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A contemporary drawing of Rocket
Rocket as preserved in the Science Museum, London.
A replica coach and Rocket at the Rocket 150 event

Stephenson's Rocket was an early steam locomotive of 0-2-2 wheel arrangement, built in Newcastle at the Forth Street Works of Robert Stephenson and Company in 1829. The Rocket was designed and built to compete in the Rainhill Trials. The trials were conceived by the owners of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway in order to stimulate the development of the steam locomotive and determine if the locomotive was a suitable replacement for the fixed engines they, at that time, planned to use to draw trains along their railway. The Rocket won the Trials and the Stephensons £500. The Rockets victory convinced the Manchester and Liverpool Railway to abandon their plans for fixed engines and order several locomotives of the "Rocket" type from Robert Stephenson and Company. [1]


Historical Significance

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The Rocket was not the first steam locomotive. The first steam locomotive to run on tracks was built by Richard Trevithick 25 years earlier, but his designs were not developed beyond the experimental stage. Then followed the first commercially successful twin cylinder steam locomotives (Salamanca) built by Matthew Murray in Holbeck for the Middleton Railway in West Yorkshire. George Stephenson, as well as a number of other engineers, had built many steam locomotives before.

Rocket's claim to fame is that it was the first 'modern' locomotive, drawing together several recent strands of technological improvement, some tried elsewhere and some still experimental, to produce the most advanced locomotive of its day, and the template for most steam locomotives since. In fact, the standard steam locomotive design is often called the "Stephensonian" locomotive

Design Development

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Robert Stephenson spent the summer of 1829 developing an engine to compete in the trials, it was at that time named the "Premium Engine". [2] Robert Stephenson in early 1828 had noted the benefits of placing the driving cylinders at the side of, or beneath the boiler of the engine. This appears to have been inspired by Sir Goldsworthy Gurney's steam-coach design. [3] At that time steam locomotives normally had vertical cylinders set within, above or beside the boiler. The disadvantage of this "standard" arrangement was that ocsillating vertical forces from the cylinders prevented the use of suspension springs as they would have absorbed the driving forces and the vertical hammer blow wore the rails out. A typical arrangement is that of Locomotion No 1. Robert Stephenson tried out this arrangemnt on inclined cylinders first on the Experiment and then on the successful Lancashire Witch. [4] Stephenson went on to build several locomotives of this time prior to the development of the Rocket. The arrangement of the cylinders was


Rocket used a multi-tubular boiler, which made for much more efficient and effective heat transfer between the exhaust gases and the water. Previous locomotive boilers consisted of a single pipe surrounded by water. Rocket had 25 copper tubes running the length of the boiler to carry the hot exhaust gases from the firebox. This was a significant development, as it greatly increased the amount of steam produced, and subsequent designs used increased numbers of boiler tubes. Rocket also used a blastpipe, feeding the exhaust steam from the cylinders into the base of the chimney so as to induce a partial vacuum and pull air through the fire. Credit for the invention of the blastpipe is disputed between Sir Goldsworthy Gurney and Timothy Hackworth. The blastpipe worked well on the multi-tube boiler of Rocket but on earlier designs with a single pipe through the boiler it created so much suction that it tended to rip the top off the fire and throw burning cinders out of the chimney, vastly increasing the fuel consumption.[5]

A closer view

Rocket had two cylinders set at 35 degrees from the horizontal, with the pistons driving a pair of 4 ft 8 in (1.42 m) diameter wheels. Most previous designs had the cylinders positioned vertically, which gave the engines an uneven swaying motion as they progressed along the track. Subsequently Rocket was modified so that the cylinders were set horizontally, a layout used on nearly all designs that followed. The second pair of wheels was 2 ft 6 in (0.76 m) in diameter, and uncoupled from the driving wheels, giving an 0-2-2 wheel arrangement. The firebox was separate from the boiler and was double thickness, being surrounded with water. Copper pipes led the heated water into the boiler.[5]

A cutaway view of the cylinder and steam valve of the replica Rocket

There have been differences in opinion on who should be given the credit for designing Rocket. George Stephenson had designed several locomotives before but none as advanced as Rocket. At the time that Rocket was being designed and built at the Forth Banks Works, he was living in Liverpool overseeing the building of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. His son Robert had recently returned from a stint working in South America and resumed as managing director of Robert Stephenson and Company. He was in daily charge of designing and constructing the new locomotive. Although he was in frequent contact with his father in Liverpool and probably received advice from him, it is difficult not to give the majority of the credit for the design to Robert. A third person who deserves a significant amount of credit is Henry Booth, the treasurer of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. He is believed to have suggested to Robert Stephenson that a multi-tube boiler should be used.[5]

History

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Rainhill trials

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Rocket was designed and built to compete in the Rainhill Trials, a competition to select the locomotive type for the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, on 6 to 14 October 1829. Of the five entrants, only three of them were seen as serious contenders. All of the other competitors broke down and Rocket was declared the winner. Rocket fulfilled the key requirement of the contest that a full simulated 50 mile (80km) round trip under load be completed with satisfactory fuel consumption. It averaged 12 miles per hour while hauling 13 tons and 29 miles per hour running light.[6]

Opening-day accident

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The opening ceremony of the L&MR, on 15 September 1830, was a considerable event, drawing luminaries from the government and industry, including the Prime Minister, the Duke of Wellington. The day started with a procession of eight trains setting out from Liverpool. The parade was led by Northumbrian driven by George Stephenson, and included Phoenix driven by his son Robert, North Star driven by his brother Robert Sr. and Rocket driven by assistant engineer Joseph Locke. The day was marred by the death of William Huskisson, the Member of Parliament for Liverpool, who was struck and killed by Rocket at Parkside.[5]

Subsequent service

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In 1834, the engine was selected for modifications to test a newly-developed rotary steam engine designed by Lord Dundonald (Thomas Cochrane). At a cost of nearly £80, Rocket's cylinders and driving rods were removed and two of the engines were installed directly on its driving axle with a feedwater pump in between. On October 22, of that year, an operational trial was held with disappointing results; one witness observing, that "the engine could not be made to draw a train of empty carriages". Due to inherent design flaws and engineering difficulties associated with their design, Dundonald's engines were simply too feeble for the task.[7]

After service on the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, Rocket was used near Tindale village on Lord Carlisle's Railway in Cumberland (now Cumbria), England.[8]

Preservation

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In 1862 Rocket was donated to the Patent Office Museum in London by the Thompsons of Milton Hall, near Brampton, in Cumbria.[9]

The locomotive still exists, in the Science Museum (London), in much modified form compared to its state at the Rainhill Trials. The cylinders were altered to the horizontal position, compared to the angled arrangement as new, and the locomotive was given a proper smokebox. Such are the changes in the engine from 1829 that The Engineer magazine, circa 1884, concluded that "it seems to us indisputable that the Rocket of 1829 and 1830 were totally different engines".


The Replica

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In 1979 a replica Rocket was built by Locomotion Enterprises for the 150th anniversary celebrations.[10] It has a shorter chimney than the original in order to the clear the bridge at Rainhill: the trackbed is deeper than in the 19th century, giving less headroom. This replica is based at the National Railway Museum, York.

See also

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References

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  1. ^ Rolt, L.T.C. (1960). George and Robert Stephenson The Railway Revolution. London: Longman. pp. 180–181. ISBN 0-14007646-8.
  2. ^ Rolt, L.T.C. (1960). George and Robert Stephenson The Railway Revolution. London: Longman. p. 160. ISBN 0-14007646-8.
  3. ^ Rolt, L.T.C. (1960). George and Robert Stephenson The Railway Revolution. London: Longman. p. 147. ISBN 0-14007646-8.
  4. ^ Rolt, L.T.C. (1960). George and Robert Stephenson The Railway Revolution. London: Longman. pp. 148–9. ISBN 0-14007646-8.
  5. ^ a b c d Burton, Anthony (1980). The Rainhill Story. British Broadcasting Corporation. ISBN 0563178418.
  6. ^ Schoolnet article on the Rainhill Trials, accessed 17 June 2007
  7. ^ Cochrane's Rotary Steam Engines. [1]
  8. ^ Webb, Brian (1978). Lord Carlisle's Railways. Lichfield, Staffordshire: Railway Correspondence and Travel Society. p. 101. ISBN 0-901115-43-6. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  9. ^ Liffen, John (2003). "The Patent Office Museum and the beginnings of railway locomotive preservation". In Lewis, M. J. T. (ed.) (ed.). Early Railways 2. London: Newcomen Society. pp. 202–20. ISBN 0-904685-13-6. {{cite book}}: |editor= has generic name (help)
  10. ^ Satow, M. G. (1979). "Rocket reborn". Railway Magazine. 125: 472–4.
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