Behind this coach is an ordinary train, and the men you see here are measuring, with the help of recording instruments, the amount of pull, in pounds, on the drawbar which con-nects the locomotive with the rest of the train. They take other measurements too, and can find out a great deal about the locomotive’s performance under all sorts of conditions of running. So scientists and technicians help to run the railway. But there are men in equally vital jobs in all parts of the railway service, and on all of them depends the smooth running of this great organisation. ”

“ You know these men, or men very like them – the guard, the engine driver and the fireman; they represent a whole army of experienced railwaymen whom we trust so confidently every time we travel by train. ”

“ Now here you can see that locomotive wheel, or one like it, with its tyre in place, waiting for the time when it can be fitted in place in the locomotive being built on the right. When the time comes for this loco to have its wheels put on, it will be swung in the air, the wheels will be arranged in place underneath it, and it will slowly be lowered on to them. Just as important as the work of building locomotives is that of keeping them in repair. Routine examinations of locomotives and coaches keep up the railway’s safety standards. ”

“ You probably know that pigeon fanciers hold races to see whose bird can get home first. And this is where the railways come in, for all the pigeons you see here came from the north in ten railway vans. On occasions like this the baskets are piled up by the side of the train, and then at a given moment the doors are slipped open and the pigeons fly out on their 250-mile journey home. ”

“ You know that metal expands when it is heated. Well, when the tyre which is lying on the floor here, is heated by the squarish gas burners arranged round it, it will expand sufficiently to let the wheel slip inside it. And then, when the tyre cools, it grips the wheel tightly and the whole wheel is ready for the track. The tyre, of course, saves the wheel from getting worn, and can be renewed if necessary like the iron tyre of a farm cart. ”

“ This engine is a special type known as a ‘Garratt’, and it can haul a train of anything up to a hundred wagons filled with coal. This particular loco-motive is two engines in one. It has four cylinders fed with steam from the boiler in the middle, which is in turn fed with water from the tanks at front and rear. Such engines, which are the most powerful we have, are used for mineral traffic – coal and iron ore. Coal class traffic – of which we carried nearly a hundred and sixty-five million tons in 1949 – is obviously of vital importance to the country. ”

“ A gas turbine loco which will be more powerful than No. 18000 is under con-struction in this country now. ‘But no one would dream of suggesting that the age of the steam locomotive is past in Britain. Indeed, for many years to come British Railways will have to depend mainly on the steam locomotive. Whether it’s intended for shunting or hauling goods trains, or for passenger expresses, as this one is, the steam loco is still a satisfactory piece of mechanism, and it is as fast as any rival form of traction. ”

“ The passenger comes first to the booking offices, then goes out on to the concourse and passes the timetables in the middle of the open space: he then comes to the train indicator, and finally arrives at the platforms themselves. The station is arranged so that the passenger comes across everything in the right order.
Now so far you’ve heard what might be called the outside story of the railways. But there’s an inside story, too – the story of a whole organisation of which the ordinary man or woman knows little. British Railways, for instance, build almost all the steam locomotives they use... ”

“ The results of these tests will help in designing the dozen or so standard locomotives I have already told you about. Passenger trains are usually thought of as the spectacular part of railway working.
But goods trains too are not without romance. Many who love trains would just as soon be travelling through the Scottish Highlands in the guard’s van of this train as they would be going off on the Golden Arrow for a week in Paris. ”

“ The men in train control rooms such as that at Manchester do their work by giving instructions to signal boxes, each of which controls a small section of line. There are some ten thousand signal boxes in Britain, and about twenty thousand miles of line – a signal box for every two miles of railway. I may also mention that there are about twenty thousand locomotives. on British Railways. This is the signal box at Waterloo Station, London. The diagrams on the wall show all the lines running into the platforms and every set of points and signals under the signalman’s control. ”

“ It is the busiest railway junction in the worid. More than two thousand five hundred trains pass through here every twenty-four hours – that is an average of two a minute all through the day and night. Actually, at the peak period, there is a train passing about every twenty seconds, and it has been worked out that about two thousand passengers ride through the station every minute during the morning and evening peak periods. ”

“ And here, in one of the nerve centres of British Railways, you find the men who have the minute-to-minute responsibility for the movement of goods and passenger trains in their area. This is the central control at Manchester for the Central Division of the London Midland Region, where trains are directed throughout the system shown on the map on the wall. Each man is responsible for a section, which is mapped out in straight lines in front of him. ”

“ This loco is driven by a gas turbine motor in which the large quantities of air which it inhales are compressed in a compressor and heated in a combustion chamber. The air emerges from the combustion chamber at high speed and drives a turbine, and this turbine drives an electric generator. ”

“ In the tower a man works an automatic device which alters the points outside according to which siding, or road’ as it’s called, the wagons should run into. On each set of rails there is a retarder which is used to slow the wagons down to the right speed for running into the siding. ”

“ Here is one of them being pushed on to the train ferry at Harwich on its way to Holland for trials on the Dutch electrified railway system. On the top of the locomotive, folded fiat, you can see the pantograph. And yet power – steam, diesel, or electric – could not drive this vast and intricate machine of British Railways without what you might call the permanent installations of the railways – track, stations, bridges, warehouses. As far as track is concerned, our forefathers did their job well. We do not often have to lay new railways. ”

“ Sometimes they move whole farms from one part of the country to another and horses, cows and sheep are frequently railway travellers. There’s a big trade in livestock with Ireland, for instance, and the railways have special accommoda-tion for livestock at Heysham, Holyhead and Fishguard. ”

“ It can carry enough fuel for a 250-mile run. It uses diesel oil to start, and then when it is warmed up it switches over to heavy furnace fuel oil. British Railways think that this type of power unit should be much easier to maintain than (for example) a diesel engine, and that the loco will therefore be available for service on a greater number of days per year. This gas turbine loco was built in Switzerland. ”

“ Here’s another way in which testing is carried out – in what is known as a dynamometer car coupled to the locomotive itself. This is the inside of such a car; this one belongs to the London Midland Region. ”

“ In many areas, too, one of the running rails carries a small electric current, and as soon as it is occupied by the passage of a train the signals are automatically locked against any other trains trying to enter that portion of the track. ”

“ The older man is holding a microphone in his hand by which he can speak through loud speakers to the men on duty outside in the marshalling yard. You’ve already seen quite a good deal about railway working. ”

“ Power which you see here is in its simplest form. These three giants are of the type which takes main-line express trains from King’s Cross, London, to Yorkshire, Newcastle, and Scotland. The one on the right, incidentally, is being swung round on a turntable by the man holding the lever. ”