The British really have it all over us Americans when it comes to trains and steam in particular. I've run several steam engines and this machine is truly beautiful. And using hydrostatic cylinder oiling is really neat and much more efficient that the mechanicals.
A lot of British locos were fitted with mechanical lubrication in the 40's and 50's but quite often drivers preferred hydrostatic on the grounds that they could control it and set it at a level so that the loco ran "nicer".
Yes, Hydrostatic lubricators were liked by crew. That said North American loco design (USA and Canada, later copied Worldwide, particularly in the USSR and China) was magnificent and demonstrated far more thoughtfulness towards crew. Pull-out Regulators did not involve the tremendous stiffness of some UK designs which could require a force of 60lbs to move the handle! Auto-couplers were far better (safer) than UK three-link couplings, which required shunters to go between loco and vehicles to couple up. Shunters who had to flip the linkages onto the hooks of trucks using shunting poles while vehicles were moving at faster than walking pace... were placed in absurd levels of danger and were killed in their hundreds. North American Cab Layout placed all relevant controls within easy reach of drivers (engineers) and firemen (stokers)... And while the UK design aesthetic was beautiful indeed, the brute honesty of North American design - with accessibility and ease of servicing the main concern - is stunning. It is amazing that Stanier's Princess Coronation class pacifics did not have rocking grates, while these had been standard on North American locos for a long time. Finally, long-travel valves were imported into UK practice via Churchward on the GW after he'd visited the US at the turn of the C20th... while obsolete short valve-travel locos were still being built new in the 1930s (Derby 4Fs)! GW Hall Class locos, like all GW tender designs had no cab doors, hardly any UK locos had mechanical stokers, even though several had 50 square foot grates. GW shovels were known as 'man-killers'.... and roller bearings only came at the end. Don't get me wrong; I'm a diehard steam fan, but as soon as #4014 is back in steam, I'm coming over to ride behind it. The Big Boys are so magnificent that it would bankrupt the English language to describe them. Let #4014 do the talking!
Thank god these infernos no longer exist in India. Poor driver and fireman will have to stand all the distance. Now is either diesel or electric in the last 25 years.
