Welding cast iron

[Andy Dingley]

Early TBDs (torpedo boat destroyers) of the early 1890s. This is difficult, as there were several building yards and a vast array of boiler designs at this time, often obscure water-tube inventions. There seems to be little written distinction between the launch-type and the locomotive-type "locomotive" boilers - you have to look at the builder's plans. Havock (Yarrows) was one with a dual-firedoor Belpaire, I think Fervent, Charger, Dasher, Hasty & Zephyr might have been too. Lyon's "The First Destroyers" is a very good read on the development of turbine propulsion around this time, although it doesn't go into as much detail on boilers as you or I might like.

[Andy Breen]

You're entirely right. I can't believe that I missed that one, given that (a) it's a period/area that interests me and (b) I have a copy of Lyon on my shelf. A quick inspection of the drawings revealed that Yarrow did, indeed, use a true locomotive-type boiler in their early TBDs. I must now start checking to see whether they'd done the same in their later, larger TBs or in any of the TGBs they'd been responsible for.

Thanks for that. I most heartily apologise for my unforgivable mistake.

[Andy Dingley]

Henry Hoy's batch of the L&YR Class 30.

I've done some wiki stuff about them, under the Hoy article. Ahrons' ''Development of British Loco Design'' has some photos, if I get time to scan them. Strange thing is that they were a response to a firebox problem that he'd caused himself, by specifying a new, and brittle, alloy for the firebox rod stays.