Novelty was an early
steam locomotiveA steam locomotive is a locomotive powered by steam. The term usually refers to its use on railways, but can also refer to a "road locomotive" such as a traction engine or steamroller....
built by
John EricssonJohn Ericsson was an American Swedish-born inventor and mechanical engineer, as was his brother, Nils Ericson...
and
John BraithwaiteJohn Braithwaite, the younger was an English engineer who invented the first steam fire engine.Braithwaite was third son of John Braithwaite the elder. He was born at 1 Bath Place, New Road, London, on 19 March 1797, and, after being educated at Mr...
to take part in the
Rainhill TrialsThe Rainhill Trials were an important competition in the early days of steam locomotive railways, run in October 1829 in Rainhill, Merseyside at the time in Lancashire ....
.
It was an
0-2-2An 0-2-2, in the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives by wheel arrangement, is one that has two coupled driving wheels followed by two trailing wheels, with no leading wheels .Other equivalent classifications are:
...
WT locomotive and is now regarded as the very first
tank engineA tank locomotive is a steam locomotive that carries its own fuel and water on it, instead of pulling it behind it in a tender.-Origins:The earliest tank locomotives date from the 1840s, one of the first of which was supplied by George England and Co. of New Cross to the contractors building the...
. It had a unique design of boiler and a number of other novel design features (perhaps explaining the choice of name). Unfortunately, several of the major components had significant design weaknesses which ultimately resulted in its failure at the Trials.
Ericsson and Braithwaite Partnership
During the late 1820s Ericsson and Braithwaite were working together building horse drawn
fire enginesA fire apparatus, fire engine, fire truck, or fire appliance is a vehicle designed to assist in fighting fires by transporting firefighters to the scene and providing them with access to the fire, water or other equipment...
with steam pumps. These used a
boilerA boiler is a closed vessel in which water or other fluid is heated. The heated or vaporized fluid exits the boiler for use in various processes or heating applications.-Overview:-Materials:...
designed by Ericsson and were built in the
London[]London is the capital of England and the United Kingdom. It has been a major settlement for two millennia, and the history of London goes back to its founding by the Romans, when it was named Londinium. London's core, the ancient City of London, the 'square mile', retains its medieval boundaries...
works of John Braithwaite.
These fire engines were known for their ability to raise steam quickly and looked very similar to
Novelty.
Charles Vignoles has also been associated with
Novelty, but his practical involvement is not known. He may have aligned himself with the engine because of a continuing feud with
George StephensonGeorge Stephenson was an English civil engineer and mechanical engineer who built the first public railway line in the world to use steam locomotives, and he is renowned as being the "Father of Railways"...
.
Building the Engine
It is said that Ericsson and Braithwaite only found out about the Rainhill Trails seven weeks before the event was due to take place, when Ericsson received a letter from a friend referring to a "Steam Race". This incredibly short space of time has led people to suggest that
Novelty is in fact a converted fire engine. It is more likely that it used many of the same parts as their fire engines and these parts may even have been built for an existing order and diverted to
Novelty.
Novelty was constructed in the
London[]London is the capital of England and the United Kingdom. It has been a major settlement for two millennia, and the history of London goes back to its founding by the Romans, when it was named Londinium. London's core, the ancient City of London, the 'square mile', retains its medieval boundaries...
Workshop belonging to Braithwaite and transported to Liverpool by boat. There was no time to test
Novelty in London before transportation, and following test runs at
RainhillRainhill is a large village and civil parish of the Metropolitan Borough of St Helens, in Merseyside, England. It lies south-southwest of St Helens, north-northwest of Widnes and east of Liverpool city centre....
before the trials, modifications were carried out with the help of
Timothy HackworthTimothy Hackworth was a steam locomotive engineer who lived in Shildon, County Durham, England and was the first locomotive superintendent of the Stockton and Darlington Railway.- Youth and early work :...
.
The Boiler
The boiler used on
Novelty was designed by John Ericsson. The design was very scientific for the era but proved to be very hard to build and maintain compared with the boiler design adopted for
RocketStephenson's Rocket was an early steam locomotive of 0-2-2 wheel arrangement, built in Newcastle at the Forth Street Works of Robert Stephenson and Company in 1829.- Design innovations :The Rocket was not the first steam locomotive...
and most steam locomotives since.
The most prominent feature for the boiler is the vertical copper firebox (the large vessel to the right in the illustration here). Within the vertical vessel was the inner firebox and the space between the two was filled with water (to a level just about the same as the driver’s ankle). (
CokeCoke is the solid carbonaceous material derived from destructive distillation of low-ash, low-sulfur bituminous coal. Cokes from coal are grey, hard, and porous.-Production:Coke is usually produced from coal; the process is called coking....
) fuel was added from the top, where a tube passed down through the top of the firebox. This firebox construction was not dissimilar to some types of vertical boiler, but this was only part of Ericsson’s design.
Like
George StephensonGeorge Stephenson was an English civil engineer and mechanical engineer who built the first public railway line in the world to use steam locomotives, and he is renowned as being the "Father of Railways"...
, Ericsson understood that a large area was needed to extract heat from the hot gases. This he did in a long horizontal tube filled with water which ran under the full length of the engine. It can be seen of the illustration here, sticking out to the right, with the vertical chimney attached to it. Within the horizontal section was a tube carrying the hot gases, this formed an ‘S’ shape so the gases made three passes through the water. This ‘S’ shaped tube was also tapered causing the gases to speed up as they cooled down. In practice this tube is almost impossible to clean.
The resulting boiler was the shape of a
hammerA ball-peen hammer is a type of peening hammer used in metalworking. It is distinguished from a point-peen hammer or chisel-peen hammer by having a hemispherical head...
and was required to be fitted to the
frameA locomotive frame is the structure that forms the backbone of the railway locomotive, giving it strength and supporting the superstructure elements such as a cab, boiler or bodywork. The vast majority of locomotives have had a frame structure of some kind...
before the
footplateThe footplate of a steam locomotive is a large metal plate that rests on top of the frames. It is the full width of the locomotive and extends all the way from the front buffer beam to the back buffer beam. The boiler, the cab, and other superstructure elements are in turn mounted on the footplate...
, cylinders or blower could be added.
The boiler used a ‘Forced Draught’ provided by a mechanical blower (the triangular structure on the right in the illustration). This forced air along a pipe and into the sealed ashpan (below the fire). Very few steam locomotives have ever used a forced draught like this, the main reason is that in order to add fuel either the draft must be stopped or some form of
airlockAn airlock is a device which permits the passage of people and objects between a pressure vessel and its surroundings while minimizing the change of pressure in the vessel and loss of air from it...
fitted.
Novelty used an airlock to feed the fuel in, but there was still a chance of flame and hot gases being blown into the face of the fireman.
The blower was driven from the rods linking the cylinders to the wheels, thus the draught was proportional to the speed of the engine, not to how hard it is working as with a
blastpipeThe blastpipe is part of a steam locomotive that discharges exhaust steam from the cylinders into the smokebox beneath the chimney in order to increase the draught through the fire.- History :...
. It is assumed that either the blower was worked by hand when the engine was standing or the drive wheels were lifted of the rails. Details of the blower design are not known for certain.
Water was forced into the boiler using a
pumpA boiler feedwater pump is a specific type of pump used to pump feedwater into a steam boiler. The water may be freshly supplied or returning condensate produced as a result of the condensation of the steam produced by the boiler...
driven off one of the cylinders (this was normal practice at the time).
Drive to the Wheels
At this time, engineers were worried about uneven wear on pistons and cylinders when they were mounted horizontally, so most were mounted vertically, but vertical cylinders driving directly on the wheels (as on
Sans PareilSans Pareil was a steam locomotive built by Timothy Hackworth which took part in the 1829 Rainhill Trials on the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, held to select a builder of locomotives...
) caused problems with poor riding and did not work well with the springs.
On
Novelty, the cylinders were mounted vertically towards the rear of the engine (to the right of the men in the illustration). Directly below were
bell crankA bell crank is a type of crank that changes motion around a 90 degree angle. The name comes from its first use, changing the vertical pull on a rope to a horizontal pull on the striker of a bell, used for calling staff in large houses or commercial establishments.The bell crank consists of an "L"...
s which changed the drive to horizontal. Connecting rods linked the bell cranks to the crank axle (the axle on the left in the illustration).
The
valve gearThe valve gear of a steam engine is the mechanism that operates the inlet and exhaust valves to admit steam into the cylinder and allow exhaust steam to escape, respectively, at the correct points in the cycle...
took a similar route to the drive. One effect of this was it had many pins and links, resulting in lost motion.
The wheels themselves were of the suspension type (similar to a
bicycle wheelA bicycle wheel is a wheel, most commonly a wire wheel, designed for a bicycle. A pair is often called a wheelset, especially in the context of ready built "off the shelf" performance-oriented wheels....
).
It is easy to think that
Novelty is an
0-4-0Under the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives, 0-4-0 represents one of the simplest possible types, that with two axles and four wheels, all of which are driven. Generally speaking, those two axles are linked with side rods and form a single driven set. Richard Trevithick's...
locomotive as it had equal sized wheels, however is actually an
0-2-2An 0-2-2, in the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives by wheel arrangement, is one that has two coupled driving wheels followed by two trailing wheels, with no leading wheels .Other equivalent classifications are:
...
WT. Only the wheels under the firebox (those to the left on the illustration here) were driven, the other wheels were not connected to the drive in any way.
The First Tank Engine
Novelty is regarded as the first
tank engineA tank locomotive is a steam locomotive that carries its own fuel and water on it, instead of pulling it behind it in a tender.-Origins:The earliest tank locomotives date from the 1840s, one of the first of which was supplied by George England and Co. of New Cross to the contractors building the...
as the fuel was carried in baskets on the footplate and water was in a well tank between the wheels.
As one of the rules for the Rainhill Trials related to the weight of the engine without a tender, a special allowance had to be made for
Novelty.
Performance in the Trials
Novelty was the crowd’s favourite to win the Trials. This may be because it looked like a steam carriage (which people associated with speed and improvements in transport) or it may be because it did not look like a typical colliery engine of the time. In the demonstration runs that took place on the first day of the trials,
Novelty did not disappoint, managing a speed of around
In the preparations for the trials,
Novelty was shown to be very lightweight and very quick to raise steam.
Novelty was the first locomotive to be tested. Starting on the second day of the trials, it began the planned series of runs but very quickly the blower failed and repairs had to be made. The repairs took up all of the next day. However, when
Novelty next ran the water feed pipe burst and more repairs had to be made, which seem to have included a seal on the boiler. At the time, the boilers were sealed with a
cementIn the most general sense of the word, a cement is a binder, a substance which sets and hardens independently, and can bind other materials together. The word "cement" traces to the Romans, who used the term "opus caementicium" to describe masonry which resembled concrete and was made from crushed...
-like substance which required days - if not weeks - to set properly. Time would not allow this and the seal quickly failed once the trial runs were restarted.
The recurring boiler problems prompted Ericsson and Braithwaite to withdraw from the Trials.
Before it failed, the Stephensons were said to be seriously worried by
Novelty, as it was well-suited to meet the conditions of the trial. For one thing the Stephensons considered the weight to be pulled to be too light for a practical railway.
After the Rainhill Trials
Once all the repairs were completed,
Novelty made a number of successful demonstration runs but it was too late to have any effect on the competition. It is sometimes claimed that one of these demonstration runs included the locomotive reaching a speed of , but there is little to back this up and it may be a misinterpretation of a newspaper report trying to give an impression of the great speeds that the Rainhill engines were achieving.
Two further engines were built by Ericsson and Braithwaite named
William IV and
Queen Adelaide. These were generally larger and more robust than
Novelty and differed in a number of details (for example, it is thought that a different design of blower was used which was an ‘Induced Draught’ type, sucking the gases from the fire). The pair ran trials on the
Liverpool and Manchester RailwayThe Liverpool and Manchester Railway was the world's first inter-city passenger railway in which all the trains were timetabled and were hauled for most of the distance solely by steam locomotives. The line opened on 15 September 1830 and ran between the cities of Liverpool and Manchester in North...
but the railway declined to purchase the new designs.
Novelty was transferred to the
St Helens and Runcorn Gap RailwaySt Helens and Runcorn Gap Railway, later known as St Helens Railway, was an early railway company in Lancashire, England, which opened in 1833. It ran originally from the town of St Helens to the area which would later develop into the town of Widnes. Branches were opened to Garston, Warrington...
and worked there for a few years. During its time there (around 1833) it received new cylinders and a new boiler.
Somehow, all the wheels and both cylinders (assumed to be the original one not those from the 1833 rebuild) survived.
During 1929 the original wheels and one cylinder were incorporated into a rebuilt/replica (?) locomotive that is now on display in the Manchester Museum of Science and Industry. This early replica was rebuilt in 1988 and currently includes batteries and an electric motor to allow it to operate (all wheels are driven making the engine a 4wBE). The other cylinder is on display at
RainhillRainhill is a large village and civil parish of the Metropolitan Borough of St Helens, in Merseyside, England. It lies south-southwest of St Helens, north-northwest of Widnes and east of Liverpool city centre....
Public Library.
No other British locomotives are known to have been built in this style. Comparisons are made with 20th century vertical boilered engines such as those by
SentinelSentinel Waggon Works Ltd was a British company based in Shrewsbury, Shropshire that made steam-powered lorries, railway locomotives and later diesel engined lorries and locomotives.-Alley & MacLellan, Sentinel Works, Jessie Street Glasgow:...
of
ShrewsburyShrewsbury is the county town of Shropshire, in the West Midlands region of England. Lying on the River Severn, it is home to 70,689 inhabitants, and is the primary settlement and headquarters of Shropshire Council...
, but in fact the principles were very different.
The Replica
For the Rocket 150 event in 1980, a completely new replica of
Novelty was constructed by Locomotion Enterprises in the Springwell Workshop of the
Bowes RailwayThe Bowes Railway, built by George Stephenson in 1826, is the world's only preserved operational standard gauge cable railway system. It was built to transport coal from Durham pits to boats on the River Tyne. Only part of the system now remains.-Background:...
. It was a fully working replica that was built to look correct when display at the planned event; however many changes were made to reduce the construction costs and meet modern standards. It has been suggested that the replica was built to last no longer than the 3 days of the Rocket 150 event.
Some of the differences between the original and replica are:
- Carbon steel used instead of wrought iron
thumb|The [[Eiffel tower]] is constructed from [[puddle iron]], a form of wrought ironWrought iron is an iron alloy with a very low carbon content, in comparison to steel, and has fibrous inclusions, known as slag. This is what gives it a "grain" resembling wood, which is visible when it is etched...
- Wrought iron was no longer commercially produced, while carbon steel was understood by every commercial fabricator.
- Boiler built from welded steel instead of copper
Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu and atomic number 29.It is a ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. Pure copper is rather soft and malleable and a freshly-exposed surface has a pinkish or peachy color...
- A copper boiler would have been very expensive in materials and would have needed specialist skills while welded steel had much in common with industrial pressure vessels.
- Blower built from plywood
Plywoodis a type of engineered wood made from thin sheets of wood, called plies or wood veneers. The layers are glued together so that adjacent plies have their grain at right angles to each other for greater strength. There are usually an odd number of plies, as the symmetry makes the board less...
and painted copper colour
- The blower is likely to have been the subject of development work, plywood being much cheaper and easier to work with. Additionally few people would get close enough to tell the difference.
- Handbrake fitted to act on both wheels
- This may have been fitted after the ‘Rocket 150’ event.
- Boiler fitted with gauge glass and Bourdon pressure gauge
- Requirements for any steam boiler, vital if the engine was to be operated safely.
- Safety valve
A safety valve is a valve mechanism for the automatic release of a substance from a boiler, pressure vessel, or other system when the pressure or temperature exceeds preset limits. It is part of a bigger set named pressure safety valves or pressure relief valves...
is "pop" type rather than "dead weight".
- Firstly the pop valves were a type used in industry; secondly the dead-weight type could be held down (so it would never work properly); and thirdly a dead-weight valve tends to bounce and thus waste steam.
- The boiler of the replica contains approximately twice the volume of water
- This is mainly as a result of the construction methods used (flanged joints on the barrels and standard steel pipe for the flue tube). It is also gave bigger water spaces between the inside and outside plates. In consequence, the fire grate must have considerably smaller than on the original.
For a reason that is not fully understood, the wheels of the replica were built with very narrow treads. It is possible that wheels were scaled off a model in the
London Science MuseumThe Science Museum on Exhibition Road, South Kensington, London is part of the National Museum of Science and Industry. The museum is a major London tourist attraction.-Origin:...
. As a result it was unable to travel over modern
pointworkA railroad switch, turnout or [set of] points is a mechanical installation enabling railway trains to be guided from one track to another at a railway junction....
.
During the Rocket 150 event,
Novelty was carried on a Well wagon, supported in such a way as to allow the engine to be run and its wheels to rotate freely.
Following the Rocket 150 event,
Novelty was steamed on a small number of occasions in
ManchesterManchester is a city and metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. In 2007, the population of the city was estimated to be 458,100...
. Around 1982, it was sold to the
Swedish Railway MuseumThe Swedish Railway Museum, , in Gävle, Gästrikland, Sweden, national museum for Sweden's railway history.The Swedish Railway Museum is tasked with acquiring, preserving and supplying knowledge about Swedish railway history on the basis of the national collection...
,
GävleGävle ['jɛ:vlə] is a city, the seat of Gävle Municipality and the capital of Gävleborg County in Sweden. It has 68,700 inhabitants in 2005. It is the oldest city in the historical Norrland , as it received its charter in 1446 by Christopher of Bavaria.-History:It is believed that the name Gävle...
, and left the
UKThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a sovereign state located off the northwestern coast of continental Europe. It is an island country, spanning an archipelago including Great Britain, the northeastern part of Ireland, and many small islands...
.
During July 2002,
Novelty was collected from its then home in the
AngelholmÄngelholm is a locality and the seat of Ängelholm Municipality in Skåne County, Sweden with 22,532 inhabitants in 2005.It is known for its clay cuckoos — a special kind of ocarina. This is however a dying tradition as there is now only one producer of clay cuckoos, Sofia Nilsson.Tourism is an...
, for use in a TV programme. It was returned to
SwedenSweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe...
during the spring of 2003, but made a short visit to the
Museum of Science and Industry in ManchesterThe Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester , located in Manchester, England, is a large museum devoted to the development of science, technology, and industry and particularly the city's considerable contributions to these. It is an Anchor Point of ERIH — The European Route of Industrial...
during the autumn of 2005.
2002 Restaging – The Television Programme
For the
BBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation, usually referred to by its abbreviation as the "BBC", is the longest established and largest broadcaster in the world...
TV programme "
TimewatchTimewatch is a long-running British television series showing documentaries on historical subjects, spanning all human history. Produced by the BBC, the Timewatch brandname is used as a banner title in the UK, but many of the individual documentaries can be found on US cable channels without the...
– Rocket and its Rivals" the replica of
Novelty was transported to the
National Railway MuseumThe National Railway Museum is a museum in York forming part of the British National Museum of Science and Industry and telling the story of rail transport in Britain and its impact on society. It has won many awards, including the European Museum of the Year Award in 2001...
in
YorkYork is a walled city, situated at the confluence of the Rivers Ouse and Foss in North Yorkshire, England. The city has a rich heritage and has provided the backdrop to major political events throughout much of its two millennia of existence....
. Here it was completely dismantled to allow examination of the boiler and working parts. Several items needed to be attended to before the locomotive could be run:
- Full boiler inspection for insurance
Insurance, in law and economics, is a form of risk management primarily used to hedge against the risk of a contingent loss. Insurance is defined as the equitable transfer of the risk of a loss, from one entity to another, in exchange for a premium, and can be thought of as a guaranteed and known...
purposes
- Minor boiler repairs
- Modifications to the wheels to allow safe operation on normal railways
- Cleaning and repainting of the water tank
- Releasing of several water valves that had seized
- Partial repaint
Of this work, the major item was the modification of the wheels. The solution adopted by the National Railway Museum Workshop was to employ a metal fabricator to cut four rings from 40-mm-thick steel plate. These were cut with enough precision not to need any further machining. The rings were then bolted to the existing wheels and were a complete success.
Following re-assembly, the locomotive was steam tested at York before transport to
Carrog stationCarrog railway station in Denbighshire, Wales, was formerly a station on the Ruabon to Barmouth line. It was to have closed to passengers on Monday 18 January 1965 but closed prematurely on 14 December 1964 due to flood damage. It was reopened in 1996 as part of the preserved Llangollen Railway...
on the
Llangollen RailwayThe Llangollen Railway is a volunteer-run preserved railway in Denbighshire, Wales, which runs from Llangollen to Carrog, at 7.5 mile long , it is easily the longest preserved Standard-Gauge line in Wales.Work is being carried out on an extension to Corwen, with the trackbed cleared to Bonwm Halt,...
. Early tests showed up two major problems: firstly the linkage to the blower was not strong enough, and secondly operating the water feed pump caused very serious priming of the boiler. It was later shown that the feed pump was five times the size of that required for the engine. This caused air to be fed into the horizontal boiler tube probably caused the priming.
To fully recreate the Rainhill Trials, 20 return runs along a section of the Llangollen Railway were required (between Carrog and
Glyndyfrdwy stationsGlyndyfrdwy railway station in Denbighshire, Wales, was formerly a station on the Ruabon to Barmouth line. It was to have closed to passengers on Monday 18 January 1965 but closed prematurely due to flood damage on 14 Dec 1964. It has since reopened by the preserved Llangollen Railway...
).
Novelty was only able to complete 10 runs before the fire became completely filled with
clinkerClinker may refer to:* Clinker , construction method for wooden boats* Clinker , waste from industrial processes* Clinker , a kilned then quenched cement product* Clinker brick, rough dark coloured bricks...
. The inability to clear clinker from the fire in this type of boiler was a major problem, the only way being to drop the fire completely and start again.
During the runs for the restaging of the trials
Novelty was run with an electric fan (powered by a petrol generator) in place of the blower. Even allowing for this in the final calculation
Novelty was much more efficient than
Sans Pareil
For the Restaging, the replica of
Novelty was too slow to meet the requirements of the original trials and did not complete the course. The maximum speed attained at any point was , possibly because the main steam pipe from the boiler was restricting the flow to the cylinders. The valve gear was also set incorrectly (indicated by the odd noise of the exhaust beats).
With all the obvious differences between the original and the replica, added to the fact that the locomotive crew used had only four days experience of operating the locomotive, it cannot be said that in this restaging of the trial the replica of
Novelty gave the performance that the original could have achieved if more time had been made available in 1829.
Other Locomotives Named Novelty
Excluding the original and the replicas, the following locomotives have carried the name
Novelty
- LNWR
The London and North Western Railway was a railway company of the United Kingdom which existed between 1846 and 1922. It was created by the merger of three railway companies - the Grand Junction Railway, the London and Birmingham Railway and the Manchester and Birmingham Railway. During the late...
no. 1682, built 1868, rebuilt 1892
- LMS Royal Scot Class
The London, Midland and Scottish Railway Royal Scot Class is a class of 4-6-0 express passenger locomotive introduced in 1927. Originally having parallel boilers, all members were later rebuilt with tapered type 2A boilers, and were in effect two classes.- Background :By the mid-1920s the LMS had...
no. 6127, built 1927 (later renamed)
- LMS Jubilee Class
The London Midland and Scottish Railway Jubilee Class is a class of steam locomotive designed for mainline passenger work. 191 locomotives were built between 1934 and 1936...
no. 5733, built 1936
- British Rail Class 86
The British Rail Class 86 was the standard electric locomotive built during the 1960s, developed as a result of testing with the earlier Classes 81, 82, 83, 84 and 85. One hundred of these locomotives were built from 1965-1966 by either English Electric at Vulcan Foundry, Newton-le-Willows, or...
, no. 86 235 (ex-E3194), built 1965 (later renamed)
Sources
- Bailey, M. – Various notes, Speeches and lectures (unpublished)
- Burton, A. – The Rainhill Story - 1980
- Hurrell, A & Lamb, R – Various Diaries, written accounts and lecture notes (unpublished)
- Pike, J. – Locomotive Names, An Illustrated Dictionary - 2000
- Official Handbook for ‘Rocket 150’ event - 1980
- Programme for ‘Riot of Steam’ Event - 2005