Iron Duke: Broad Gauge Giant

[@beefv8]

the fact we now have these 2 broad gauge replica locos iron duke and fire fly is great to have and both now kept in the original transfer shed at didcot on original borad gauge track there is some great parts of GWR history preserved at didcot

[@JonatanGronoset]

Brunel gauge is such a vibe, its uniqueness alone makes it such a fashinating subject to study. I hope you'll keep covering it.

[@johncamp2567]

I am awed by this locomotive today, and I can only imagine its impact on those who first saw it in 1842. Your video was like a wonderful college lecture on the subject!! (..new subscriber, Virginia)

[@MJC19]

They certainly live up to their name, "Iron Duke" My favorite broad gauge locomotive!

[@johnsharp8632]

Thanks for another very interesting video Anthony. Another magnificent locomotive. The driver and fireman had no protection whatever. Imagine being on the footplate at 60 miles/hour in bad weather.

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

Done Planet at 30. Being an engine driver was an outdoor job, just like being a Mail Coach Driver or Stagecoach Driver. Plus, unlike Planet you've got a whacking great big boiler in front of you. People were just used to being outdoors - heck travelling on the roof of stage coaches was though to be healthier than sitting inside, and the Victorians, even in winter, kept windows open!

[@andrewhall2554]

I can't imagine what it was like for the crew to be running at speeds up to 60 MPH without a cab to shield them from the wind and weather.

[@ArthurAndNormandyFan1]

Great video! Always found earlier Great Western locos interesting, especially the Iron Dukes. Also I had no idea the replica was constructed using Austerity 0-6-0 parts, those two locos were so far removed from each other in my mind.

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

Removed in time by a hundred years, but to give some indication of how big an Austerity is and small Iron Duke was, that the "look like" is basically an Austerity with outside frames and big driving wheels. No major changes were needed.

[@Railway_Riches]

Fantastic video. Tis a shame we haven’t seen Firefly or Iron Duke run in a long while. I look forward to seeing the next upload! Cheers.

[@timothyverbist5795]

A cute little whistle for a big steamie like this lady.

[@Samstrainss]

One of two austerity 0-6-0s to have been converted into a tender engine in preservation. They really are useful engines.

[@RockyRailroadProductions_B0SS]

A fantasy of mine is having a go on one of these at high speed with no weatherboards or "Rover" style cabs and whatnot - I don't suppose they'd let us try that at Didcot with theirs. A very pretty machine, most GWR broad gauge locos just look wide, but the proportions are almost "over-scale" on the Iron Duke as it takes full advantage of the greater size.

[@inyobill]

If my arithmetic is right, 60 mph on 8' drivers (~25' circumference) comes to about 200 RPM. Impressive enough to get those masses moving at those rates.

[@Mighty_Square]

Brilliantly informative video Anthony! Thanks.

[@garryferrington811]

Those were amazing speeds for railways of that time, and seem to bear out Brunel's reasoning that his broad gauge would allow for that.

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

It was simply because they had bigger boilers and fireboxes and could raise more steam. Compared to later S/G locomotives the boiler was not that big. Brunel never fully exploited the loading gauge of the B/G. Flying Scotsman's boiler, for example, is 6ft 5in diameter, on the S/G two feet bigger than that of Iron Duke on the B/G. Brunels thinking behind B/G was to put the wheels of locomotives and carriages outside the bodies so they could be as low as possible, to keep the centre of gravity down. His carriage designs are very odd with large diam outside wheels and are not at all user friendly.

[@The_Smith]

I can't imagine working the foot plate going a mile a minute let alone at the top speed!

[@missiontent111]

......... and in the winter .......!!!!

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

Done Planet at 30mph. Not a problem.

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

It's a bit nippy, but thankfully the railawy companies gave their loco crews a cap and an overcoat (albeit paid for stoppages from their pay).

[@antman5474]

Flat out at 80mph in 1847/8 That's completely bonkers. I can't get my head around it. No wonder trains have a following, they're the grand daddy of power and speed.

[@primrosevale1995]

We have to thank Christopher Awdry for helping to introduce this class to many children around the world through that time Thomas when to the NRM and met the replica. Though that does beg the question. Iron Duke in that story spoke and looked like an old man, complete with a white mustache, but as Anthony stated, that replica was created in 1985, only five years before the book took place. How is that possible?

[@ABellEngine]

He probably either forgot the Iron Duke replica at the NRM is not that old or didn't know it's not one of the original ones from the 19th century. Either that or in the Railway Series universe, the NRM wanted to make him look like an old engine for some reason, so they put a fake mustache on him. Those are my theories.

[@primrosevale1995]

@@ABellEngine Yeah to be fair he doesn't say he lived back then. Maybe he was just leaning into the bit.

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

I think it would be impossivle to think Iron Duke was original - it was very well known it was a look-a-like and that Lord of the Isles had got the chop in 1906. It's an Austerity in drag. I just think the illustrator got it wrong, that and Christopher Awdry thought that an 0-6-0ST Austerity dressed up to look like Iron Duke had somehow assumed the personality of Iron Duke. Which is very wierd if you think about it. It's an Austerity from the 1940s not a Victorian loco. Then again, it's not real its just a story. And he used Iron Duke as any other character to tell a story. For all we know the loco in the book has Munchausen syndrome and genuinely thought it was old and had seen Brunel, when it clearly hadn't. Same with e.g. Stephenson's Rocket.

[@nicholaskelly1958]

Of course Christopher Awdry knew about the history of the 'IRON DUKE' replica. Probably the best book that he wrote was on the history of the Broad Gauge. 'Brunel's Broad Gauge Railway' Published by OPC . The present 'IRON DUKE' is illustrated on the cover of the book.

[@warriorstar2517]

I really hope that at least one of the replicas is restored to operational status at some point.

[@johnf3f810]

Fascinating video - as always!

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

Glad you enjoyed it!

[@robertmiller1299]

Thank you - if only Brunel’s broad gauge had become universal - we would never have to squeeze through narrow gauge carriages again!

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

We'd still be crammed in like sardines. Just more of us!

[@railwayjade]

What a beauty

[@moistnugget1178]

More history videos of Brunel gauge locos or rolling stock pls it’s a wonderful fascination and a part of history not as heavily documented on KZbin

[@Danthehorse]

Love this, what a lovely machine. Im amazed Hornby has not made a mofel of this.

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

It would need its own specialist track, and everything else. Unless you made it to a different scale so it could run on 16.5mm track. There are scratch built Broadgauge locomotives in 4mm scale, but cant see anything commerical RTR ever appearing.

[@Danthehorse]

@AnthonyDawsonHistory yeah, I jumped the gun when I wrote that, I didn't appreciate that broad gauge was a different size track re the model world. Still learning!

[@phaasch]

Remember Jeremy Clarksons comments about the Iron Duke class "Now THAT is a real Sports train- 96" rims, and just look at that phat exhaust - that is a max power train!"

[@tooleyheadbang4239]

Yes, another memorable example of Clarkson's schoolboy-level ignorance.

[@darylcheshire1618]

I’ve ridden on poorly maintained 5’3” branch lines in Victoria, you tend to bounce up and down instead of swaying on SG or NG. Not a whole lot of difference between BG and SG.

[@doughart2720]

Imagine if Brunel's btosd gauge had become the norm instead of standard gauge! Imagine how much more efficient it would be for both high speed and load carrying. Got to love Brunels broad gauge.

[@thomasgray4188]

would be abdominal brunel gauge was terrible

[@bingbong7316]

​@@thomasgray4188you can't stomach it?

[@emilyadams3228]

​@@bingbong7316Well, it is a lot to digest.

[@Alzaar_The_Gunzel]

Would be interesting to see Anthony do a video on a locomotive from Victorian Railways in Australia

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

Ta dah! kzbin.info/www/bejne/hIaod5igidN2g6M

[@Alzaar_The_Gunzel]

@@AnthonyDawsonHistory I was referring the the company 'Victorian Railways' of Victoria from 1859 to 1983. But thanks for the reply!

[@jandoerlidoe3412]

It is on static display now, because its boiler certificate did expire & there is no fund to get a new one ( or refurbich the locomotive to comply with the boiler certificate stipulations )

[@inyobill]

I am a huge fan of the British single-driver locomotives, so elegant. Of course, the design had not a chance on the rubbish American roads )not calling names, I'm native Californian).

[@1258-Eckhart]

I went to Hyde Park with a friend on 9. April 1985 and rode behind Iron Duke in one of the carriages. A very impressive locomotive. G.J. Churchward was a brilliant engineer but a very poor respecter of history. He was killed by a successor of Lord of the Isles in 1933.

[@CaseyJonesNumber1]

I believe that Churchward didn't order the scrapping of LoTI - Stanier arranged it while Churchward was out of the country. Churchward was none too pleased upon his return...

[@joshslater2426]

Will you make a video on North Eastern Railway M1 No. 1621 and its role in the Race to the North?

[@marvwatkins7029]

Is there no video of it in action.

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

The replica of Iron Duke has not operated in over ten years. So no, there is no video of it in action. The only time I saw it run was in 1988 when I was a wee bairn.

[@hythekent]

When I hear of the wonderful locos that some pen-pusher decided to scrap it makes me feel very sad

[@roderickjoyce6716]

Not some pen pusher, but no less than William Stanier, who was in charge of the works while Churchward was on holiday. He thought North Star and Iron Duke were taking up space. So the only original surviving broad gauge loco is the South Devon Railway's shunter, Tiny.

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

There were two William Staniers at Swindon, father and son. William Stanier, the Chief Stores Supertinendent at Swindon, and his son Sir William Stanier who Assistant Works Manager at Swindon from 1912 and later Manager in 1920. Became CME of the LMS in 1931. It was the father who scrapped the two B/G locos, not the son. William Stanier (son) was working in London from 1904 and was not at Swindon when the two B/G locos were scrapped.

[@itsonlyme9938]

Some people thought going at such speed would take there breath away going so fast. at that time.

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

That's not quite true. It's one of the "early railway facts" which people think they know but isn't true at all. It's based on a report by Dr Dionysius Lardner on the Box Tunnel and what would happen if a train ranaway. In that circumstance he thought in the enclosed space a train running at very high speed might cause people to suffocate. The report failed to take into account air movement or wind resistance of the train. But it became a popular "fact" which is simply not true. Hope this helps 🙂

[@henrileroy2485]

Do you think that if the broad gauge was generalized, it could have been benefic for the worldwide railways? More security, more speed, greater capacity?

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

I don't. It would have been much more expensive to build, and the difference in capacity was that not great, especially when the S/G started to truly exploit their loading gauge with locomotives and carriages as big as B/G. Or in the USA, bigger! A five foot gauge might have been more logical than 4ft 8 1/2in one with a bit more room between the wheels.

[@ferdinandfrancis9673]

where are the flanges?

[@forrestrobin2712]

Hard to imagine how unpleasant that open footplate must’ve been at 70mph+…

[@laurenceskinnerton73]

Interesting.

[@AMOGLES99]

Are there any plans to restore her (or Firefly) to steam?

[@Tak3anap]

Hello Mr dawson I have only one question but this of an entirely different locomotive. What was the boiler diameter of the supposed ten foot wheeler Ajax?

[@henrileroy2485]

How was for the engine driver at 50 mph by cold rainy weather?

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

Cold and wet, but the GWR did issue drivers with an overcoat and a cap (not the firemen tho) which were paid for out of the men's pay.

[@RichardSawyer-ok7ov]

Correct me if I am wrong but when I calculated the locomotives tractive effort I got 6885.00000001lbs of force and when calculating the 115psi variants I got 7917.7500lbs of force. Were you possibly rounding to 8000lbs of force by any chance ?

[@richardswiderski4985]

Great vidro sure looks a big loco but those coaches look wrong to low.Proberly to used to looking at standard gauge rolling stock.

[@martinsto8190]

With some of burnel's Great Western converted to stardard gauge by parliament only to be liquidated by the 1960s, would it be ok to rebuild former GWR&SOUTHERNRAIL rail lines to their original broad gauge form? then there will finally be a place to use Lady Patracia and the Iron Duke.

[@Samstrainss]

The Gwili railway was originally broad gauge, always struck me as a shame they didn't see the chance for some dual gauge fun. The trackbed further north of the existing standard gauge preserved line even features a tunnel built for the broad gauge.

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

There's be a massive cost implication. You couldn't buy anything "off the shelf". Everything would have to be built from scratch including the track. It would be prohibitvely expensive. You'd need completely new locomotives, carriages, track, the lot.

[@marvwatkins7029]

Where's the sound?

[@vsvnrg3263]

i would hope that they will build a real copy of the iron duke for the 200th anniversary and use it like a rental car, not like a trailer queen. oh, and give it a decent length of 7' track too.

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

It would be about £1million and there's basically only one place in the UK you can run it - Didcot or the very short stretch of B/G still at the NRM. The 1985 replica was built by a National Museum to do demonstration runs. A commercially built replica would need to be commercially viable and not sure it would be.

[@vsvnrg3263]

@@AnthonyDawsonHistory , a filthy rich benefactor is needed. this benefactor can provide a long section of bg track too. seriously, uk has done really well resurrecting old trains.

[@thomasshaftoe461]

Imagine Iron duchess?

[@missiontent111]

So how does an engine with metal wheels actually "grip" on a metal track ? Never have reslly understood how that works. I guess thats wht railways only have shallow gradients ?

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

Simply due to friction between the wheel and the rail. Wheels and rails are not totally smoothe, so the weight of a locomotive pushing down on the wheels helps with friction. And yes that's why they struggle with leaves on the line which create a greasy surface, or when there's ice on the rails, or as you say, going up a steep gradient.

[@sirrliv]

Alternate History Question: Do you think there was any hope for Brunel Gauge spreading beyond the GWR system for fast intercity mainlines? If so, how might the landscape of Britain's railways have been changed? Example: What if the Great Northern had adopted Brunel Gauge for their line from London to Selby in the early development of the East Coast Mainline?

[@thomasgray4188]

brunel gauge was a terrible idea if you wanted a better option. Irish gauge would be my choice

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

There was absoslutely no hope for the Broad Gauge. It's a shame that the Gauge Act of 1846 had no teeth and that it took so long to get rid of the anachronism. Broad Gauge was a mistake from the start: it was a one-off, isolated system doing its own thing in a rising sea of 4ft 8 1/2in. It was a sign of Brunel's arrogance, just like his atmospheric caper. The Great Northern would not have been so stupid as to adopt Broad Gauge because in order to get to York it relied on running rights from other companies - you'd have had a break of gauge at Askern (near Doncaster) where all the miserys of Gloucester and the break of gauge there would be repeated. It would effectively have killed off the GNR due to the a) the cost of building to broad gauge b) delays due to break of gauge c) lack of revenue and extra costs due to break of gauge. All the advantages claimed by Brunel - low centre of gravity - were basically shown to be false within only a few years. Brunel adopted it so that the wheels of carriages and locomotives would be outside the body and that he could use large diameter wheels on the carriages. His design for carriages were for very long slung vehicles as he thought having carriage etc bodies above the wheels was unsafe. It wasn't as John Gray had proved in 1837/38 the same year the GWR opened. Gray demonstrated you didn't need low slung locomotives and low slung carriages empirically but the idea was still there - hence Crampton's patent, or even Cornwall. If the GNR had gone broad gauge it wouldve crashed and burned.

[@sirrliv]

Wow. Was not expecting such an impassioned response. I don't take offense at all; it was an open ended question and I had no bias to either side. But the furor of your rebuttal did take me off guard, though I have to suspect this isn't the first time this concept has reared its head in your presence. If I may put forward a couple of counterpoints, not to argue a case but more furthering the discussion by playing devil's advocate: 1. Despite the false claims for low center of gravity, it is undeniable that the broad gauge allowed for at least the potential for larger locomotives and rolling stock. Even in its early days, the GWR was able to field engines that could only be matched by one-off freaks on the standard gauge; it took a giant like the LNWR Liverpool to match Gooch's Iron Duke. Once Gooch took Brunel's toys away and told him to go back to what he was good at, the GWR developed a whole fleet of engines that would only be regularly surpassed by their smaller brethren 20-30 years later. Even after its abolishion in 1892, the GWR was still able to take advantage of its relative blessing of size, something that would plague preservationists when GWR engines proved too wide for other regions. 2. The broad gauge system, while concentrated in the southwest, was quite extensive to be called "isolated", going as far as Penzance and South Wales and north to Liverpool. 3. The Metropolitan Railway in London was initially in partnership with the GWR and initially adopted broad gauge. Their relationship fell apart primarily due to business reasons; the Met needed more money to expand and wanted to run more trains, the GWR wanted a bigger cut than the Met was willing to give, so the GWR packed up its toys and went home. Jago Hazzard has done a brief video positing on what if the Met had been bought out by the GWR. The results could have been staggering. 4. A bit of a digression, but the Atmospheric Railway, for its time, may not have been as absurd as it seemed. The Irish system worked quite well, though it was short lived. The biggest issue I've heard with Brunel's South Devon system was that he omitted the metal weather shielding above the slot in the vacuum pipe that protected the leather flaps from rain, sun, and in that line's particular case sea spray. The Irish system was the only one to have such a shield and was broadly the most successful. Granted, steam locomotive technology soon made the scheme obsolete, but the principle itself wasn't the problem, it was the execution. 5. While break of gauge would always have been an issue, it could have and was somewhat alleviated by dual gauge. Indeed it was possible to have run both broad and standard gauge wagons in the same train, as shown on the Denver & Rio Grande narrow gauge lines around Alamosa. It may have also helped to have better defined the broad gauge as the high speed Intercity gauge and standard as the slower secondary gauge. Overall though, you are right that even by 1838 standard gauge had a clear majority. In the end, this is all purely subjectively what-if dreaming. I reiterate that I don't mean to argue for either side, and I sincerely apologize if I caused undue frustration. I merely wish to engage as one (admittedly rank amateurish) historian to another.

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

@@sirrliv The Broad Gauge did not get to Liverpool, nor did the GWR. That had been the GWR's ultimate goal but all the other companies did their best to force out the interloper, especially the LNWR. The GWR got to Birkenhead on the other side of the Mersey via the Birkenhead Railway (SG) which was a joint line with the LNWR. Also worth pointing out that the GWR and indeed Brunel was not exclusively wedded to the 7ft gauge as they built lines to Standard Gauge in South Wales to 4ft 8 1/2in and when building railways internationally Brunel used 4ft 8 1/2 as well. The GWR owned more standard gauge track than broad gauge track. After 1851 for the GWR to expand it built SG lines, and by 1871 had more miles of SG than BG, which was really the beginning of the end of the BG. The Standard Gauge was readily able to compete with the Broad Guage without using as you say "freaks". Sturrock's 215 was as good as the Iron Duke and as big but on the standard guage. One-offs like Cornwall were built to get as low a centre of gravity as possible, same with the Cramptons. And, the Cramptons were not "freaks" they were a perfectly cromulant design and were popular accross Europe and Scandinavia. Several were also built in the UK but they didn't really catch on. The Atmospheric Railway whilst a clever idea could never have worked for the reasons George and Robert Stephenson noted: it was a return to stationary engines and haulages and that if one stationary engine failed the whole system would fall into chaos. The irish line was only short, 4 1 /2 miles and was in a pretty protected as a lot of it ran in a cutting which helped protect the leather valve from the weather. It was still prone to pests. The pipe for it was 36 feet in diameter and in a trench 9 feet deep! It was enormously expensive to set up. The atmospheric system was only used to take the trains "up" the line, which was laid on a contniuous gradient. So they free-wheeled down hill controlled by the brakesman. There had been various designs of the Atmospheric System from the 1820s onwards and none got off the drawing board or could be made to work. The best example was that built in France between Paris and St Germain, but that was on a very much improved system compared to the South Devon of Brunel. The Paris - St Germain system worked like the Dublin - Dalkley atmospheric up hill, gravity down hill and was built because locomotives then could not surmount the steep inclines to reach St Germain. In fact it didnt reach Paris at all the atmospheric section was from Le Pecq to St Germain - basically to overcome the steep gradient. It opened in 1847 and went out of use in 1858 following a terrible accident, but had been pretty much obsolete from 1848/9 when larger locomotives were constructed which could go up the line to St Germain. The South Devon was the longest anyone had ever built such a system. And it simply didn't work which has left the UK rail system with the infamous "South Devon Banks" as Brunel thought the atmospheric system would do away with the need to ease gradients. 🙂

[@joshslater2426]

I don’t know if I ever went on it, but for the longest time Thomas & The Great Railway Show convinced me the replica loco was at York 24/7. I would love to ride on it or see it again, but it’s a long way away.

[@thomasgray4188]

its such a shame that they couldn't be converted to standard gauge.

[@AnthonyDawsonHistory]

you mean convert it back?

[@Arkay315]

Go great Western or go home.

[@Titan604]

If you lived in Swindon you could do both!

[@joshslater2426]

Oh well, looks like I’m going home then…

[@alistairkewish651]

It would bring huge tribute and respect to our mother tongue if the subtitles were fully generated to 100% accuracy rather than putting up with this insulting and scrappy joke and travesty. There is no excuse for not putting things in order.

[@marioxerxescastelancastro8019]

Use metric units.