SAR Engine 365 S ?

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Dave OBrien
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SAR Engine 365 S ?

Post by Dave OBrien »

Hi All.

I have recently acquired an oval brass (I think ?) plate which I believe is from the side of a steam train drivers cab ( correct terms ? ).

It weighs about 11kg and bears the English and Afrikaans "South African Railways" with the number "365" and a smaller letter "S" below that.

Could anyone tell me how to trace the history of this engine number, if it would be available ?

I think that it was possibly previously ""acquired"" from a steam engine scrap yard in Germiston about 10 to 15 years back.

I want to mount it in our entertainment area and would like to know if it has any history.

Here is a pic ...
IMG_2056.jpg
IMG_2056.jpg (53.84 KiB) Viewed 4150 times
Regards,
Dave
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John Ashworth
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Re: SAR Engine 365 S ?

Post by John Ashworth »

Welcome to the FOTR forum, Dave - your first post.

Paxton and Bourne tells us that the S class, numbered 360-373, were 0-8-0 tender locos built by Henschel in 1928-9 for shunting work. Experts on this forum will no doubt be able to tell you more details of this particular loco, 365.
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Stefan Andrzejewski
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Re: SAR Engine 365 S ?

Post by Stefan Andrzejewski »

S denotes Shunter. These 0-8-0 Loco's were the first Loco's purely for shunting S 369 is seen working near Roodepoort. This photo comes from the Great Steam Trek. We had the S2's here in Cape Town.As a family we would go to the docks on a Sunday to watch the ships.(Circa 1967) I would watch the S2's going back and forth. Outside F or G birth was their resting place , where at any one time 20 of these S2's could be seen hissing away.
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Stefan Andrzejewski
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Re: SAR Engine 365 S ?

Post by Stefan Andrzejewski »

A typical Cape Town harbour scene. S2 doing her thing.Although just a shunter she is immaculate . I think this is a Sue Lawrence photo.With no leading wheels they were restricted to 50 or 60 km/h. They could go faster in reverse.
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Derek Walker
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Re: SAR Engine 365 S ?

Post by Derek Walker »

Blimey, for a shunter that is a seriously clean engine.
Not quite on the rails.
Check out my train vids. http://www.youtube.com/user/nixops
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Martin Coombs
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Re: SAR Engine 365 S ?

Post by Martin Coombs »

I will leave others to comment on the photo of a 24 masquerading as a shunter, my interest is more in the supposed cabside number-plate.

A first glance takes in the numbers obviously dropped into place with the rectangular base shapes still apparent - not usually seen on those made by the loco builders but perhaps more often on replacement plates made by an SAR workshop.

Then I notice the rather-thinner-than-normal lettering around the outside - also suggesting a replacement plate made by someone not really following the original drawings.

However, the really puzzle is that this plate has no bolt holes to fix it to a cabside. Over to others to speculate about it further.

Martin Coombs
Dave OBrien
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Re: SAR Engine 365 S ?

Post by Dave OBrien »

Firstly a BIG Thank You to everyone for the very interesting info.
Martin Coombs wrote:Then I notice the rather-thinner-than-normal lettering around the outside - also suggesting a replacement plate made by someone not really following the original drawings.

However, the really puzzle is that this plate has no bolt holes to fix it to a cabside. Over to others to speculate about it further.
If it would help shed light, I would be happy to take any measurements the guru's need / want for solving this one.

I can confirm that there are 2 mounting holes, each counter-sunk & about 6 mm diameter.

Not sure if this extra note would help : this plate was handed down to me after my father passed away years ago. I remember seeing it in his house together with another smaller plate. I think it was about 1/4 the size of the plate I have, but I am unable to locate it so I can't confirm if it was the same number. Would there have been a matching smaller plate for the cabs, or would a smaller plate have been from a different class of engine ?

Additional Note :: come to think of it, my father did work for a brass tubing company in Springs, as well as for a number of different engineering companies on the East Rand. He may even have worked for "Standard Brass" which I think was a foundry in the Boksburg Industrial Sites. He also did a number of years with the engineering division of the SABS and did a lot of field visits. With the lack of what I imagine would need to be much larger diameter mounting holes, it is possible that this plate was "lifted / liberated" from the point of production !!
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Martin Coombs
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Re: SAR Engine 365 S ?

Post by Martin Coombs »

Having returned from work, I have more time to think about this.

The visible marks around the running numbers suggest to me that this plate was cast using a multi-use pattern, with the running numbers and necessary spacers slotted in as appropriate. I believe SAR workshops had such patterns made of aluminium. The numbers too would have been made up with the necessary backing board, so that they slotted into the background at the correct level.

In other words, this is probably a casting from a genuine SAR pattern, rather than something cast as a replica in more recent times.

The mounting bolt holes were 5/8 inch diameter, then countersunk at 60 degrees. The resulting hole is between say 25 and 30mm diameter at the front surface. This plate clearly doesn't have such holes; the small 6mm holes that Dave describes would probably have been drilled later to mount the plate on a wall or whatever.

My guess is that Dave is right, and this plate was a reject for some reason. I wonder if any faults are visible on the reverse, such as cross-moulding when the front and rear patterns get out of line. I have recently had exactly that happen, when a new plate for the North British Locomotive Preservation Group's class 11 no 929 at Bloemfontein had to be rejected. Rather than melt the plate down again, the foundry have mounted it in their showroom to display the type of work that they can do - after all the fault cannot be seen from the front!

One useful measurement that could be made is between the small bolt holes. These appear to be at the correct locations for the proper large holes and should be 18 1/4 inches apart, centre to centre. If they should be closer than that, the plate would appear to have been cast from an actual plate rather than from the usual oversized pattern (to allow for the normal 1 1/2 % shrinkage of brass on cooling). Replicas have sometimes been cast from actual plates and can be identified in this way.

Finally the small plate that Dave mentions would almost certainly have been a tender/tank plate, mounted centrally on the rear of the tender, or in other cases on the tanks of a Garratt loco.

Martin
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Nathan Berelowitz
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Re: SAR Engine 365 S ?

Post by Nathan Berelowitz »

This is definately not the original plate which would have single language only. Again, the bolt holes are not correct and you can see this pattern is made to accomodate a variety of numbers. Most likely it was cast as a replacement and the loco was withdrawn before it was fitted or it was made as a presentation to a staff member of importance. I have a 15CA plate with the same small holes which was presented as a gift to an engineer.

Still a good souveneer. Drill the holes out correctly, and in 20years time, it will be original!
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Stefan Andrzejewski
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Re: SAR Engine 365 S ?

Post by Stefan Andrzejewski »

Martin you are correct. Looking closer you clearly see the 2-8-4. When I downloaded this photo it was labeled as a S2. Sorry for the incorrect info. Its a great photo though with Table Mountain in the back ground.
Dave OBrien
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Re: SAR Engine 365 S ?

Post by Dave OBrien »

Martin Coombs wrote:I wonder if any faults are visible on the reverse, such as cross-moulding when the front and rear patterns get out of line.

One useful measurement that could be made is between the small bolt holes. These appear to be at the correct locations for the proper large holes and should be 18 1/4 inches apart, centre to centre. If they should be closer than that, the plate would appear to have been cast from an actual plate rather than from the usual oversized pattern (to allow for the normal 1 1/2 % shrinkage of brass on cooling). Replicas have sometimes been cast from actual plates and can be identified in this way.
Thanks for the insight Martin.

The rear of this plate is completely flat, so I am not certain what you're referring to re: cross-moulding ? Should there have been some pattern on the rear, like a positioning slot / ring / indentations ?

Something that caught my eye on one of the pics on this forum, was that the pic appeared to have a thicker plate than the one I have.

Measurements on this plate are :
thickness : 12 mm
Width : 534 mm
Holes (centres) : 470 mm ( 18 1/2 inches ? )

The plot thickens ..
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Martin Coombs
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Re: SAR Engine 365 S ?

Post by Martin Coombs »

Normally SAR cabside plates had a raised rim on the rear, which spread inwards at the ends to make two almost semi-circular bosses, within which the bolt holes came through. These ensured that when the bolts were tightened up the cabside plating wasn't distorted by being pulled into the space within the rim.

In order to create this rear rim the foundry would create two sand moulds, one for the front and one for the rear. If the two were put together out of line then clearly the resulting casting would not be satisfactory. In the case of the new plate that I mentioned, I painted the front and only noticed the problem when I came to drill out the big bolt holes. The holes were not centred in the semi-circular bosses at the rear, in fact overlapping the edges of the bosses.

The fact that your plate does not have a rear rim, tends to reinforce the impression that this was a replacement plate, as Trainman says. Another feature not yet mentioned, is that this plate does not have a textured background to help key on the paint. This was not universal in earlier years but most plates supplied with new locos had this.

The specified thickness of the plates was 7/16 inch (ie 11.1mm) but I wouldn't worry too much about that as they varied quite a bit.

Martin
Dave OBrien
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Re: SAR Engine 365 S ?

Post by Dave OBrien »

Thank You once again to everyone for all the info.

I have done some additional searching and it turns out that my late father worked for Cementation Engineering on the East Rand, as well as for Dorbyl Railway Products (in Germiston ?), around the time that he acquired the plate.

I think this is where the trial / search will end as it is most probable that the plate was cast at Dorbyl.
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