OT: Underground utilities

The locomotives designed by Gooch were a success. 5 hours from Exeter to Paddington in the 1840s was a really noteworthy achievement, so much so that it got announced in Parliament. The only trouble was that Gooch designed for the broad gauge, so the useful life of the locomotives never got established.

Again, the broad gauge was better for passenger safety than the standard gauge we ended up with. In all the reports and pictures in the days of the broad gauge, not one of the broad gauge railway disasters ended up with the broad gauge trains other than on its wheels, even if the wheels were nowhere near the rails. Unlike the standard gauge where most of the accidents at that time had the engine (at least) on its side.

Brunel's design for a hospital in the Crimea was also very successful. In fact when the Government wanted to build additional hospitals for the forecast wounded in WW2, it was Brunel's design that was used for the extra UK hospitals.

That is at least 10 years after I had my ride. Maybe it had been discontinued by the time you went.

I heard/read somewhere, that they couldn't get the leather seals to seal well enough, to work for any distance. The long the distance, the higher the leakage.

And the rats loved to eat the seals.

Tim

The story I heard is similar but subtly different. Apparent the leather seals were OK until frosty weather. Some damp got into the leather, and when it froze it made the leather brittle and pieces were broken off when a train went past.

I wonder if a modern version could use magnetic linkage between the train and a piston in a sealed cylinder?

I doubt whether a magnetic coupling would be sufficient to pull a train from stationary to normal transport speed with the piston in a sealed cylinder?

Would have to hope that litter in the form of tin cans etc would not get attracted as well,

A company in Brazil has revisited the atmospheric railway in the form of an airport shuttle that started limited operation in February this year. Their application uses pressure and vacuum.

The 19th Century installations were a hoped for solution to getting trains up gradients as early locomotives were not powerful enough. That was only a short interval till they were and though in the case of he Devon installation the steep gradients proved a nuisance for another 60 years till powerful Diesels came along what the atmospheric could achieve by having trains moved by power produced elsewhere has long been done better by electric.

GH

kV

FFS