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1 Trevithick, Richard
[br]b. 13 April 1771 Illogan, Cornwall, Englandd. 22 April 1833 Dartford, Kent, England[br]English engineer, pioneer of non-condensing steam-engines; designed and built the first locomotives.[br]Trevithick's father was a tin-mine manager, and Trevithick himself, after limited formal education, developed his immense engineering talent among local mining machinery and steam-engines and found employment as a mining engineer. Tall, strong and high-spirited, he was the eternal optimist.About 1797 it occurred to him that the separate condenser patent of James Watt could be avoided by employing "strong steam", that is steam at pressures substantially greater than atmospheric, to drive steam-engines: after use, steam could be exhausted to the atmosphere and the condenser eliminated. His first winding engine on this principle came into use in 1799, and subsequently such engines were widely used. To produce high-pressure steam, a stronger boiler was needed than the boilers then in use, in which the pressure vessel was mounted upon masonry above the fire: Trevithick designed the cylindrical boiler, with furnace tube within, from which the Cornish and later the Lancashire boilers evolved.Simultaneously he realized that high-pressure steam enabled a compact steam-engine/boiler unit to be built: typically, the Trevithick engine comprised a cylindrical boiler with return firetube, and a cylinder recessed into the boiler. No beam intervened between connecting rod and crank. A master patent was taken out.Such an engine was well suited to driving vehicles. Trevithick built his first steam-carriage in 1801, but after a few days' use it overturned on a rough Cornish road and was damaged beyond repair by fire. Nevertheless, it had been the first self-propelled vehicle successfully to carry passengers. His second steam-carriage was driven about the streets of London in 1803, even more successfully; however, it aroused no commercial interest. Meanwhile the Coalbrookdale Company had started to build a locomotive incorporating a Trevithick engine for its tramroads, though little is known of the outcome; however, Samuel Homfray's ironworks at Penydarren, South Wales, was already building engines to Trevithick's design, and in 1804 Trevithick built one there as a locomotive for the Penydarren Tramroad. In this, and in the London steam-carriage, exhaust steam was turned up the chimney to draw the fire. On 21 February the locomotive hauled five wagons with 10 tons of iron and seventy men for 9 miles (14 km): it was the first successful railway locomotive.Again, there was no commercial interest, although Trevithick now had nearly fifty stationary engines completed or being built to his design under licence. He experimented with one to power a barge on the Severn and used one to power a dredger on the Thames. He became Engineer to a project to drive a tunnel beneath the Thames at Rotherhithe and was only narrowly defeated, by quicksands. Trevithick then set up, in 1808, a circular tramroad track in London and upon it demonstrated to the admission-fee-paying public the locomotive Catch me who can, built to his design by John Hazledine and J.U. Rastrick.In 1809, by which date Trevithick had sold all his interest in the steam-engine patent, he and Robert Dickinson, in partnership, obtained a patent for iron tanks to hold liquid cargo in ships, replacing the wooden casks then used, and started to manufacture them. In 1810, however, he was taken seriously ill with typhus for six months and had to return to Cornwall, and early in 1811 the partners were bankrupt; Trevithick was discharged from bankruptcy only in 1814.In the meantime he continued as a steam engineer and produced a single-acting steam engine in which the cut-off could be varied to work the engine expansively by way of a three-way cock actuated by a cam. Then, in 1813, Trevithick was approached by a representative of a company set up to drain the rich but flooded silver-mines at Cerro de Pasco, Peru, at an altitude of 14,000 ft (4,300 m). Low-pressure steam engines, dependent largely upon atmospheric pressure, would not work at such an altitude, but Trevithick's high-pressure engines would. Nine engines and much other mining plant were built by Hazledine and Rastrick and despatched to Peru in 1814, and Trevithick himself followed two years later. However, the war of independence was taking place in Peru, then a Spanish colony, and no sooner had Trevithick, after immense difficulties, put everything in order at the mines then rebels arrived and broke up the machinery, for they saw the mines as a source of supply for the Spanish forces. It was only after innumerable further adventures, during which he encountered and was assisted financially by Robert Stephenson, that Trevithick eventually arrived home in Cornwall in 1827, penniless.He petitioned Parliament for a grant in recognition of his improvements to steam-engines and boilers, without success. He was as inventive as ever though: he proposed a hydraulic power transmission system; he was consulted over steam engines for land drainage in Holland; and he suggested a 1,000 ft (305 m) high tower of gilded cast iron to commemorate the Reform Act of 1832. While working on steam propulsion of ships in 1833, he caught pneumonia, from which he died.[br]BibliographyTrevithick took out fourteen patents, solely or in partnership, of which the most important are: 1802, Construction of Steam Engines, British patent no. 2,599. 1808, Stowing Ships' Cargoes, British patent no. 3,172.Further ReadingH.W.Dickinson and A.Titley, 1934, Richard Trevithick. The Engineer and the Man, Cambridge; F.Trevithick, 1872, Life of Richard Trevithick, London (these two are the principal biographies).E.A.Forward, 1952, "Links in the history of the locomotive", The Engineer (22 February), 226 (considers the case for the Coalbrookdale locomotive of 1802).See also: Blenkinsop, JohnPJGR -
2 Richard Trevithick
s.Ricardo Trevithick, Richard Trevithick, Trevithick. -
3 Trevithick
m.Trevithick, Richard Trevithick. -
4 Ricardo Trevithick
m.Richard Trevithick. -
5 Railways and locomotives
Biographical history of technology > Railways and locomotives
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6 Land transport
See also: INDEX BY SUBJECT AREA[br]Austin, HerbertHamilton, Harold LeeIssigonis, Sir Alexander Arnold ConstantineMa JunMorris, William RichardSauerbrun, Charles de -
7 Steam and internal combustion engines
See also: INDEX BY SUBJECT AREA[br]Giffard, Baptiste Henry JacquesHamilton, Harold LeePorta, Giovanni Battista dellaBiographical history of technology > Steam and internal combustion engines
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8 Blenkinsop, John
[br]b. 1783 near Newcastle upon Tyne, Englandd. 22 January 1831 Leeds, England[br]English coal-mine manager who made the first successful commercial use of steam locomotives.[br]In 1808 Blenkinsop became agent to J.C.Brandling, MP, owner of Middleton Colliery, from which coal was carried to Leeds over the Middle-ton Waggonway. This had been built by Brandling's ancestor Charles Brandling, who in 1758 obtained an Act of Parliament to establish agreements with owners of land over which the wagon way was to pass. That was the first railway Act of Parliament.By 1808 horse haulage was becoming uneconomic because the price of fodder had increased due to the Napoleonic wars. Brandling probably saw the locomotive Catch-Me- Who-Can demonstrated by Richard Trevithick. In 1811 Blenkinsop patented drive by cog-wheel and rack rail, the power to be provided preferably by a steam engine. His object was to produce a locomotive able to haul a substantial load, while remaining light enough to minimize damage to rails made from cast iron which, though brittle, was at that date the strongest material from which rails could be made. The wagonway, formerly of wood, was relaid with iron-edge rails; along one side rails cast with rack teeth were laid beside the running surface. Locomotives incorporating Blenkinsop's cog-wheel drive were designed by Matthew Murray and built by Fenton Murray \& Wood. The design was developed from Trevithick's to include two cylinders, for easier starting and smoother running. The first locomotive was given its first public trial on 24 June 1812, when it successfully hauled eight wagons of coal, on to which fifty spectators climbed. Locomotives of this type entered regular service later in the summer and proved able to haul loads of 110 tons; Trevithick's locomotive of 1804 had managed 25 tons.Blenkinsop-type locomotives were introduced elsewhere in Britain and in Europe, and those upon the Kenton \& Coxlodge Wagonway, near Newcastle upon Tyne, were observed by George Stephenson. The Middleton locomotives remained at work until 1835.[br]Bibliography10 April, 1811, "Certain Mechanical Means by which the Conveyance of Coals, Minerals and Other Articles is Facilitated….", British patent no. 3,431.Further ReadingJ.Bushell, 1975, The World's Oldest Railway, Sheffield: Turntable (describes Blenkinsop's work).E.K.Scott (ed.), 1928, Matthew Murray, Pioneer Engineer, Leeds.C.von Oeynhausen and H.von Dechen, 1971, Railways in England 1826 and 1827, Cambridge: W.Heffer \& Sons.PJGR -
9 Webb, Francis William
[br]b. 21 May 1836 Tixall, Staffordshire, Englandd. 4 June 1906 Bournemouth, England[br]English locomotive engineer who pioneered compound locomotives in Britain and the use of steel for boilers.[br]Webb was a pupil at Crewe Works, London \& North Western Railway (LNWR), under F. Trevithick (son of Richard Trevithick), and was subsequently placed in charge of the works under Trevithick's successor, J.Ramsbottom. After a brief spell away from the LNWR, Webb returned in 1871 and was made Chief Mechanical Engineer, a post he held until his retirement in 1904.Webb's initial designs included the highly successful "Precedent" or "Jumbo" class 2– 4–0, from which the example Hardwicke (now preserved by the National Railway Museum, York) achieved an average speed of 67.2 mph (108.1 km/h) between Crewe and Carlisle in 1895. His 0–6–0 "coal engines" were straightforward and cheap and were built in large numbers. In 1879 Webb, having noted the introduction of compound locomotives in France by J.T.A. Mallet, rebuilt an existing 2–2–2 locomotive as a two-cylinder compound. Then in 1882, seeking fuel economy and the suppression of coupling rods, he produced a compound locomotive to his own design, the 2–2, 2–0 Experiment, in which two outside high-pressure cylinders drove the rear driving-wheels, and a single inside large-diameter low-pressure cylinder drove the front driving-wheels. This was followed by a large number of compound locomotives: three successive classes of 2–2, 2–0s; some 2–2, 2–2s; some 4–4–0s; and some 0–8–0s for goods traffic. Although these were capable of good performance, their overall value was controversial: Webb, who was notoriously autocratic, may never have been fully informed of their defects, and after his retirement most were quickly scrapped. Webb made many other innovations during his career, one of the most important being the construction of boilers from steel rather than wrought iron.[br]Further ReadingC.Hamilton Ellis, 1958, Twenty Locomotive Men, Shepperton: Ian Allan, Ch. 14 (describes Webb's career).E.L.Ahrons, 1927, The British Steam Railway Locomotive 2825–1925, London: The Locomotive Publishing Co., Chs 18 and 20 (includes a critique of Webb's compound locomotives).PJGR -
10 Inoue Masaru
[br]b. 1 August 1843 Hagi, Choshu, Japand. 2 August 1910 London, England[br]Japanese "Father of Japanese Railways".[br]In the early 1860s, most travel in Japan was still by foot and the Japanese were forbidden by their government to travel abroad. Inoue was one of a small group of students who left Japan illegally in 1863 for London. There he studied English, mathematics and science, and afterwards mineralogy and railways. Inoue returned to Japan in 1868, when the new Meiji Government reopened the country to the outside world after some 200 years of isolation. Part of its policy, despite opposition, was to build railways; at Inoue's suggestion, the gauge of 3 ft 6 in. (1.07 m) was adopted. Initially capital, engineers, skilled labour and materials ranging from locomotives to pencils and stationery were all imported from Britain; Edmund Morel was the first Chief Engineer. In 1871 Inoue was appointed Director of the Government Railway Bureau and he became the driving force behind railway development in Japan for more than two decades. The first line, from Tokyo to Yokohama, was opened in 1872, to be followed by others, some of them at first isolated. The number of foreigners employed, most of them British, peaked at 120 in 1877 and then rapidly declined as the Japanese learned to take over their tasks. In 1878, at Inoue's instance, construction of a line entirely by Japanese commenced for the first time, with British engineers as consultants only. It was ten years before Japanese Railways' total route was 70 miles (113 km) long; over the next ten years, this increased to 1,000 miles (1,600 km) and the system continued to grow rapidly. During 1892–3, a locomotive was built in Japan for the first time, under the guidance of Locomotive Superintendent R.F.Trevithick, grandson of the pioneer Richard Trevithick: it was a compound 2–4–2 tank engine, with many parts imported from Britain. Locomotive building in Japan then blossomed so rapidly that imports were discontinued, with rare exceptions, from 1911. Meanwhile Inoue had retired in 1893; he was on a visit to England at the time of his death.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsViscount 1887.Bibliography1909, "Japanese communications: railroads", in Count Shigenobu Okuma (ed.), Fifty Years of New Japan (English version ed. M.B.Huish), Smith, Elder, Ch. 18.Further ReadingT.Richards and K.C.Rudd, 1991 Japanese Railways in the Meiji Period 1868–1912, Uxbridge: Brunel University (one of the few readily available accounts in English of the origins of Japanese Railways).PJGR -
11 Hedley, William
[br]b. 13 July 1779 Newburn, Northumberland, Englandd. 9 January 1843 Lanchester, Co. Durham, England[br]English coal-mine manager, pioneer in the construction and use of steam locomotives.[br]The Wylam wagonway passed Newburn, and Hedley, who went to school at Wylam, must have been familiar with this wagonway from childhood. It had been built c.1748 to carry coal from Wylam Colliery to the navigable limit of the Tyne at Lemington. In 1805 Hedley was appointed viewer, or manager, of Wylam Colliery by Christopher Blackett, who had inherited the colliery and wagonway in 1800. Unlike most Tyneside wagonways, the gradient of the Wylam line was insufficient for loaded wagons to run down by gravity and they had to be hauled by horses. Blackett had a locomotive, of the type designed by Richard Trevithick, built at Gateshead as early as 1804 but did not take delivery, probably because his wooden track was not strong enough. In 1808 Blackett and Hedley relaid the wagonway with plate rails of the type promoted by Benjamin Outram, and in 1812, following successful introduction of locomotives at Middleton by John Blenkinsop, Blackett asked Hedley to investigate the feasibility of locomotives at Wylam. The expense of re-laying with rack rails was unwelcome, and Hedley experimented to find out the relationship between the weight of a locomotive and the load it could move relying on its adhesion weight alone. He used first a model test carriage, which survives at the Science Museum, London, and then used a full-sized test carriage laden with weights in varying quantities and propelled by men turning handles. Having apparently satisfied himself on this point, he had a locomotive incorporating the frames and wheels of the test carriage built. The work was done at Wylam by Thomas Waters, who was familiar with the 1804 locomotive, Timothy Hackworth, foreman smith, and Jonathan Forster, enginewright. This locomotive, with cast-iron boiler and single cylinder, was unsatisfactory: Hackworth and Forster then built another locomotive to Hedley's design, with a wrought-iron return-tube boiler, two vertical external cylinders and drive via overhead beams through pinions to the two axles. This locomotive probably came into use in the spring of 1814: it performed well and further examples of the type were built. Their axle loading, however, was too great for the track and from about 1815 each locomotive was mounted on two four-wheeled bogies, the bogie having recently been invented by William Chapman. Hedley eventually left Wylam in 1827 to devote himself to other colliery interests. He supported the construction of the Clarence Railway, opened in 1833, and sent his coal over it in trains hauled by his own locomotives. Two of his Wylam locomotives survive— Puffing Billy at the Science Museum, London, and Wylam Dilly at the Royal Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh—though how much of these is original and how much dates from the period 1827–32, when the Wylam line was re-laid with edge rails and the locomotives reverted to four wheels (with flanges), is a matter of mild controversy.[br]Further ReadingP.R.B.Brooks, 1980, William Hedley Locomotive Pioneer, Newcastle upon Tyne: Tyne \& Wear Industrial Monuments Trust (a good recent short biography of Hedley, with bibliography).R.Young, 1975, Timothy Hackworth and the Locomotive, Shildon: Shildon "Stockton \& Darlington Railway" Silver Jubilee Committee; orig. pub. 1923, London.C.R.Warn, 1976, Waggonways and Early Railways of Northumberland, Newcastle upon Tyne: Frank Graham.See also: Stephenson, GeorgePJGR -
12 Rastrick, John Urpeth
[br]b. 26 January 1780 Morpeth, Englandd. 1 November 1856 Chertsey, England[br]English engineer whose career spanned the formative years of steam railways, from constructing some of the earliest locomotives to building great trunk lines.[br]John Urpeth Rastrick, son of an engineer, was initially articled to his father and then moved to Ketley Ironworks, Shropshire, c. 1801. In 1808 he entered into a partnership with John Hazledine at Bridgnorth, Shropshire: Hazledine and Rastrick built many steam engines to the designs of Richard Trevithick, including the demonstration locomotive Catch-Me-Who-Can. The firm also built iron bridges, notably the bridge over the River Wye at Chepstow in 1815–16.Between 1822 and 1826 the Stratford \& Moreton Railway was built under Rastrick's direction. Malleable iron rails were laid, in one of the first instances of their use. They were supplied by James Foster of Stourbridge, with whom Rastrick went into partnership after the death of Hazledine. In 1825 Rastrick was one of a team of engineers sent by the committee of the proposed Liverpool \& Manchester Railway (L \& MR) to carry out trials of locomotives built by George Stephenson on the Killingworth Waggonway. Early in 1829 the directors of the L \& MR, which was by then under construction, sent Rastrick and James Walker to inspect railways in North East England and report on the relative merits of steam locomotives and fixed engines with cable haulage. They reported, rather hesitantly, in favour of the latter, particularly the reciprocal system of Benjamin Thompson. In consequence the Rainhill Trials, at which Rastrick was one of the judges, were held that October. In 1829 Rastrick constructed the Shutt End colliery railway in Worcestershire, for which Foster and Rastrick built the locomotive Agenoria; this survives in the National Railway Museum. Three similar locomotives were built to the order of Horatio Allen for export to the USA.From then until he retired in 1847 Rastrick found ample employment surveying railways, appearing as a witness before Parliamentary committees, and supervising construction. Principally, he surveyed the southern part of the Grand Junction Railway, which was built for the most part by Joseph Locke, and the line from Manchester to Crewe which was eventually built as the Manchester \& Birmingham Railway. The London \& Brighton Railway (Croydon to Brighton) was his great achievement: built under Rastrick's supervision between 1836 and 1840, it included three long tunnels and the magnificent Ouse Viaduct. In 1845 he was Engineer to the Gravesend \& Rochester Railway, the track of which was laid through the Thames \& Medway Canal's Strood Tunnel, partly on the towpath and partly on a continuous staging over the water.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsFRS 1837.Bibliography1829, with Walker, Report…on the Comparative Merits of Locomotive and Fixed Engines, Liverpool.Further ReadingC.F.Dendy Marshall, 1953, A History of Railway Locomotives Down to the End of the Year 1831, The Locomotive Publishing Co.R.E.Carlson, 1969, The Liverpool \& Manchester Railway Project 1821–1831, Newton Abbot: David \& Charles.C.Hadfield and J.Norris, 1962, Waterways to Stratford, Newton Abbot: David \& Charles (covers Stratford and Moreton Railway).See also: Stephenson, RobertPJGR -
13 Reichenbach, Georg Friedrich von
SUBJECT AREA: Mechanical, pneumatic and hydraulic engineering, Photography, film and optics, Public utilities[br]b. 24 August 1772 Durlach, Baden, Germanyd. 21 May 1826 Munich, Germany[br]German engineer.[br]While he was attending the Military School at Mannheim, Reichenbach drew attention to himself due to the mathematical instruments that he had designed. On the recommendation of Count Rumford in Munich, the Bavarian government financed a two-year stay in Britain so that Reichenbach could become acquainted with modern mechanical engineering. He returned to Mannheim in 1793, and during the Napoleonic Wars he was involved in the manufacture of arms. In Munich, where he was in the service of the Bavarian state from 1796, he started producing precision instruments in his own time. His basic invention was the design of a dividing machine for circles, produced at the end of the eighteenth century. The astronomic and geodetic instruments he produced excelled all the others for their precision. His telescopes in particular, being perfect in use and of solid construction, soon brought him an international reputation. They were manufactured at the MathematicMechanical Institute, which he had jointly founded with Joseph Utzschneider and Joseph Liebherr in 1804 and which became a renowned training establishment. The glasses and lenses were produced by Joseph Fraunhofer who joined the company in 1807.In the same year he was put in charge of the technical reorganization of the salt-works at Reichenhall. After he had finished the brine-transport line from Reichenhall to Traunstein in 1810, he started on the one from Berchtesgaden to Reichenhall which was an extremely difficult task because of the mountainous area that had to be crossed. As water was the only source of energy available he decided to use water-column engines for pumping the brine in the pipes of both lines. Such devices had been in use for pumping purposes in different mining areas since the middle of the eighteenth century. Reichenbach knew about the one constructed by Joseph Karl Hell in Slovakia, which in principle had just been a simple piston-pump driven by water which did not work satisfactorily. Instead he constructed a really effective double-action water-column engine; this was a short time after Richard Trevithick had constructed a similar machine in England. For the second line he improved the system and built a single-action pump. All the parts of it were made of metal, which made them easy to produce, and the pumps proved to be extremely reliable, working for over 100 years.At the official opening of the line in 1817 the Bavarian king rewarded him generously. He remained in the state's service, becoming head of the department for roads and waterways in 1820, and he contributed to the development of Bavarian industry as well as the public infrastructure in many ways as a result of his mechanical skill and his innovative engineering mind.[br]Further ReadingBauernfeind, "Georg von Reichenbach" Allgemeine deutsche Biographie 27:656–67 (a reliable nineteenth-century account).W.Dyck, 1912, Georg v. Reichenbach, Munich.K.Matschoss, 1941, Grosse Ingenieure, Munich and Berlin, 3rd edn. 121–32 (a concise description of his achievements in the development of optical instruments and engineering).WKBiographical history of technology > Reichenbach, Georg Friedrich von
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Trevithick, Richard — born April 13, 1771, Illogan, Cornwall, Eng. died April 22, 1833, Dartford, Kent British inventor of the first steam locomotive. With little formal education, in 1790 he became an engineer for several ore mines in Cornwall. In 1797 his… … Universalium
Trevithick, Richard — (13 abr. 1771, Illogan, Cornwall, Inglaterra–22 abr. 1833, Dartford, Kent). Británico que inventó la primera locomotora de vapor. Con muy poca educación formal, en 1790 se convirtió en ingeniero de varias explotaciones minerales en Cornwall. En… … Enciclopedia Universal
Richard Trevithick — Richard Trevithick, porträtiert von John Linnell (1816) Richard Trevithick (* 13. April 1771 in Illogan, Cornwall; † 22. April 1833 in Dartford) war ein britischer Erfinder, Ingenieur und Maschinenbauer. Er entwickelte die ersten fun … Deutsch Wikipedia
Richard Trevithick — par John Linnell, 1816 Naissance 13 avril&# … Wikipédia en Français
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Richard Trevithick — Infobox Scientist name = Richard Trevithick box width = image width = 150px caption = Richard Trevithick, by John Linnell (1792 1882) birth date = April 13, 1771 birth place = Cornwall death date = April 22, 1833 (aged 62) death place = Dartford … Wikipedia
Richard Trevithick — noun English engineer who built the first railway locomotive (1771 1833) • Syn: ↑Trevithick • Instance Hypernyms: ↑engineer, ↑applied scientist, ↑technologist * * * Richard Trevithick … Useful english dictionary
Richard — /ri shahrd /; Fr. /rddee shannrdd /, n. Maurice /maw rees /; Fr. /moh rddees /, ( the Rocket ), born 1921, Canadian hockey player. /rich euhrd/, n. a male given name. * * * (as used in expressions) Allen Richard Arkwright Sir Richard Attlee… … Universalium
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