Iron Duke - the Great Western Railway steam engine
Ranked #2,296 in Education, #54,791 overall
About the Iron Duke class
Once the successful Firefly class had been created, the Iron Duke was created as an prototype for improvement. Initially the only change was to increase the diameter of the driving wheels, but after an accident it was rebuilt in a 4-2-2 set up, with four wheels in front of the driving wheels. This proved successful and the class was built to this design.
About the GWR "Iron Duke" Class
One of the earliest Broad gauge engines
Broad Gauge Express Engine from Bristol and Exeter Railway
Buy at AllPosters.com
It looked very similar to the Firefly, the main external difference visible in images being the two wheels in front of the main motive driving wheel rather than one.
Other differences, such as the larger driving wheel, can be hard to make out in the pictures of the time without a direct comparison.
It pulled the Flying Dutchman, for some decades the world's fastest express. As this ran across the country, from London Paddington to Penzance in Cornwall, the Iron Duke engines became instantly recogniseable and iconic. Speeds of sixty miles an hour were common, but the Iron Duke was known to reach eighty.
The end of the Iron Duke class
Lord of the Isles
The last Iron Duke engine:
Drawn when new:
LOCO LORD OF THE ISLES - Media Storehouse
Lord of the Isles
The Iron Duke class, like most broad gauge engines, could not be converted to narrow gauge. When broad gauge was removed, the engines had no purpose, and the scrappers' yards were full of them.
The Iron Duke class engine "Lord of the Isles" was selected for preservation at Swindon. It outlived the broad gauge Great Western by less than ten years. In 1906 it was scrapped by the same order that saw the destruction of the North Star, the first broad gauge engine ever built which had also been preserved there.
The decision was condemned as short sighted at the time, and history has proved that point. Within twenty years a replica of the North Star had been built (using the original pieces where possible), and a more recent replica of the Iron Duke has been created.
Unfortunately, the DVD can only be viewed in the UK and Europe as it is Region 2 Pal.
More Images
Commercially available images from across the web.
- More Images from Amazon.co.uk
- More resources about Iron Duke steam engines from Amazon.co.uk
A working replica
The Iron Duke
It is usually housed at the National Railway Museum in York. As well as Didcot, its other famous excursion was to the SS Great Britain in Bristol, where it was displayed alongside the historic Iron Ship for Brunel's jubilee.
Few images of the originals are available (consider when they were built and eventually scrapped). However, the replica that was constructed is available for public viewing and some photographers have kindly made their images available online through flickr.
The Iron Duke on Thomas the Tank engine
A TV appearance for the replica
Thomas and the
Great Railway Show
The book is available through Amazon.com at a high price, but can be had from .co.uk at around $2, which makes it cheaper even with postage.
Thomas 35 Thomas & Great Railway Show
Amazon Price: $34.70 (as of 06/02/2012)
Used Price: $34.70
Other Great Western Engines
The original broad gauge engine
About the Great Western Railway
More about Brunel's Broad Gauge rail
The Great Western Railway, the unique Broad gauge railway designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, has its own lens. The covers in brief, its history, the guage wars, the roling stock and its eventual end after the second world war.
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wildlens
Mar 17, 2011 @ 1:54 pm | delete
- Interesting lens, thumbs up!
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Treasures-By-Brenda
May 12, 2009 @ 12:27 pm | delete
- Nicely done lens; blessed by a SquidAngel.
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