Steam in the Blood

Steam in the Blood Photographs Graham Dean Collection & Neil Marsden
Recently regular volunteer Graham Dean brought along something a little different to show us over the lunch break at one of our regular weekly working parties. The item in question is a model of a locomotive that he has built over a number of years largely from bits and pieces with just a few commercially produced items to help along the way. We knew of Graham's modelling skills already when he recently produced a model of a proposed design for improved engine-room skylights for the boat. His ingenuity was very evident in that miniature, but as you will see from the accompanying photographs and Graham's own text it doesn't stop there! So is it in the blood then? Graham like myself trained as a marine engineer, he with Harrison Line, me with Clan Line, both are descended from railway locomotive drivers, his ancestor with The Great Central Railway while mine was with the LNWR. Ship's engineers run in both families too and of course we both come from Liverpool and no we're not related! I confess that I'm a keen model maker myself, so is it in the blood? Is it genetic? Well perhaps it is and it may explain why we're so keen to be a part of this project. Anyway for a change I thought you might appreciate something just a little different to accompany my latest update, I hope you enjoy it. - Neil Marsden

The photos depict a Great Central Railway locomotive designed by Robinson in 1901. It is a class 11B, 4-4-0, one of 25 built by Sharpe Stewart & Co between 1901-03. A further 15 were built by the Vulcan foundry.
The locomotives' original route was Manchester to London serving the Great Central's new express run, by the First War they were running from Liverpool through the midlands and up to Hull. The two locos in the photographs are seen at Brunswick railway shed, Liverpool, about 1920, my great grandfather, Thomas Williams, driver, is standing on the footplate with his fireman. The model was made mostly from bits of metal scrounged and acquired over a period of nine years. The wheels were castings from Reeve's model engineers, an excellent firm by the way, but when they were delivered they were really rough, twice as thick as needed and with flashing still between the spokes. Not having a lathe at the time it took two years with grinders and needle files to finish them, there being eighty spokes amongst the four driving wheels. Luckily by the time I came to do the front bogey wheels with forty spokes I had bought an old second hand Myford lathe which obviously sped things up. On the model the fire box rests on a Yale front door lock mechanism because it was the right fit, the buffers were turned from coach bolts, the smoke box door from a joiner's hand drill with the teeth ground off, lots of brass fittings were shaped from clock innards, inside the cab 5 amp fuses became water gauges the terminals of a 13 amp plug became valves and the lamps at the front of the engine were made from my grand daughter's plastic bracelet (don't tell her!). The entire thing is held together by a mixture of nuts, bolts, super glue for the little bits, gravity and prayer, no soldering. Thanks are due to the lads on the Daniel Adamson for allowing me to show it off and no! I'm not going to do the six wheel tender as well! - Graham Dean