1.
Cornwall
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Cornwall is a ceremonial county and unitary authority area of England within the United Kingdom. It is bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, Cornwall has a population of 551,700 and covers an area of 3,563 km2. Cornwall forms the westernmost part of the south-west peninsula of the island of Great Britain, and this area was first inhabited in the Palaeolithic and Mesolithic periods. It continued to be occupied by Neolithic and then Bronze Age peoples, there is little evidence that Roman rule was effective west of Exeter and few Roman remains have been found. In the mid-19th century, however, the tin and copper mines entered a period of decline, subsequently, china clay extraction became more important and metal mining had virtually ended by the 1990s. Traditionally, fishing and agriculture were the important sectors of the economy. Railways led to a growth of tourism in the 20th century, however, the area is noted for its wild moorland landscapes, its long and varied coastline, its attractive villages, its many place-names derived from the Cornish language, and its very mild climate. Extensive stretches of Cornwalls coastline, and Bodmin Moor, are protected as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, Cornwall is the homeland of the Cornish people and is recognised as one of the Celtic nations, retaining a distinct cultural identity that reflects its history. Some people question the present constitutional status of Cornwall, and a nationalist movement seeks greater autonomy within the United Kingdom in the form of a devolved legislative Cornish Assembly. On 24 April 2014 it was announced that Cornish people will be granted minority status under the European Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities. The modern English name Cornwall derives from the concatenation of two ancient demonyms from different linguistic traditions, Corn- records the native Brythonic tribe, the Cornovii. The Celtic word kernou is cognate with the English word horn. -wall derives from the Old English exonym walh, the Ravenna Cosmography first mentions a city named Purocoronavis in the locality. This is thought to be a rendering of Duro-cornov-ium, meaning fort of the Cornovii. The exact location of Durocornovium is disputed, with Tintagel and Carn Brea suggested as possible sites, in later times, Cornwall was known to the Anglo-Saxons as West Wales to distinguish it from North Wales. The name appears in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in 891 as On Corn walum, in the Domesday Book it was referred to as Cornualia and in c.1198 as Cornwal. Other names for the county include a latinisation of the name as Cornubia, the present human history of Cornwall begins with the reoccupation of Britain after the last Ice Age. The area now known as Cornwall was first inhabited in the Palaeolithic and Mesolithic periods and it continued to be occupied by Neolithic and then Bronze Age people. The Common Brittonic spoken at the time developed into several distinct tongues
2.
Richard Trevithick
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Richard Trevithick was a British inventor and mining engineer from Cornwall, England. The son of a captain, and born in the mining heartland of Cornwall. He performed poorly in school, but went on to be a pioneer of steam-powered road. His most significant contribution was the development of the first high-pressure steam engine and he also built the first full-scale working railway steam locomotive. Turning his interests abroad, Trevithick also worked as a consultant in Peru. Throughout his professional career, he went through ups and downs. During the prime of his career, he was a well-respected and known figure in mining and engineering, Richard Trevithick was born at Tregajorran, between Camborne and Redruth, in the heart of one of the rich mineral mining areas of Cornwall. He was the child and the only boy in a family of six children. He was very tall for the era at 6 ft 2in, as well as athletic, an exception was arithmetic, for which he had an aptitude, but arrived at the correct answers by unconventional means. Trevithick was the son of mine captain Richard Trevithick and of miners daughter Ann Teague, as a child he would watch steam engines pump water from the deep tin and copper mines in Cornwall. For a time he was a neighbour to William Murdoch, the steam carriage pioneer, Trevithick first went to work at the age of 19 at the East Stray Park Mine. He was enthusiastic and quickly gained the status as a consultant and he was popular with the miners because of the respect they had for his father. In 1797, Trevithick married Jane Harvey of Hayle and his company became famous worldwide for building huge stationary beam engines for pumping water, usually from mines, based on Newcomens and Watts engines. Until this time, such engines were of the condensing or atmospheric type, originally invented by Thomas Newcomen in 1712. Trevithick became engineer at the Ding Dong Mine in 1797, and he worked on building and modifying steam engines to avoid the royalties due to Watt on the separate condenser patent. He also experimented with the pump, a type of pump – with a beam engine – used widely in Cornwalls tin mines. He was not the first to think of so-called strong steam, William Murdoch had developed and demonstrated a model steam carriage, starting in 1784, and demonstrated it to Trevithick at his request in 1794. In fact, Trevithick lived next door to Murdoch in Redruth in 1797 and 1798, Oliver Evans in the U. S. had also concerned himself with the concept, but there is no indication that his ideas had ever come to Trevithicks attention
3.
Crewe Works
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Crewe railway works is a British railway engineering facility built in 1840 by the Grand Junction Railway. It is located in the town of Crewe, in Cheshire and it is currently owned by Bombardier Transportation. The railway also built 200 cottages establishing a new community in what had been the rural township of Monks Coppenhall, among the first workers to arrive were those from the old works at Edge Hill producing an increase in the towns population by some 800 men, women and children. The first locomotive built at Crewe went into service in 1843, by 1846 the demand for space was such that wagon building was moved, first to Edge Hill and Manchester, then to a new works at Earlestown. By 1848 the works employed over 1,000 producing one locomotive a week, in 1845 the Liverpool and Manchester Railway was merged with the Grand Junction. These, in turn, merged in 1846, with the London and Birmingham Railway, all four had their own workshops but, in time, locomotive building was concentrated at Crewe. In 1857 John Ramsbottom became Locomotive Superintendent and he had previously invented the first reliable safety valve and the scoop for picking up water from troughs between the tracks. He went on to improve the precision and interchangeability of tools, in 1862 locomotive work was transferred from Wolverton. Wolverton became the works, while wagon building was concentrated at Earlestown. In 1853 Crewe had begun to make its own iron and roll its own rails. In 1868 it became the first place to use open-hearth furnaces on an industrial scale and it also built its own brickworks. Later the works was fitted with two electric arc furnaces, as traffic density increased there was a need for longer trains and more powerful locomotives to haul them. In 1932, William Stanier became Chief Mechanical Engineer and set out to rationalise production, since Crewe had experience with heavier locomotives and had its own steel making facilities, he chose it as his main production location. There followed the Princesses and Duchesses, along with the Jubilees, Crewe produced all the new boilers for the LMS, and all heavy drop stampings and forgings. It also produced most of the steel components for the track. During World War II, Crewe produced over 150 Covenanter tanks for the army, after British Railways was formed in 1948, Robert Riddles introduced the BR standard classes, and Crewe built Britannia and Clan passenger engines and some of the Class 9 2-10-0 freight locomotives. At the end of steam, it had built over 7000 locomotives in its long career, from 1957 it built a succession of diesel locomotives including the Class 43 High Speed Train power cars and over 200 Class 47 locomotives. Much of the site at Crewe was cleared in a redevelopment in the mid 1980s
4.
2-2-2
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The wheel arrangement both provided more stability and enabled a larger firebox than the earlier 0-2-2 and 2-2-0 types. They were also described as Singles, although this name could be used to describe any kind of locomotive with a single pair of driving wheels. The new type known as Stephensons Patentee locomotive. Adler, the first successful locomotive to operate in Germany, was a Patentee supplied by Robert Stephenson, other examples were exported to the Netherlands, Russia and Italy. By 1838 the 2-2-2 had become the standard design by Robert Stephenson. Eighteen of the first nineteen locomotives ordered by Isambard Kingdom Brunel for the opening of the Great Western Railway in 1837/8 were of the 2-2-2 type and these included six 2-2-2 locomotives built by Charles Tayleur at his Vulcan Foundry. Also in 1837 the successful North Star broad gauge locomotive was delivered to the Great Western Railway by Stephenson, sharp, Roberts and Company constructed more than 600 2-2-2 locomotives between 1837 and 1857. Ten of these supplied to the Grand Junction Railway became the basis of Alexander Allans successful designs for the railway from 1845, J. & G. Rennie supplied 2-2-2 locomotives to the London and Croydon Railway from 1838 and the London and Brighton Railway in 1840. Arend was one of the two first steam locomotives in the Netherlands, built by R. B, Longridge and Company of Bedlington, Northumberland in 1839. The Great Western Railway continued to order both broad gauge and standard gauge locomotives on the railway, including the Firefly and Sun classes, which were enlarged versions of North Star. The London & North Western Railway Cornwall locomotive was designed at Crewe Works as a 4-2-2 by Francis Trevithick in 1847, notable late examples include William Stroudleys singles of 1874-1880, William Deans 157 class of 1878-79, and his 3001 class, both for the Great Western Railway. James Holden of the Great Eastern Railway created some 2-2-2 singles in 1889 by removing the side rod from a 2-4-0, the first steam railway locomotive built in Belgium in 1835, and was built by John Cockerill under license to a design by Robert Stephenson & Co. It was built for use on the first main line on the European mainland, a replica was built at the workshops of Boissellerie Cognaut for the 150th anniversary of the formation of Belgium. Two 2-2-2 locomotives were imported from Longridge and Co of Bedlington Ironworks England for the Naples–Portici railway in 1839 named Bayard, a replica of Bayard is at the Naples Railway Museum. Most of the earliest locomotives to operate in what is now Germany before the mid-1840s were 2-2-2s delivered by UK manufacturers, however, by 1839 the type was also being built locally see List of Bavarian locomotives and railbuses. The Pegasus of 1839 was the first locomotive to be built by the Sächsische Maschinenbau-Compagnie in Chemnitz, august Borsig and Company manufactured Beuth in 1843 which was highly successful, its valve design became de facto standard for locomotives for decades to come. By 1846 he had manufactured more than a hundred similar locomotives, both the Leipzig-Dresden Railway and Royal Bavarian State Railways built several 2-2-2 classes 1841-1859. Similarly, the Grand Duchy of Mecklenburg Friedrich-Franz Railway grouped various 2-2-2 steam locomotives procured from German manufacturers between 1848 and 1863 into its Mecklenburg I class, the Imperial Austrian State Railways built two successful locomotives of this wheel arrangement in 1907
5.
Track gauge
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In rail transport, track gauge is the spacing of the rails on a railway track and is measured between the inner faces of the load-bearing rails. All vehicles on a network must have running gear that is compatible with the track gauge, as the dominant parameter determining interoperability, it is still frequently used as a descriptor of a route or network. There is a distinction between the gauge and actual gauge at some locality, due to divergence of track components from the nominal. Railway engineers use a device, like a caliper, to measure the actual gauge, the nominal track gauge is the distance between the inner faces of the rails. In current practice, it is specified at a distance below the rail head as the inner faces of the rail head are not necessarily vertical. In some cases in the earliest days of railways, the company saw itself as an infrastructure provider only. Colloquially the wagons might be referred to as four-foot gauge wagons, say and this nominal value does not equate to the flange spacing, as some freedom is allowed for. An infrastructure manager might specify new or replacement track components at a variation from the nominal gauge for pragmatic reasons. Track is defined in old Imperial units or in universally accepted metric units or SI units, Imperial units were established in United Kingdom by The Weights and Measures Act of 1824. In addition, there are constraints, such as the load-carrying capacity of axles. Narrow gauge railways usually cost less to build because they are lighter in construction, using smaller cars and locomotives, as well as smaller bridges, smaller tunnels. Narrow gauge is often used in mountainous terrain, where the savings in civil engineering work can be substantial. Broader gauge railways are generally expensive to build and require wider curves. There is no single perfect gauge, because different environments and economic considerations come into play, a narrow gauge is superior if ones main considerations are economy and tight curvature. For direct, unimpeded routes with high traffic, a broad gauge may be preferable, the Standard, Russian, and 46 gauges are designed to strike a reasonable balance between these factors. In addition to the general trade-off, another important factor is standardization, once a standard has been chosen, and equipment, infrastructure, and training calibrated to that standard, conversion becomes difficult and expensive. This also makes it easier to adopt an existing standard than to invent a new one and this is true of many technologies, including railroad gauges. The reduced cost, greater efficiency, and greater economic opportunity offered by the use of a common standard explains why a number of gauges predominate worldwide
6.
Driving wheel
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On a steam locomotive, a driving wheel is a powered wheel which is driven by the locomotives pistons. On diesel and electric locomotives, the wheels may be directly driven by the traction motors. Coupling rods are not usually used, and it is common for each axle to have its own motor. Jackshaft drive and coupling rods were used in the past but their use is now confined to shunting locomotives, on an articulated locomotive or a duplex locomotive, driving wheels are grouped into sets which are linked together within the set
7.
Gear train
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A transmission is a machine in a power transmission system, which provides controlled application of the power. Often the term refers simply to the gearbox that uses gears and gear trains to provide speed. In British English, the term refers to the whole drivetrain, including clutch, gearbox, prop shaft, differential. In American English, however, the term more specifically to the gearbox alone. The most common use is in vehicles, where the transmission adapts the output of the internal combustion engine to the drive wheels. Such engines need to operate at a high rotational speed, which is inappropriate for starting, stopping. The transmission reduces the engine speed to the slower wheel speed. Transmissions are also used on bicycles, fixed machines. Often, a transmission has multiple gear ratios with the ability to switch between them as speed varies and this switching may be done manually or automatically. Directional control may also be provided, single-ratio transmissions also exist, which simply change the speed and torque of motor output. The output of the transmission is transmitted via the driveshaft to one or more differentials, while a differential may also provide gear reduction, its primary purpose is to permit the wheels at either end of an axle to rotate at different speeds as it changes the direction of rotation. Conventional gear/belt transmissions are not the mechanism for speed/torque adaptation. Alternative mechanisms include torque converters and power transformation, automatic transmissions use a valve body to shift gears using fluid pressures in conjunction with an ecm. Early transmissions included the right-angle drives and other gearing in windmills, horse-powered devices, and steam engines, in support of pumping, milling, most modern gearboxes are used to increase torque while reducing the speed of a prime mover output shaft. This means that the shaft of a gearbox rotates at a slower rate than the input shaft. A gearbox can be set up to do the opposite and provide an increase in speed with a reduction of torque. Some of the simplest gearboxes merely change the rotational direction of power transmission. Many typical automobile transmissions include the ability to select one of several gear ratios, in this case, most of the gear ratios are used to slow down the output speed of the engine and increase torque
8.
Firebox (steam engine)
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In a steam engine, the firebox is the area where the fuel is burned, producing heat to boil the water in the boiler. Most are somewhat box-shaped, hence the name, the hot gases generated in the firebox are pulled through a rack of tubes running through the firebox boiler. In the standard steam locomotive type boiler, the firebox is surrounded by water space on five sides. The bottom of the firebox is open to atmospheric pressure, if the engine burns solid fuel, like wood or coal, there is a grate covering most of the bottom of the firebox to hold the fire. An ashpan, mounted underneath the firebox and below the grates, catches and collects hot embers, ashes, in a coal-burning locomotive, the grates may be shaken to clean dead ash from the bottom of the fire. They are shaken either manually or by a powered grate shaker, wood-burning locomotives have fixed grates that cant be shaken. Wood ash is generally powder which will fall through the grates with no more required than the vibrations of the locomotive rolling down the track. The fire grates must be replaced due to the extreme heat they must endure. Combustion air enters through the bottom of the firebox and airflow is usually controlled by damper doors above the ash collection pocket of the ash pan, a locomotive that burns liquid fuel - usually Bunker C fuel oil or similar heavy oil - does not have grates. Instead, they have a metal gauge firing pan bolted tight against the bottom of the firebox. The firing pan is covered with firebrick and the firebox has a lining, usually up to the level of the firebox door. The oil burner is a nozzle containing a slot for the oil to flow out onto a steam jet which atomizes the oil into a fine mist which ignites in the firebox. The oil burner nozzle is mounted in the front of the firebox, protected by a hood of firebrick. Dampers control air flow to the oil fire, there is a large brick arch the front third to half of the firebox. It is supported on arch tubes, thermic syphons, or circulators, the brick arch directs heat, flames, and smoke back over the fire towards the rear of the firebox. Visible smoke contains unburned combustible carbon particles and combustible gasses, the purpose of this redirection is to cause more complete combustion of these particles and gasses which make the locomotive more efficient and causes less visible smoke to be emitted from the stack. Without the arch, flames and visible smoke would be sucked straight into the firetubes without having been fully burned, the brick arch and its supports require periodic replacement due to the extreme heat they endure. Firetubes are attached to one wall of the firebox and carry the hot gaseous products of combustion through the water, heating it
9.
Grand Junction Railway
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The line built by the company was the first trunk railway to be completed in England, and arguably the worlds first long-distance railway with steam traction. Presently, the lines which comprised the GJR form the section of the West Coast Main Line. The GJR established its chief engineering works at Crewe, relocating there from Edge Hill and it began operation with a temporary Birmingham terminus at Vauxhall, The travelling post office where mail was sorted on a moving train was instituted on the Grand Junction Railway in January 1838. Using a converted horse-box, it was carried out at the suggestion of Frederick Karstadt, karstadts son was one of two mail clerks who did the sorting. The route between Curzon Street railway station and Vauxhall primarily consisted of the Birmingham Viaduct and it consisted of 28 arches, each 31 feet wide and 28 feet tall and crossed the River Rea. This being accomplished, what further improvement could be desired between London and Lancashire, in 1840 the GJR absorbed the Chester and Crewe Railway soon before it began operation. In 1845 the GJR merged with the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, in 1841 the company appointed Captain Mark Huish as the Secretary of the railway. Huish was ruthless in the development of the business and contributed significantly to the Companys success, the GJR was very profitable, paying dividends of at least 10% from its beginning and having a final capital value of more than £5. One locomotive, Columbine, is preserved at the Science Museum and this was GJR No.49 and LNWR No. In the 2007 adaptation of the television series Cranford, a line owned by the Grand Junction Railway is the subject of gossip when the railway line bypasses the village of Cranford. Grand Junction Railroad Notes References Bibliography Webster, Norman W. Britains First Trunk Line – the Grand Junction Railway, the Railways of Great Britain and Ireland Practically Described and Illustrated
10.
The Great Exhibition
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It was the first in a series of Worlds Fairs, exhibitions of culture and industry that became popular in the 19th century, and it was a much anticipated event. The Great Exhibition was organized by Henry Cole and Prince Albert, husband of the reigning monarch, Queen Victoria. It was arguably a response to the highly successful French Industrial Exposition of 1844, indeed, Queen Victoria and her family visited three times. Although the Great Exhibition was a platform on which countries from around the world could display their achievements, Britain sought to prove its own superiority. The British exhibits at the Great Exhibition held the lead in almost every field where strength, durability, utility and quality were concerned, whether in iron and steel, Britain also sought to provide the world with the hope of a better future. Europe had just struggled through two decades of political and social upheaval, and now Britain hoped to show that technology. Technology and moving machinery were popular, especially working exhibits and she also notes that visitors could watch the entire process of cotton production from spinning to finished cloth. Scientific instruments were found in class X, and included electric telegraphs, microscopes, air pumps and barometers, a special building, nicknamed The Crystal Palace, or The Great Shalimar, was built to house the show. The building was architecturally adventurous, drawing on Paxtons experience designing greenhouses for the sixth Duke of Devonshire. It took the form of a glass house,1851 feet long by 454 feet wide and was constructed from cast iron-frame components and glass made almost exclusively in Birmingham. From the interior, the large size was emphasized with trees and statues, this served, not only to add beauty to the spectacle. The Crystal Palace was an success, considered an architectural marvel. The building was moved and re-erected in 1854 in enlarged form at Sydenham Hill in south London. It was destroyed by fire on 30 November 1936, six million people—equivalent to a third of the entire population of Britain at the time—visited the Great Exhibition. The average daily attendance was 42,831 with an attendance of 109,915 on 7 October. The event made a surplus of £186,000, which was used to found the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Science Museum and they were all built in the area to the south of the exhibition, nicknamed Albertopolis, alongside the Imperial Institute. The remaining surplus was used to set up an educational trust to provide grants and scholarships for industrial research, the Exhibition caused controversy as its opening approached. Some conservatives feared that the mass of visitors might become a revolutionary mob, must shock every honest and well-meaning Englishman
11.
Safety valve
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A safety valve is a valve that acts as a fail-safe in a thermal-hydraulics plant. Pilot-operated relief valves are a type of pressure safety valve. Safety valves were first developed for use on steam boilers during the Industrial Revolution, early boilers operating without them were prone to explosion. Vacuum safety valves are used to prevent a tank from collapsing while it is being emptied, when sizing a vacuum safety valve, the calculation method is not defined in any norm, particularly in the hot CIP / cold water scenario, but some manufacturers have developed sizing simulations. The earliest and simplest safety valve was used on a 1679 steam digester and utilized a weight to retain the steam pressure, however, on the Stockton and Darlington Railway, the safety valve tended to go off when the engine hit a bump in the track. A valve less sensitive to sudden accelerations used a spring to contain the steam pressure and this dangerous practice was sometimes used to marginally increase the performance of a steam engine. In 1856, John Ramsbottom invented a tamper-proof spring safety valve that became universal on railways, Safety valves also evolved to protect equipment such as pressure vessels and heat exchangers. The term safety valve should be limited to compressible fluid applications, the two general types of protection encountered in industry are thermal protection and flow protection. Flow protection is characterized by safety valves that are larger than those mounted for thermal protection. They are generally sized for use in situations where significant quantities of gas or high volumes of liquid must be discharged in order to protect the integrity of the vessel or pipeline. This protection can alternatively be achieved by installing a high integrity pressure protection system, Relief valve, an automatic system that is actuated by the static pressure in a liquid-filled vessel. It specifically opens proportionally with increasing pressure, Safety valve, an automatic system that relieves the static pressure on a gas. It usually opens completely, accompanied by a popping sound, Safety relief valve, an automatic system that relieves by static pressure on both gas and liquid. Pilot-operated safety relief valve, a system that relieves on remote command from a pilot. Low pressure safety valve, a system that relieves static pressure on a gas. Used when the difference between the pressure and the ambient atmospheric pressure is small. Vacuum pressure safety valve, a system that relieves static pressure on a gas. Used when the difference between the vessel pressure and the ambient pressure is small, negative and near to atmospheric pressure
