ON TRACK: The Flying Scotsman’s boiler, refurbished by Riley and Son at the ELR’s Baron Street works in Bury, is lowered into place.
One of Britain’s best-loved steam trains is to make a historic return to the rails, thanks to a little help from the East Lancashire Railway.
Heritage railway enthusiasts from the ELR have refurbished the Flying Scotsman’s boiler and fitted it into the locomotive as part of a six-year overhaul.
Now the restoration is almost complete it is hoped the train will soon pull passenger trains on the line, which runs through Bury, Ramsbottom, Heywood and Rawtenstall. Project manager Chris Chesney said: “This represents a very exciting stage in the restoration and means that her return to steam is only a few short months away.”
The Flying Scotsman was built in 1923 and became the flagship of the London and North Eastern Railway.
It became the first steam locomotive to officially record speeds of 100mph in 1934 and travelled two million miles before being withdrawn from service in 1963. The engine, number 4472, is owned by the National Railway Museum at York.
Steam engines could be eco hope
steam trains of the future I hope
By Jo Twist
BBC News science and technology reporter
Think of steam engines and hazy, romantic images of chugging great beasts of old fill the mind.
Inspiration aims to break the record next summer
Steam-powered vehicles are not usually deemed as being parked at the cutting edge of transport technology.
Nor do they seem to be the type to race across desert landscapes in a bid to smash land speed records in the 21st Century.
But British design engineer Glynne Bowsher and his team have almost finished building a super-fast vehicle reminiscent of the Batmobile.
And this car puts a new technological breath of life into what is regarded as a traditional means of power.
He knows engine and vehicle design like old friends, having worked on Richard Noble's record-breaking Thrust 2 jet car and having designed ThrustSSC, the first vehicle to break the sound barrier on land.
His team, the British Steam Car Challenge (BSCC), is hoping that its Inspiration vehicle will live up to its name and not only break a long-standing steam-car speed record, but also inspire thinking about alternative fuels for the future.
In and out
The search for a suitable alternative fuel source to hydrocarbons which can cleanly power our vehicles has touched on various different options.
Fuels which do not "rot" the environment usually bring to mind images of gently humming electric cars, clean hydrogen, natural gas, or hithane - a concoction of hydrogen and methane.
The most promising, believes Mr Bowsher, is either nuclear or hydrogen fuel.
The public is reluctant to explore nuclear; but researchers and engineers across the world are exploring how best to generate and, more importantly, store hydrogen fuel, one of the main barriers to its widespread use.
Nine European cities are taking part in a pilot scheme to use hydrogen fuelled buses on certain routes, for instance.
But until a viable mass-scale way of storing and distributing hydrogen effectively is developed, it remains limited in use.
INSPIRATION STEAM CAR
Construction: Tubular steel spaceframe with composite/metal panels
Length: 5.25m
Width: 1.70m
Height: 1.10m
Fuel: LPG (Liquified petroleum gas)
Working fluid: Water/steam
Performance: Maximum speed 200+ mph (320km/h); Initial acceleration: 0.52G
Brakes: Twin front wheel brakes and twin rear inboard rear disc brakes
Steering: Rack and pinion
Mr Bowsher believes that until then, designers could look to Inspiration for a different take on good old steam.
The key to its potential is the difference between internal and external combustion technologies.
External combustion engines - like steam ones - hold several advantages over internal ones.
They have the potential to produce fewer harmful nitrogen oxides (NOx) than conventional cars which use internal combustion engines.
Although steam engines are most likely to need to burn hydrocarbon-based fuels like petrol and diesel, which in turn release carbon dioxide, external combustion engines can control the release and the production of CO2 more efficiently.
And because such engines can work well at lower peak temperatures and pressures, the creation of NOx compounds can be almost negligible.
Steam lad
Inspiration is a far cry from the steam cars made famous by the Stanley brothers, however.
The 1906 record, set by a Stanley Steamer at what is now Daytona Beach, is the longest-standing officially recognised land speed record for a steam car.
It was set at a time when the battle for supremacy between petrol-powered internal combustion engines and steam-powered external combustion engines was in full sprint.
Although Stanley Steamers had enjoyed a boom in the early 1900s, they were quickly being overtaken by internal combustion engines.
I grew up with steam locomotives in my own town, so steam was a part of my life 
Glynne Bowsher
The steam car, driven by Fred Marriott, reached 127.7mph (205.5 km/h), beating four petrol-powered vehicles to pick up the Dewar Trophy rewarding the fastest vehicles on land.
Even before steam became speedy, a steam-powered engine designed by Nicolas Joseph Cugnot drove the first self-propelled vehicle in 1769.
But it had to rest every 15 minutes to generate enough steam power to send it on its way again.
To Mr Bowsher, it is steam's historical legacy that has always attracted him.
"I grew up with steam locomotives in my own town, so steam was a part of my life. When I was young we didn't have a car - my father never owned one," he explains.
"We went on the railway or the bus. It was quite important to me; I always had a love of aviation and steam so those two things in terms of transport are still with me."
Own design
Designing a steam engine fit for the demands of a 21st Century land-speed attempt has proved somewhat of a challenge, however.
"We basically had to come up with our own design, which is innovative in some ways," says Mr Bowsher. So innovative, in fact, that the team is exploring patenting the design.
Inspiration's engine works in quite a simple way, he explains.
Water is passed through a steam generator where it is heated by burning propane gas into superheated steam at 400C and at 40-bar pressure (4 million Pa).
Inspiration is designed to break the long-standing land-speed record for steam cars
Enlarge ImageThat steam is then fed into four nozzles on a two-stage turbine arrangement.
"With a turbine, you either use the pressure energy or velocity energy. In this case, we turn the pressure energy into high velocity.
"Then the moving gas stream strikes the turbine wheels and starts them rotating - a bit like a small-scale power station," explains Mr Bowsher.
"Once we have a turbine that goes round, rotational power, that along with gear ratios can be used to drive the wheels and once we have the wheels rotating we can make it go forward fast."
It sounds simple enough, but there were big challenges technologically to generate enough power in such a small vehicular space - 300 brake horsepower to be precise.
That is 225kW of power operating at 12,000rpm. Formula 1 engines typically operate at more than 17,000rpm, while aircraft turbine engines turn at 85,000rpm and above.
"One difficulty was getting a turbine and transmission system in such a small space.
"But the worst problem was providing a steam generator to provide steam the turbine needed in such a small space."
INSPIRATION ENGINE SPEC
Two stage turbine on single spool
Output: 300bhp at 12,000rpm (turbine speed) (225kw)
Output shaft gear ratio: 4:1 or 4.45:1 to twin output shafts
Differential: Epicyclic type with viscous couplings
It is a method of steam production that seems not to have been used previously, according to Mr Bowsher.
He does not imagine that steam cars will be the complete road ahead for cars on our streets.
"Gas turbines have been used in the past," he says. "But the problem of turbines is that to be efficient, they have to run at a predetermined speed.
"The very nature of road cars is that their speed changes all the time, so this design would be no good for road vehicles."
But he can imagine the engine design being used in diesel-based commercial vehicles which belch out a large proportion of pollution, like buses and lorries.
"Burning propane is environmentally more friendly than burning diesel. If the technology could be adapted, then it might just be a possibility - it is something we are investigating," he says.
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Steam train's snow rescue 'glory'2009 but it could happen again this year with this cold spell we are having thank God for steam trains to help pull us out of trouble maybe again. | ||
 Darlington-built Tornado was unaffected by the freezing conditions
Passengers were rescued by a steam locomotive after modern rail services were brought to a halt by the snowy conditions in south-east England. Trains between Ashford and Dover were suspended on Monday when cold weather disabled the electric rail. Some commuters at London Victoria faced lengthy delays until Tornado - Britain's first mainline steam engine in 50 years - offered them a lift. They were taken home "in style", said the Darlington-built engine's owners. Train services in Kent were hit hard by the freezing conditions at the start of the week.
The weather-related disruption included three days of cancellations for Eurostar services through the Channel Tunnel. Tornado, a £3m Peppercorn class A1 Pacific based at the National Railway Museum in York, was in the South East for one day, offering "Christmas meal" trips from London to Dover. Its "Cathedrals Express" service, the last mainline journey in its first year of operations, was about to depart when staff heard about the stranded passengers. About 100 people were offered free seats, according to Mark Allatt, chairman of The A1 Steam Locomotive Trust - the charity which built Tornado. 'All credit' He said: "It was a nice way to finish for Christmas, though I think some of the rescued passengers didn't realise they'd even been travelling on a steam train until they got off." Mr Allatt, who was on the service at the time, said he only saw a handful of other trains between London and Dover throughout Monday. He added: "If any of the train operators want to modernise their services by using steam trains, I would be happy to give them a quote." A spokesman for Southeastern Trains congratulated Mr Allatt on his "moment of glory". He said: "I'm sure those passengers were saved from a lengthy wait, all credit to him."
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The train set off from Darlington at 0745 GMT and arrived at London King's Cross station shortly after 1400 GMT.
The £3m Peppercorn class A1 Pacific engine was built in Darlington over 18 years with donations from enthusiasts.
Hundreds watched Tornado arrive in London. Passenger John Warren described the journey as "absolutely phenomenal".
Tornado pulled 13 carriages, equating to about 500 tons, and ran at speeds of up to 75mph.
Additional passengers were picked up at York and the train passed through stations including Newark, Peterborough and Potters Bar before arriving in London.
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 In these dark days, to have something like this is absolutely brilliantPassenger John Warren |
The journey took twice as long as the regular rail service and was delayed by 30 minutes following electrical problems near Peterborough unrelated to the steam engine.
Mr Warren, from Whittlesey, Peterborough, was one of the first passengers to step off the train.
He said: "Thousands of people were at the sides of the tracks waving as we went by.
"In these dark days, to have something like this is absolutely brilliant."
Derek Bryne travelled to York from Seaford, East Sussex, to catch Tornado after his wife bought him tickets for his 75th birthday.
He said the atmosphere on board was "unbelievable".
"Everyone was so friendly. They were all of the same ilk and wanting to travel," he added.
The train is apple green, the colour carried by the first 30 Peppercorn class A1s, and it began taking fare-paying passengers on 31 January.
Robert Morland from the A1 Steam Locomotive Trust said: "We built it to the original plans and drawings which came from 1948, so the engine is completely new but it is as it would have been as one of the original engines."
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Although it does of course create some smoke, actually pulling 500 people with a steam engine is quite... efficient Robert Morland, A1 Steam Locomotive Trust |
The train's headlamps, signalling system and onboard voyage data recorder or "black box" are powered by electricity, he added.
Mr Morland denied the steam engine posed a health risk.
"The approach to steam has changed in the last few years but once you have your engine fully certified for the mainline there isn't really a problem," he said.
"Although it does of course create some smoke, actually pulling 500 people with a steam engine is quite an efficient way of transporting people."
Trust chairman Mark Allatt said the journey marked "the end of another chapter in the story of a project that many said could not be completed".
