Vincent Raven
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Sir Vincent Litchfield Raven,
KBE KBE may refer to: * Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, post-nominal letters * Knowledge-based engineering Knowledge-based engineering (KBE) is the application of knowledge-based systems technology to the domain o ...
(3 December 1859 – 14 February 1934) was an English railway engineer, and was chief mechanical engineer of the North Eastern Railway from 1910 to 1922.


Biography

Vincent Raven was born the son of a clergyman at
Great Fransham Great Fransham is a village and former civil parish in the Breckland district, in the county of Norfolk, England, roughly about an equal distance between Swaffham and Dereham. There is also a Little Fransham; the two villages, both now part of ...
rectory in
Norfolk Norfolk () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in East Anglia in England. It borders Lincolnshire to the north-west, Cambridgeshire to the west and south-west, and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the No ...
and educated at Aldenham School in
Hertfordshire Hertfordshire ( or ; often abbreviated Herts) is one of the home counties in southern England. It borders Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire to the north, Essex to the east, Greater London to the south, and Buckinghamshire to the west. For govern ...
. In 1877 he began his career with the North Eastern Railway as a pupil of the then Locomotive Superintendent, Edward Fletcher. By 1893 he had achieved the post of Assistant Mechanical Engineer to Wilson Worsdell who was then the Locomotive Superintendent. In this post he was involved for the first time with an
electrification Electrification is the process of powering by electricity and, in many contexts, the introduction of such power by changing over from an earlier power source. The broad meaning of the term, such as in the history of technology, economic histor ...
project, as the N.E.R. was electrifying the North Tyneside suburban route in 1904. This was a third rail system at 600 volts DC.


Steam locomotives

In 1910 he became Chief Mechanical Engineer on Wilson Worsdell's retirement (The title of the post had changed from Locomotive Superintendent in 1902). Raven developed some of Worsdell's designs for steam locomotives, like the T2
0-8-0 Under the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives, represents the wheel arrangement of no leading wheels, eight powered and coupled driving wheels on four axles and no trailing wheels. Locomotives of this type are also referre ...
freight locomotive, as well as introducing designs of his own. In particular he favoured a 3-cylinder design with the locomotives driving on the leading coupled axle. This was applied to a series of locomotives, which were Class S3, a mixed traffic
4-6-0 A 4-6-0 steam locomotive, under the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives by wheel arrangement, has four leading wheels on two axles in a leading bogie and six powered and coupled driving wheels on three axles with the abse ...
, Class Y, a
4-6-2T Under the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives, represents the wheel arrangement of four leading wheels on two axles, six powered and coupled driving wheels on three axles and two trailing wheels on one axle. The locomotiv ...
tank engine for freight work, Class D, a 4-4-4T tank engine for passenger work, Class Z, a 4-4-2 'Atlantic' for express passenger work, and the
LNER Class A2 The first London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) Class A2 was a class of 4-6-2 steam locomotive designed by Vincent Raven for the North Eastern Railway (as NER class 4.6.2). Two were built by the NER in 1922 before the grouping and another t ...
4-6-2 Under the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives, represents the wheel arrangement of four leading wheels on two axles, six powered and coupled driving wheels on three axles and two trailing wheels on one axle. The locomotiv ...
, a 'Pacific' for express passenger work. The most memorable of these was the Class Z Atlantics which had a reputation for speed and good riding on
East Coast Main Line The East Coast Main Line (ECML) is a electrified railway between London and Edinburgh via Peterborough, Doncaster, York, Darlington, Durham and Newcastle. The line is a key transport artery on the eastern side of Great Britain running broa ...
expresses north of York. The 3 cylinder principle was also applied to Class X, a heavy freight 4-8-0T tank engine, but this had a divided drive with the inside cylinder driving the second axle and the outside cylinders driving the third axle. The Class T3 was also three cylinder with all cylinders driving the second axle of this heavy freight 0-8-0.


Electrification


Shildon–Newport

Raven was a great advocate of electrification, and in 1915, a section of line was electrified between Shildon in the south west Durham Coalfield and
Newport Newport most commonly refers to: *Newport, Wales *Newport, Rhode Island, US Newport or New Port may also refer to: Places Asia *Newport City, Metro Manila, a Philippine district in Pasay Europe Ireland *Newport, County Mayo, a town on the ...
, on Teesside, with the intention of improving performance on coal trains from Shildon to Middlesbrough. For this, he introduced electrification at 1500 volts DC with overhead wires. Ten centre cab electric locomotives of 1100 horsepower were built at Darlington Works for this, numbered in a series from 3 to 12 ( 1 and 2 were a different design of 1902 for the Tyneside electrification at 600 volts DC).


York–Newcastle

Following the success of the Shildon–Newport scheme, Raven set about planning the electrification of the main line from York to Newcastle, also at 1500 volts DC. Both third rail and overhead power supply systems were considered and some experiments were done with dummy collector shoes fitted to the bogie of a steam locomotive to assess the mechanical performance at speed. In the end, the overhead system was selected. A prototype passenger loco was built in 1922 at Darlington for this, NER No. 13, which was a new design of and a 2-Co-2 (
4-6-4 Under the Whyte notation for the classification of locomotives, represents the wheel arrangement of four leading wheels, six powered and coupled driving wheels and four trailing wheels. In France where the type was first used, it is known as t ...
) wheel arrangement. Although successfully tested between Newport and Shildon using the overhead power supply, No. 13 was destined to be unlucky as it never did the job for which it was designed. The reorganisation of Britain's railways in 1923 led to the abandonment of the electrification plans by the successor company, the
LNER LNER may refer to: *London and North Eastern Railway, a railway company in the United Kingdom from 1923 until 1947 *London North Eastern Railway, a train operating company in the United Kingdom since 2018 * Liquid neutral earthing resistor, a type ...
.


Decline of electric traction

After the grouping, the proposed electrification of the
East Coast Main Line The East Coast Main Line (ECML) is a electrified railway between London and Edinburgh via Peterborough, Doncaster, York, Darlington, Durham and Newcastle. The line is a key transport artery on the eastern side of Great Britain running broa ...
was quickly abandoned, although it was electrified by
British Rail British Railways (BR), which from 1965 traded as British Rail, was a state-owned company that operated most of the overground rail transport in Great Britain from 1948 to 1997. It was formed from the nationalisation of the Big Four British rai ...
in the late 1980s. The Shildon–Newport electrification reverted to steam haulage in 1935. Falling traffic levels and the need to replace the overhead equipment were cited as the reasons. The EF1 electric freight locomotives went into store, and lasted until 1950, when they were all scrapped except No 11. The EE1 express passenger locomotive No 13 was also scrapped in 1950, having spent most of its life in storage, but one of the ES1 shunting locomotives is preserved. No 11 was rebuilt for use on the Woodhead route of the
Manchester–Sheffield–Wath electric railway The Manchester–Sheffield–Wath electric railway was an electrification scheme on British railways. The route featured long ascents on both sides of the Pennines with the long Woodhead Tunnel at its central summit close to the Woodhead pass. ...
and re-classified EB1. It was never used on this scheme, but found work as a shunter at Ilford until 1964 when it was scrapped.


Steam survival

The steam classes fared better, most lasting into
nationalisation Nationalization (nationalisation in British English) is the process of transforming privately-owned assets into public assets by bringing them under the public ownership of a national government or state. Nationalization usually refers to pri ...
in 1948. Class Z all were scrapped by the early 1950s. The S3s lasted well, some being rebuilt with different boilers and new cylinders. The class D tank engines were rebuilt by the LNER as 4-6-2 tank engines and lasted into the very early 1960s when they were replaced by diesel units. The freight classes also lasted well, the class Y tanks going before 1960 and the class X and T3 lasting a little longer. The rugged, reliable and simple T2s lasted until the end of steam locomotive use in North East England, in September 1967. they were, along with the Worsdell designed P3s, the last pre-grouping locomotives in use in Britain. Two Raven steam locomotives survive in preservation, a T2 No 2238 (currently in running order as No. 63395 in British Railways paintwork) and No. 901, the pioneer T3, the only surviving loco of Raven's 3 cylinder design.


World War I and after

At the direction of the prime minister, David Lloyd George, in September 1915 Raven was appointed as superintendent of the
Royal Arsenal The Royal Arsenal, Woolwich is an establishment on the south bank of the River Thames in Woolwich in south-east London, England, that was used for the manufacture of armaments and ammunition, proofing, and explosives research for the Britis ...
, Woolwich in order to oversee the production of munitions for the Great War. Within three months, Lloyd George was able to report to the House of Commons that output had risen by 60 to 80 percent, despite an increase in the size of the workforce of only 23 percent. For his efforts, Raven was awarded a knighthood in 1917. At the
Grouping Grouping may refer to: * Muenchian grouping * Principles of grouping * Railways Act 1921, also known as Grouping Act, a reorganisation of the British railway system * Grouping (firearms), the pattern of multiple shots from a sidearm See also ...
of the railways in 1923, the post of chief mechanical engineer for the
London and North Eastern Railway The London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) was the second largest (after LMS) of the " Big Four" railway companies created by the Railways Act 1921 in Britain. It operated from 1 January 1923 until nationalisation on 1 January 1948. At th ...
was given to
Nigel Gresley Sir Herbert Nigel Gresley (19 June 1876 – 5 April 1941) was a British railway engineer. He was one of Britain's most famous steam locomotive engineers, who rose to become Chief Mechanical Engineer (CME) of the London and North Eastern Rai ...
of the Great Northern Railway, with Raven becoming a technical adviser. He resigned in 1924 and was appointed to the Royal Commission on New South Wales Government Railways, in company with Sir Sam Fay. Raven died on 14 February 1934 after heart trouble whilst on holiday with Lady Raven in Felixstowe. In 1883, Raven married Gifford Allan Crichton, and in the years 1883-9 fathered four children (Constance Gifford, Guendolen Edith, Norman Vincent, and Frederick Gifford). Edward Thompson was Raven's son-in-law (married Guendolen in 1913).


References


Sources

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External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Raven, Vincent 1859 births 1934 deaths English mechanical engineers English railway mechanical engineers Locomotive builders and designers Knights Commander of the Order of the British Empire North Eastern Railway (UK) people People educated at Aldenham School