Rocket (locomotive)
| The Rocket | |
|---|---|
 Not ready to drive replica of the "Rocket" in its original version at a special exhibition in the Nuremberg Transport Museum
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| Numbering: | 1-5 |
| Number: | 5 |
| Manufacturer: | Robert Stephenson & Co. , Newcastle |
| Year of construction (s): | 1829 |
| Retirement: | 1840 |
| Type : | A1 n2 |
| Gauge : | 1435 mm ( standard gauge ) |
| Length: | 6.56 m / 3.85 m
(with / without tender) |
| Service mass: | 4.2 t / 4 tons, 3 cwt |
| Service mass with tender: | 7.4 t |
| Top speed: | 47 km / h |
| Traction power: | 21 hp |
| Driving wheel diameter: | 1422 mm (4 ft 8 in) |
| Impeller diameter: | 830 mm |
| Number of cylinders: | 2 |
| Cylinder diameter: | 203 mm |
| Piston stroke: | 432 mm |
| Cup length: | 1830 mm |
| Boiler overpressure: | 3.5 bar |
| Number of heating pipes: | 25 3-inch diameter copper flame tubes |
| Grate area: | 0.56 m² |
| Radiant heating surface: | 12.8 m² |
The Rocket ( English for the rocket ) was an early steam locomotive , which in 1829 by George and Robert Stephenson for the Rainhill Trials was built that to determine a suitable locomotive for the Liverpool and Manchester Railway was announced.
history
The operation of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway was originally intended as a cable car with 21 stationary steam engines to drive the wire ropes, because it was not yet believed that locomotives could overcome gradients. At the urging of George Stephenson, the railway administration announced the Rainhill locomotive race. In contrast to locomotives built earlier, which were used to transport coal and iron and thus had to deliver high tractive effort at low speeds, the competition call for a reliable, light, fast locomotive that was also suitable for transporting passengers.
The Stephensons built the Rocket to take part in the locomotive race, which ran from October 6, 1829 to October 14, 1829. They also won this, because the Rocket was the only one of the five participating locomotives that both reached the required minimum speed and did not suffer any technical defect during the entire test period. In addition to the prize money from the competition, Stephenson also received the order to supply four almost identical locomotives: the No. 2 Arrow , No. 3 Wildfire (later renamed Meteor ), No. 4 Dart and No. 5 Comet . Further deliveries followed, so that the Liverpool and Manchester Railway had received 34 locomotives from Stephenson by 1834.
According to stories, Rocket is said to have received her name in response to the Stephensons' nasty article in the Quarterly Review published by John Murray . The political magazine wrote that “people would rather let themselves be shot to the moon with a rocket” than trust this crazy invention of all things. The background was the frequent serious accidents with stationary steam engines . Around 1830, many, even highly educated people, found the idea of driving a carriage with a small steam engine crazy and dangerous.
On the opening day of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, September 15, 1830, the Rocket was involved in one of the first fatal accidents in railway history. Member of Parliament William Huskisson was carelessly hit by the locomotive and fatally injured.
The Rocket was in service on the Brampton Railway between 1836 and 1840 .
technology
In the early days of locomotive construction, there were many technical solutions that seem exotic today with regard to the arrangement and design of the boiler and the cylinders . In the Rocket, the steam boiler was already very similar to the later locomotive boilers. The water space was closed off in the cylindrical pressure vessel by two vertically inserted pipe walls that were connected with 25 pipes in which the smoke gases could flow from the fire box to the chimney and thus heat the water. The idea of using this boiler is said to have been suggested by Henry Booth , managing director of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway.
The fire box already had a water jacket in order to be able to use the radiant heat of the fire. This standing boiler was still separated from the long boiler and had its own water and steam rooms, which were connected to the corresponding rooms of the long boiler with two pipes for the water and one for the steam. In the original version, the locomotive also had no smoke chamber .
Further equipment of the boiler was the two non-closable safety valves required in the competition documents , as well as a blowpipe that fills the furnace with the exhaust steam flowing out of the steam cylinders by blowing it with a nozzle into the chimney, so that a negative pressure is created there. The blowpipe was an invention of Richard Trevithick .
The chimney was made as long as possible in order to get a good fanning of the fire through the smoke gases rising in it. The boiler was not fired with coal , but with coke . This variant avoided the black smoke, which was unpopular among the population, and made it possible to meet the competition requirement that the locomotive must burn its own smoke.
The cylinders were originally inclined at 35 ° to create as much space as possible for the suspension. However, this arrangement was unfavorable for the running properties of the locomotive, so that the locomotive fluctuated greatly during operation. During the renovation in 1831, the cylinders were flattened and the locomotive was provided with a smoke chamber so that the smoke tubes were accessible from the front and the fly ash could easily be removed.
The illustrated along with the locomotive Tender was a normal open freight car on which a barrel for the water and the coke used as fuel were. During the Rainhill race, the locomotive is said to have been on the road sometimes without this car.
Parts received / replicas
The original rocket has been preserved. It is exhibited in the Science Museum in London and is in a condition that differs greatly from the familiar illustrations after the renovation in 1831.
In 1979 the company Locomotion Enterprises made a ready-to-run replica that shows the original condition of the locomotive.
The Rocket was faithfully recreated for the Buster Keaton film Verflixte Gastfreundschaft (USA; 1923; original title Our Hospitality ) set in the 1830s , where it is the subject of numerous gags about the early railroad era. The train driver is played in the film by Joe Keaton , Buster Keaton's father.
Web links
- "The Rainhill Trials October 1829" on resco.co.uk (English)
- "The Rocket", Locomotive Steam Engine of Mr. Robert Stephenson . In: The Mechanics' Magazine . No. 324 , October 24, 1829, p. 1 (English, ANNO - AustriaN Newspapers Online [accessed on May 5, 2020]).
Individual evidence
- ^ A b Liverpool & Manchester Railway. In: Steamindex. Retrieved March 9, 2013 .
- ^ Thomas Minchin Goodeve: Text-book on the Steam Engine: With a Supplement on Gas Engines . C. Lockwood and Company, 1888, pp. 225-.
- ^ A b Rolf-Fredrik Matthaei: Science Museum - "Rocket" and Rainhill. Retrieved August 8, 2015 .
- ^ Rolf-Fredrik Matthaei: September 15, 1830: Opening Liverpool - Manchester. In: George Stephenson. Retrieved August 8, 2015 .
- ^ The Engineer: Links in the history of the locomotive . In: Scientific American Supplement . tape 18 , no. 460 . New York 1884 (full text at gutenberg.org - The locomotive from 1830 mentioned in the article is not the Rocket but the Northumbrian . The picture of the locomotive corresponds to the illustration here .).
- ^ Brian Hollingsworth: The Illustrated Directory of Trains of the World . MBI Publishing Company, Osceola 2000, ISBN 0-7603-0891-8 , pp. 8-11 (English).
- ↑ See Jim Kline: The Complete Films of Buster Keaton. Citadel Press, New York NY 1993, ISBN 0-8065-1303-9 , p. 94.
