Fifties cambox designer approves Duke of Gloucester refinements
THE BR Class 8 Steam Locomotive Trust has been visited by No. 70000 Duke of Gloucester’s joint cambox designer from the 1950s – John Slater – to see progress being made on the restoration of the three unique camboxes at Tyseley Locomotive Works.
John, who worked for Associated Locomotive Equipment Ltd in the 1950s, had played a part with Tom Daniels during the designing of the camboxes.
He was delighted to see the refurbished units, which have incorporated some fine-tuning with the assistance of modern advancements in technology since they were first manufactured. This has resulted in a further improvement of the performance of the camboxes to include a smoother transition of the profiles, leading to an improved operation of the poppet valves.
The fine-tuning of the camboxes is in line with the trust’s objective of returning the Duke to the main line in the condition that it believes Riddles, the locomotive designer, would have achieved following the initial running of his prototype of what was planned as being the final development of BR Express steam locomotives.
Further progress means that all three axles will be at Tyseley by the end of July, and work to turn the tyres on the crank axle and reassemble the two remaining axles into the frame will start in earnest. Once the locomotive is rewheeled with the three axles, and as the three cylinders have already been boxed up, connections will then be made to the coupled driving wheels – a major step forward in the rebuilding of the locomotive.
Due to the reduced availability of specialist materials and their significant cost increases as a result of the pandemic, the trust has accepted, in discussion with Tyseley, that the Duke’s availability for main line hiring is pushed back to mid-2023. However, it is still expected that the boiler will be steamed by the end of 2022.