The Sentinnal Steam Wagon

shallcross attached the following image(s):

Sorry the last Image is rather large

This next one is A Crane arriving at Fernilee Reservoir Construction

File Attachment(s):

B Fernilee - Reservoir Construction 02.jpg (325kb) downloaded 54 time(s).

This is A Crane arriving at Fernilee Reservoir Construction

Norm attached the following image(s):

If you email them to me, address on website, I will make them a reasonable size and post them if you wish.

Norm

Was that the Hughes Brothers who had the garage and yard behind the Jolly Carter on Blackbrook Lane in Chapel?  If my memory serves me correctly they had a quite modern-looking Foden Steam Wagon, so I am hoping one of the wagons in the forthcoming photo is that one.

As regards Shallcross's steam wagon pictures, they are both made by Sentinels in Shrewsbury. The first one being an S4 (S for "shaft drive"), and the second photo is of an older DG4 model. DG stood for Double Geared, ie they had a two-speed gearbox; which might not seem like many gears, but as the steam engine has a much wider range of "usable" rpm than an internal combustion engine, it was all that was needed.

You've got me weighed up right R.S-S. 

That's another great photograph, again its an official Sentinel "works" photograph, as can be seen from the trade plates.  Can I perhaps trouble you to email me the full-size version of it, to my usual email address, please.

Oooh, Pedrail wheels....

Traction engines essentially came in two main varieties, Agricultural or Road Haulage. The Road Locomotive would have motion covers to hide the connecting and valve rods, and a solid disk flywheel. These features were to avoid upsetting horses on the road, as horses are notoriously easy to "spook". Your photo shows a road locomotive, the motion cover is the steel sheet with a brass star within a brass circle  behind the cylinder block. Other photographs elsewhere on this website show a ploughing engine at this year's Water Weekend, and this has a spoked flywheel, and the motion is not covered, so is for agricultural use.

Now why horses engaged on the farm were expected to cope with spinning spokes, and whirring motion, whilst their cousins used on the road were protected from such distractions, I don't know. Hopefully our equine expert G Jackson can explain.

Now on to the pedrail wheel... These were a device to spread the load a little beyond the rather limited area where a conventional wheel touches the road, and as you can see on the photograph, there is more than one foot in contact with the road. In addition to simple load-spreading, it also helped in adhesion, too.  I don't think the idea was too successful, as none survive, but they are a precursor to the  caterpillar track, which also spread the load, and increase the area in contact with the road. Inside the disk cover of the rear wheel, there was all sorts of levers and springs and stuff to enable the various feet to be in contact with the road at once, and all this made the device more complex than the caterpillar track.

Its interesting (to me anyway) that the road loco was built by Fosters of Lincoln, as they built the original WWI tanks, so its not too surprising that they were also involved with prototype pedrail-wheeled traction engines.

Edited by user 01 October 2010 14:55:30(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Buggyite

A True master in the world of Steam I will see what else I have to whet your appetite!

Norm.  Do I send the pictures to wblocalhistory@gmail.com?

Devious.

Here's the first one from Devious.

Devious does aplogise for the size and quality.

Norm attached the following image(s):