[Closed] favourite steam engine

Its got to be Mallard for me too but to be honest, any steam engine is awesome.

A4s are beautiful.

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Saw this loco at Dobwalls 15 - 20 years ago. Amazing piece of engineering. Love to see a full size one!

Valve's

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These are ridiculously bad-ass, claimed to be the most powerful ever built, just barely shy of 8000hp. Ugly tender but there's something really right about the engine, like it was machined out of a solid lump of Powah.

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This one at New Lanark. It was one of our apprentice projects, almost needed time team to dig it out of the ground at the front of that hall. Unfortunately we never got it running on steam, wished I'd paid more attention at the time as we treated it all as a bit of a jolly, never really going to get the chance to do something like that again.

I was going to post up my Mamod from when I were a nipper, but NW's 8000HP pushes it close...

Went to Kempton Steam Museum the other day. This was awesome:

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Mallard or Flying Scotsman

http://store.steampowered.com/

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The Manchester Regiment.
Odd reason. My dad was a civil engineer working for Monk. He also built models trains, as a hobby at first and then after leaving his job for a living. The Manchester Regiment in 00 scale was the first he sold, and was gifter back to me by a collector from the states when he found out my dad had died. He even made a couple of models for the museum in York when that opened....

Have you got any pictures of your dad's work?

How about some traction engines?

[url= https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4081/4821398025_a01a9eecbb_z.jp g" target="_blank">https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4081/4821398025_a01a9eecbb_z.jp g"/> [/img][/url]
[url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/cycleologist/4821398025/ ]Hydro-Electric Brochure 28[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/people/cycleologist/ ]Ben Cooper[/url], on Flickr

I've always wanted one of these:

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When I lived in Rossendale the East Lancs Railway engines used to chuff past my house, close enough for the exhausts to rattle my windows. One day the Nigel Gresley came whizzing past and my neighbour Rita exclaimed: "Eeeh! Did ya see that? It were that Nigel Dempster!"

In a similar vein I once asked her son Jamie what she and her BF liked to drink because I wanted to thank them for looking after my house while I was on trips. He replied that they enjoyed the odd glass of whisky, and when I asked him if he knew the brand he replied: "It's the one with the duck on the label".

The nuclear one - yes, definitely 😉

I've got one of the conventional ones about somewhere - I should dig it out for the offspring to burn herself on.

This one.

I found it in the bush near an abandoned mine about 150 miles from Mt Isa. (outback North Queensland, edge of the desert)

[url= https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5466/9627873541_2cc0208b9b_b.jp g" target="_blank">https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5466/9627873541_2cc0208b9b_b.jp g"/> [/img][/url]

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The Kew 90 (beam weighs 32 tons) the largest still under steam. The building it is in quite good too.

I love Victorian cast iron work. It's industrial art IMO, and they didn't know the meaning of obsolescence. These things were built to run forever.

This one:
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"Yeah, that one!"
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Mine is the 1943 8F 48305, quite unremarkable in every sense except this is the engine my Dads ashes went into. Steaming over Cropston reservoir on the Great Central I nearly lost the bloody urn in the firebox due to the draw on it.
It should have been a sad day but riding that footplate was one of the best experiences of my life.

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I love Victorian cast iron work. It's industrial art IMO, and they didn't know the meaning of obsolescence. These things were built to run forever.

Absolutely - on a much smaller scale, I just got an old spoke machine:

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No idea of the age, could easily be 80 years old, [url=

works perfectly[/url].

had hours and hours of fun with one of these as a lad - still got it. Shame they don't let kids play with meths anymore!
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I could ask my step dad, I'm only here until Saturday though, so it would be unwise.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5P1dUZdbBcmVWQxSkFPRTNHOU0/edit?usp=sharing

bencooper - Member
Absolutely - on a much smaller scale, I just got an old spoke machine...

That looks like the model that can handle car and motorbike spokes.

I have a similar age one, but definitely bike only. Got it about 40 years ago from a bicycle shop that was closing down and which had been on the go since the 1880s. The old guy said he thought that and the vice i got from them were from when the shop opened.

Steam engines. Love em all

mallard's pretty cool. but Sir Nigel Gresley works and regualry runs on the North Yorkshire Moors Railway
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Tornado is always worth a mention as the last steam train built in Britain, and just built as a hobby project by a bunch of [s]nutters[/s] enthusiasts.
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For Harry Potter fans, there's the Jacobite, but that's probably more about the trip (Fort William-Mallaig) than the train
[img] http://www.visitscotland.com/cms-images/5x3-large/regions-travel/the-jacobite-steam-train [/img]

But for futuristic style, it would have to be the Duchess of Hamilton
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Although the Waverly has a pretty neat 2100 bhp three-crank diagonal triple-expansion marine steam engine, which is nice if you like that kind of thing
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That looks like the model that can handle car and motorbike spokes.

I'm sure it could with different dies - at the moment it's got a 14G die so perfect for bikes.

Pretty much the original "modern" train, a bit of local history and one of those things that's simple enough that you can figure out how it works* whilst still being an awesome feat of engineering:
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*as a non-engineering type.

When I was a kid we used to help clean the engines at worth valley. It was quite thrilling for a 12 yo, clambering right on top of the fire box and boiler to clean the funnels, can't imagine a couple of kids being allowed to do it now.[img] [/img]

Swelper - Member
Steam engines. Love em all

That looks very much like the little brother of the one I found in the bush.

Great to see the wheelies at the end of the drag. Pure torque... 🙂

Took our lad for a ride in a brake van towed by this chap the other day. It was THE MOST EXCITING THING EVER!

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Would steam turbines be pushing my luck?

[url= https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3051/2881776462_9e047cdef8_z.jp g" target="_blank">https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3051/2881776462_9e047cdef8_z.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/5oDRK5 ]Turbine Diptych[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/people/10954782@N00/ ]Ben Cooper[/url], on Flickr

Old Parsons ones especially are lovely:

[url= https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2608/3898438684_d5e1529fdd_z.jp g" target="_blank">https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2608/3898438684_d5e1529fdd_z.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/6Wuw15 ]Tullis Russell 17[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/people/10954782@N00/ ]Ben Cooper[/url], on Flickr

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Sir Nigel Gresley +1

Also have a soft spot for this:

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Couple of pics of The. Manchester Regiment, scratch built plus another of a little GWR loco that was customised from a kit for a collector who wanted that specific loco. Got a couple of others but they are in the loft. Wish I'd inherited his model making abilities!

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Plus two more.
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Mines this one

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I even get to drive it! 😉

Its the big bugger at the front and its a Fowler Z7 imported back from Africa in the Seventies and restored.

This is my favourite. I was lucky to live near "Steamtown" Carnforth as a kid and this is where she used to live in the 70's, they used to do footplate rides at weekends..............oh the good old days

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Always loved the big iconic locos, but these little ones have a particular place in my heart:

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When I was at school, Chippenham still had a marshalling yard, with one or two little Pannier Tank locos. A class-mate, Steven Light, was lucky enough to have a dad who drove it, so we'd often be found up the station train-spotting, and if he was up there, we'd get up onto the footplate, and spend a happy hour or two trundling around the station! Brilliant fun, and back then there was a spur that went to the middle of the Western Arches, Brunel's bridge over the main road, and occasionally we'd sit on the bridge watching people and traffic below.
Was most disappointed when the little tanky was replaced with a diesels shunter. Almost antiseptically clean by comparison.

mattbee is talking my language

My own absolute fave is the Collett Goods 0-6-0

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but I love a small tank, 0-6-0 mind...

truely revolutionary

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High performance steam power in 1903 - 0 to 30mph in 30 seconds, Great Eastern Railway's 'Decapod' built to prove steam could be as fast as electrics but sadly remained an experimental oddity
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PePPeR - Member
Mines this one...

Can you identify the one I found in Oz?

Also I didn't realise they preserved Turbinia. Where is it on display?

Ben Cooper's for me. Proper smooth engines 🙂

Also I didn't realise they preserved Turbinia. Where is it on display?

I was just going to ask the same thing, what museum is that?

Turbinia's in Newcastle, isn't it? I love the story of the demonstration too, Charles Parsons was being ignored by the Admiralty so he turned up uninvited at Queen Victoria's diamond jubilee navy review, and charged about at high speed showing off, with a Navy boat trying and failing to catch him 😉

bencooper - Member
Turbinia's in Newcastle, isn't it? I love the story of the demonstration too, Charles Parsons was being ignored by the Admiralty so he turned up uninvited at Queen Victoria's diamond jubilee navy review, and charged about at high speed showing off, with a Navy boat trying and failing to catch him

I loved that tale too.

Imagine the greatest and most powerful fleet the world had ever known, and this mosquito buzzing through them and they couldn't do a thing. 🙂

Southern Pacific AC-12 Cab Forward for me. Built in response to drivers suffocating in the huge snow sheds over California's Donner Pass. Oil fired, so they could rotate the front part of the loco and put the crew in front of the funnel, and give them far better visibility. They're massive too.

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They scrapped 19 of the 20 of them, with one preserved in non-working order in Sacremento. Travesty.

Turbinia's in Newcastle, isn't it?

yep she's in the Discovery Museum though the engines are on display at the Science Museum London.

Imagine the greatest and most powerful fleet the world had ever known, and this mosquito buzzing through them and they couldn't do a thing.

I imagine they could have just blown him out of the water, but that would have been rather unsporting 🙂