Vicki Explores ... Starcross Atmospheric Railway

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In this video Vicki takes the Exmouth to Starcross ferry in search of Brunel's atmospheric railway.
Find out more about the atmospheric railway here: www.ikbrunel.org.uk/atmospheri...
Find out more about the Exmouth to Starcross ferry here: www.exe-estuary.org/cruises_a...
Thanks to ‘Vicki Explores’ Patreon supporters;
Aaron Springs, Alan Lumsden, Alastair Baker, Alexander Espéret, Alfie O'Flaherty, Alobear, Amelia Davidson, Amy Banner, Andrea & Elizabeth Clayton Vail, Andrew Gray, Andrew Holloway, Andrew Rodgers, Andrew Watson, Andrew Wilkinson, Andy Francis, Anne Stellingwerf, Arthur, Arwel Parry, Bailey Bogle, Barry Stanton, Ben Barron, Brian Bell, Brian Wright, Bryan Longmuir, Chris Allen, Chris Allison, Chris Hooker, Chris Robertson, Chris Wilkes, Craig Williams, D.A. Patterson, Dan Spence, Dan The Train, Dave Kirwin, Dave Matterface, Dave Treadwell, David, David Carpenter-Lomax, David Collison, David Durant, David Miller, Dr Andy Hill, David Rook, David Smith, David Stacey, David Walsh, Dennis Lassiter, Diana Patterson, Douglas Jacobs, Emma Smith, Erik Petrich, Ethan James Whitford, Every Disused Station, Fiona Mulvey, Fred Gough, Gary Hunt, Geoff Wilson, Graham Lavers, Graham O'Mara, Graham Reed, Gregory Beecroft, Hazel Nicholson, ieee1396, Jack Wingate, James Carroll, James Marshall, James Thomson, Jason Turner, Jenny Campbell, Jeremy Rawlings, Jeremy Samuels, JeremyR22, Jim Steeley, John Crook, John Mason, John R Moore, John Simpson, John Winebarger, Jonathan Isip, Kai Michael Poppe, Karl Black, Karl Florczak, Kelly Taylor, Kenneth Rains, Kevin Gage, Kevin Porter, Lachlan Ellis, Lawrence Chan, Lee Fergusson, Leeky, Leo Starrenburg, Lewis Gill, Lisa Grimm, liv3d, Marc Waters, Mark Cooper, Mark Harper, Mark Kavanagh, Mart McDonald, Martin Clitheroe, Martin Jolly, Matthew, Matthew McKinnon, Matthew Michael, Michael Coates, Michael Doherty, Michael Harris, Michael James, Michael Monn, Michael Schmidt, Michiel Kreuze, Mr Michael Ward, Mr Andy TF, Niall Porter, Partha Mazumdar, Patrick, Patrick Quinn-Graham, Paul Taylor, Peter Sheil, Pierre Blandin, Ray Turro, Raymond Calloway, Robert Brailsford, Robert Brown, Robert Cole, Robert Deering, Sandy Quick, Simon Webb, Sophie Robson, Soren Kristensen, Stephen Lawton, Stuart Harrison, Stuart Summers, Thomas Mann, Thomas Williams, Tom Carlos, Tony Swaine, Trevor Sweatman, Tyler Dickey, Wade A Nelson, Warren Pilkington, Wendy Harper, Wouter Hoek.
About Vicki Explores:
Twitter: / vickiexplores
Instagram: / vickiexplores
BOOKS
The Railway Adventures: www.septemberpublishing.org/p...
Great British Railways: 50 Things to See and Do: www.septemberpublishing.org/p...

Опубликовано:

27 сен 2019

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Комментарии : 288

@firefly24601 4 года назад

[insert humorous statement about Vicki Pipe walking along Victoria Road and talking about pipes all in the same video here]

@Parax77 4 года назад

what no tube?

@SamSitar 4 года назад

she made a brilliant trio.

@fl-v8843 4 года назад

Victorian pipes at that

@briangarrow448 4 года назад

And I thought an atmospheric railway had well appointed salon cars with leather seats, heavy curtains and Hercule Poiriot.

@flyingbananatree5661 4 года назад

that's an ambience railway, almost the same XD

@emmajacobs5575 4 года назад

Nooooo, that’s one with trains that take sick and injured people to hospital ... ;-)

@christopherlewis6938 4 года назад

Are you thinking of the Orient Express?

@paulburton9386 4 года назад

Great video! I love the updated theme tune with "All the castles" in the lyrics!!

@bobcooper6528 4 года назад

Basically it was just a pipe dream

@allanfoster6965 4 года назад

Baboom tish!

@allanfoster6965 4 года назад

Baboom tish!😁

@arilebon 4 года назад

Your comment set me on a rabbit hole of searching on etymologies on a number of idioms. For 'pipe dream' -- this seems to be a common consensus - en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pipe_dream The one on 'steal my thunder' was among my favorites - www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/steal-ones-thunder.html

@markpieexplores 4 года назад

I did laugh.

@lesremmington-allum6384 4 года назад

Great video, Vicki. The pumping houses created a vacuum in the pipe, (insert pun, sorry Vicki), ahead of the train, so the effect was for the piston in the tube was sucked along. The problem was, as Vicki explained, the open flaps along the top of the tube, to allow the piston connection to the train, leaked. I believe Mr I.K.B. used leather for these. Today we have far better materials to work with, but the principal was good. Note: This was the broad gauge of 7'. Hope I don't sound like a 'know it all', Vicki, but I'm a big fan of Mr I.k. Brunel. Love your new "Vicki Explores" series. Thanks.

@VickiPipe 4 года назад

Les Remmington-Allum thanks Les - great have to more details. It’s difficult to understand how it all worked, so great to get up to speed (pun intended).

@cardigan7726 4 года назад

The piston was pushed along by atmospheric pressure. The clue is in the name!

@stephensaines7100 4 года назад

@@cardigan7726 Absolutely. I'm astounded so many people have no concept of basic physics. Like 'vacuum brakes' only one atmosphere of pressure is possible to use for 'work', as opposed to a pressurized system, where many multiples of atmospheric pressure can be used to perform work. The strength requirements for the mechanism would also climb with the pressure though.

@lesremmington-allum6384 4 года назад

@@VickiPipe A very interesting place for another "Explore", is West Wycombe Mausoleum, and the St Lawrence church with it's famous golden ball, plus underneath the hill is the West Wycombe (Hellfire) caves... by Sir Francis Dashwood. A lot of history there, for you. West Wycombe is located on the A40, obviously west of High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire.

@johncassels3475 4 года назад

Hello Vicki, this was truly lovely. I am pleased you have managed to capture the slightly wacky but thoroughly delightful Vicki we see when you are interacting with Geoff. Much harder to do when solo. Well done indeed! FIVE+ STARS

@erik_griswold 4 года назад

One could say that the Atmospheric Railway used a Victoria(n) Pipe!

@SamSitar 4 года назад

yes it did.

@Farfri 3 месяца назад

Hello to everyone else coming from the WTYP episode. Lovely to see that some of the pumping stations still exist!

@davidhull1481 4 дня назад

Her train/beach recitation puts me in mind of the Father Ted bit about cows- small/far away.

@stevetate 4 года назад

There are the remains of three pumping houses in the area.. Starcross, Totnes (near to the station), and Torquay.. (behind the Lidl near to the hospital). If you had taken the train to Starcross, you would have seen a small square shaped pond on the riverside of the track, between Exeter and Starcross. This was connected to the atmospheric railway and was a water storage facility, for the pumping house.. This is a very beautiful and scenic area... I can vouch for this because I live a few miles away at Teignmouth!

@johnnyfrisco5354 3 года назад

I lived just along from Brunel’s Tower in Starcross from 1960 to 1965... we teenagers used the top floor of his tower as a kind of youth club and band practise venue for several years. Great days, I mean really great days learning Rolling Stones, Beatles, Chuck Berry and other songs of the time. Cheers IK. Nice video.

@bob_._. 4 года назад

So if you guys really like it there, are you Starcross lovers? Thanks, I'll see myself out.

@petermostyneccleston2884 День назад

The Atmospheric Railway did work for a very short while. The top of the pipe needs a seal, which was leather. The seal needed constant maintenance, using lard, to preserve it. This caused the problem of rats eating the seal. There is a length of pipe, from the atmospheric railway, in the Didcot Railway Centre.

@Stevenspielburger 4 года назад

"all the castles" in the ending music!

@railwaymanjohn4721 4 года назад

Sorry to correct you Vicki, but the Atmospheric Railway used a vacuum to suck the train along with atmospheric pressure (14 psi) pushing from behind on a piston that coupled to the driving wagon. Also the tube was a standard diameter, definitely not different diameters depending on whether you were going up or down a hill. The piston was coupled to the driving wagon by a vertical bar that pushed two leather flaps out of the way as the piston travelled down the pipe. The problem with the system was the leather seals that closed the slot along the top of the pipe, as rats ate the leather, causing the vacuum in front of the piston and the atmosphere behind piston to fail.

@fidgetspinner343 4 года назад

What a lovely couple Vicki and Geoff are. 2 good humans

@epetrich 4 года назад

A Better Beaching Report: Vicki explores the beach and spots a train

@wealdenpete 4 года назад

The London and Croydon Railway used atmospheric traction 1845-46. Similarly short-lived. Another problem was one of points and crossings - very difficult to engineer with this technology. One of the pumping houses from Croydon was relocated and reused for water supply purposes, and can still be seen in Surrey Street, Croydon.

@caw25sha 4 года назад

I was wondering about the equivalent of points. I assumed they just went backwards and forwards on the same length of track so didn't need them.

@wealdenpete 4 года назад

@@caw25sha Yes I think so too, but somewhere like the London and Croydon, that simply wasn't going to work as soon as any new lines were built branching off the original. I think the London-Croydon shared the route with an ordinary railway, and in order for one to cross the other at the main junction near where Selhurst depot now stands, a flying junction had to be built, in the form of a viaduct that allowed one form of line to cross the other without interfering with it. There are drawings of this I have seen, and it was a big structure, simply to keep the two lines separate.

@tomkent4656 3 года назад

The Croydon museum has a piece of the original vacuum tube on display.

@joermnyc 4 года назад

Here in New York before we had the subway system, someone tried to make “pneumatic rail” a thing. The car was a tube on wheels with a seal that held against the tunnel walls., Large fans pushed air into the tunnel and the train moved. It was only a demonstration line though, so they had to reverse the fans and suck the train back into the station. Feasibility over a larger system, and loss of funding killed the idea. They actually found the remnants of this when they were digging for the City Hall station on the Broadway side. Too bad they destroyed it after only saving the tunneling shield.

@metropod 4 года назад

...which someone ended up loosing...

@neilcrawford8303 4 года назад

In a way it's a similar principle to modern electric traction. A stationary plant generating power which is then distributed distributed along the railway for a train or locomotive to use for traction. In many cases the primary energy source is still steam. The method of distribution has changed, it's now 3rd rail or overhead wires.

@ianbrown9108 4 года назад

Wow that brings back memories!Back in the 80's I stayed in Starcross for two days en route to Paignton.Back then there was a proper little museum in the pumping station and the pub was just called The Railway. They actually had genuine Brunel artefacts including a section of the pipe.The village wasn't as busy then either. Thanks for reminding me of a lovely little holiday 👍

@caw25sha 4 года назад

We went to the museum when I was a kid, about 1984 I think. I didn't know it had closed and I was wondering why Vicki didn't go in.

@ianbrown9108 4 года назад

@@caw25sha I think it was either 84 or 85 when I went,I remember the guy who ran it giving a demonstration of dowsing as well.

@GeoffSaint 4 года назад

My wife and I took my parents to the museum when we lived in Exeter in the late 80s/early 90s. The proprietor used a length of pipe and two vacuum cleaners to demonstrate the principle and would check the barometer every day - the higher the pressure the bigger the person who could ride on the trolly...

@ianbrown9108 4 года назад

@@GeoffSaint I don't remember the vacuum cleaners but I do remember the barometer.

@TheUphillracer 4 года назад

Great video about a little known piece of railway history. Pleased to support you Vicki!

@engineerjim2018 4 года назад

Nice video about the Starcross ferry but the facts about how the atmospheric system worked are incorrect. The pumping stations evacuated air causing a vacuum not pumping air into it. Even utilising modern materials to avoid the problems associated with rats eating the leather flap seals the pure olfistics of points etc make it a system bound to fail There are sections at Didcot and also at Brunel uni where you can see in situ track

@a11oge 3 года назад

For details on these trains, check out "Isambard Kingdom Brunel's Vacuum Powered Railway" on YT

@paulgracey4697 4 года назад

The atmospheric railway lives on in a very different, much shorter, and trackless form of transport. I refer to the steam catapults on aircraft carriers equipped with them. You Brits invented it for the advent of jet powered fighters aboard your carriers but we Americans still use it. I suspect Brunel was the inspiration. I should mention however that the pressure you mention was in fact the atmosphere itself. You see the pumping station was not pressurizing the pipe, it was evacuating it ahead of the train. This was necessary because of the sealing system that Brunel had devised. It needed that vacuum for the seals to remain tight until the train reached each one in turn. Yes the train was pushed by normal 14 lbs per square inch pressure from the open end behind the driving cart but those seals along the top slit had to hold back the atmosphere ahead of it. Unfortunately leather was all that Brunel had as an elastic seal material. Rats enjoyed it and ate it ragged. Winter stiffening did it no favors either. So why does it work on aircraft carriers? Steam at much greater pressure and more modern sealing methods help, but the shortness of the trip is the biggest factor. Rockets had been tried, Hydraulic ram rope pulled launchers had worked for propeller driven aircraft on battleships and cruisers and some unusual carrier launches. One famous American carrier launched crossways out the side of the hanger deck a few times before giving that idea up. That one was the U.S.S Hornet that picked up the three Apollo 11 astronauts. As it is now a museum, I had the fortune to notice that the track for that launch ability is still there.

@jonathancook4022 4 года назад

Vicki Pipe talks about Pipes! :D All the pipes!

@Topshaman-pk2rx 4 года назад

Nice to see you in Exmouth and Starcross. Do come to Topsham and check out the museum and the ferry to the Turf Inn. You can also catch a ferry to Exmouth.

@mob5350 4 года назад

Definitely worth my support on Patreon! Thank you, Vicki! Great visuals and interesting tidbit of history! I can't wait for the next one:)

@AverytheCubanAmerican 4 года назад

I didn’t know about the atmospheric railway until now. Very educational, Vicki

@Ulleskelf 4 года назад

I’ve been to Starcross but didn’t know about the atmospheric railway. The village also has a French postbox.

@InfernalMachinePict 4 года назад

Is that where one deposits French letters?

@davidainsworth 4 года назад

@@InfernalMachinePict Oui

@yiyodder 4 года назад

French ! Disgraceful .

@sgthree 4 года назад

I was born there, is it is a cack-hole!

@greghilton7797 4 года назад

Vicki does railway history. Yea! More please.

@raymondturro9853 4 года назад

Thanks, Vicki!

@britainonabudget 4 года назад

So happy to see this as an expanded series on this channel. Love Vicki Explores and I think it's great that it's on the All The Stations channel!

@tomas0flynn 4 года назад

There’s a section of the original pipe recovered from here on display at the Didcot Railway Centre.

@wealdenpete 4 года назад

This could be considered the precursor to the electric railway. Bear with me - the power was supplied remotely, from a steam engine creating a vaccum i.e. a "pressure potential" to "transmit" the power to where it was needed. The engine was the "generator" and the pipe was the "power cable". Now, the potential is electrical (voltage difference rather than air pressure difference), and is also generated remote from where it is needed. I can't think of another form of remote power supply used for railways until electric trains were introduced. The only other form of remote power supply that comes to mind was the hydraulic supply system used in London to provide power centrally for sites with lifts and cranes, but never used for railways, for practical reasons.

@ianbuchanan2461 4 года назад

wealdenpete Glasgow Underground, opened as a cable operated railway with a steam engine both pulling the cable through the railway and also tensioning it.

@wealdenpete 4 года назад

@@ianbuchanan2461 Good point.

@chriswilkes236 4 года назад

Loved the video, Vicki

@theoasisvlogs5954 4 года назад

Love these vidoes. Keep it up

@paulhill8224 4 года назад

Great video Vicki Pipe, I really enjoyed the video, keep up the good work.

@EntertainmentWorldz 4 года назад

great video

@XNA2NW3 4 года назад

Awesome.

@fintytin5771 4 года назад

Great stuff Vicki !!!

@jimwright4163 4 года назад

Great video 👍

@kdean9537 4 года назад

Great video Vicki! 👍

@Lulu-jl5zd 4 года назад

Lovely vlog Vicki... more please :)

@herridge819 4 года назад

Thanks for that, very interesting!

@ItsGeorgeHuh 4 года назад

I used to work in Starcross. Such a fun commute!

@henrymcilroy 4 года назад

I live just down from the Atmo pub and use to catch the train too Teignmouth for college. It’s a beautiful journey down the estuary and along the coast. Always a bit hairy when the storms hit though and waves are splashing over the carriage 😂😂😂

@stancrouch9642 4 года назад

Thanks for exploring Vicki.

@davidbagley7301 4 года назад

I went to the museum in the pumping house in the 1990s. They had a length of 5" gauge track with a length of plastic drain pipe fixed between the rails. The pipe had a sealed slot cut in the top just like Brunel's original except this was rubber and not leather. Visitors would ride on a small coach which was propelled (sucked) along by a vacuum cleaner at one end. When it reached the end, then the vacuum cleaner was turned off and another one at the other end was turned on to go back again. Apart from the noise of the vacuum cleaners, it was a really smooth and quiet ride!

@rzholland 4 года назад

Thank you Viki, what a lovely birthday treat for me - will actually be over in England at Exmouth next May

@theshowman8478 4 года назад

Am really hooked on this excellent channel. Love it ! 👍

@stephendines1936 4 года назад

Wow what an adventure.

@massivley 4 года назад

Nothing better than watching vicki explores on a Saturday afternoon

@romanbaczynski8656 4 года назад

Excellent film. I had family in Lympstone years ago and spent time in Exmouth when visiting. Never saw the atmospheric railway. Another eye opener from Vicki 👍😉

@allanfoster6965 4 года назад

Loving this!!👍🤘👏👏👏💕🦄

@rogerhudson9732 4 года назад

By Dawlish Warren I remember seeing an old GWR cast iron sign from the 19th Century threatening anyone taking shingle from the railway/beach embankment with "Transportation to the penal Colony' (Australia). Great video.

@Keefa24 4 года назад

Hey! We have improved a bit over here since that time. Cheers from Brisbane! PS. I loved the video Vicki

@BuzzingRocks 4 года назад

Cool video. 🙂

@JohnTalbot-k6xi 4 года назад

Light, Happy and Enchanting (!!) Perfect Adventure this show can be a Big Video Hit Series

@davidhcobbald3632 4 года назад

Great video Vicki and welcome back to gorgeous Devon!!

@peterdarton9603 4 года назад

Nice watching video, Starcross was the Birth place of my farther who passed away a few years ago. That stretch of line means a lot to me and my family history. My Grandad also worked on that line 60 years ago.

@ivesblackwood756 4 года назад

Awesome that you're down here in Devon! Exmouth is a lovely beach and a regular day out for all of us in Exeter, and a friend of mine lives in Starcross

@Leonard_Smith 4 года назад

Loving the nose stud. The content of the video being great goes without saying, so I won't mention it.

@SleventyFive 4 года назад

Not only can we build an atmospheric railway today, we have! There's one at the Porto Alegre Airport in Brazil, one at an Indonesian themepark, and a planned 11 mile, two line system in Canoas Brazil which will serve 24 stations. All built by Aeromovel.

@monicalang6966 4 года назад

what a brilliant presentation. I have embedded it onto The Starcross History Society's blog

@monicalang6966 4 года назад

and shared with Starcross News Facebook page

@HenrysAdventures 4 года назад

Another very interesting video! There used to be a Brunell Museum in the old pump house where they had a miniature atmospheric railway powered by a vacuum cleaner! There's a section of atmospheric railway at Didcot Railway Centre!

@mnmless 4 года назад

I used this ferry in 2010, it was absolutely amazing! So happy to see my hometown here 💖

@parkandrideme 4 года назад

Well done Vicki. It was nice to watch that without a certain person butting in

@annother3350 4 года назад

Great bit of acting at 2:25 !!

@plaws0 Год назад

Finally decided to look for vids on Atmospheric Railways - and immediately hit a good one! "Crazy idea that was never going to work?" ehh ... maybe. The vacuum idea was sound and problems with the stationary steam engines that ran the pumps to evacuate the air would have been solved but the fundamental issue was that *the train was outside the pipe*. Because of this, you needed to have a connection between the piston in the pipe and the train (or at least the piston car) and that meant you needed some sort of slot in the pipe. And if you have a slot in the pipe, how do you maintain vacuum? Well, you put a leather flap on it that is opened as the piston car passes and reseals after. I think you can immediately begin to see the problem. Miles and miles of leather flap. So ... yeah. The other big technical problem was points (track switches or turnouts depending where you live). There were apparently some in use on at least one of the 4 railways that were in commercial service (the two in England and one each in Ireland and France) but there don't appear to be any surviving drawings or descriptions of how they worked. The list of things that didn't really work (moving trains in terminals, changing ends, etc) kept getting longer. And then ... The main reason atmospheric railways were promoted was that their promoters said that they could run up steeper grades ("banks") than existing steam locomotives so they would be cheaper to build ... except that in just about every example built, there were already steam locomotives that could, and did, use the same tracks without issue. In fact, when problems arose with the pipe or the valve or the stationary engine houses, contemporary steam locomotives would replace the piston cars. RU-vid is weird about links in comments so I'll just say that Joe Brennan of Columbia U in NYC has a whole series of articles on the Atmospheric Railways on his employer's site entitled "The Atmospheric Road" - that should be enough for google to send you to the right place. Fascinating story even though the idea was doomed. 🙂 Of course, many railways in Britain and on the continent use "stationary engines" with power transmitted to the trains but instead of pumps, it's generators that send electricity to the trains through a wire over the track ...

@harleancarpenter8043 4 года назад

Nice video, Vicki

@SGMiner21 4 года назад

The music says "All the castles" 😍😍 this is gonna be a good series

@DevonPixie1991 4 года назад

DocWho 2002 powderham castle is near starcross - there is Hope!

@RichardFelstead1949 4 года назад

I like the ways you cued the trains to appear just as Vicki finished the dialogue.She must have friends in high places.lol

@pmichael73 4 года назад

Equivalent with modern technology: the Hyperloop - probably just as ineffective because the small numbers of passengers per train being proposed.

@warminghurst 4 года назад

Boats 'Parked"! - Love it Vicki, my expression too.

@johnrhodez6829 Месяц назад

Obviously a 'Navy Lark' fan. "Ship parked Sir!"

@florianb81 4 года назад

wohoo new episode ;-)

@markweir2988 4 года назад

One off my favourite parts off the UK. Been along that stretch off road between starcross and dawlish many times and never knew that story. I don't think it would still work now.

@benketteridge9150 4 года назад

The Starcross atmospheric railway ran at negative pressure - i.e. a partial vacuum. The trains were sucked along the line. For those curious as to how the train attached to the pipe, there was a slot in the top of the pipe with a flexible leather flap that allowed a piston to be inserted into the pipe. That piston was attached to the underside of the train, and thus the atmosphere in the pipe pulls or pushes (depending upon whether the pipe is at positive or negative pressure relative to the outside atmosphere) the train along. The reason for the failure of the technology at the time was that leather is not a long term solution to the flexible seal problem. It dries out in hot conditions (Devon can get lovely hot summers!), and freezes in cold (Devon winters can equally be very wet and cold). Perhaps a modern materials scientist could suggest a more durable alternative to leather?

@VickiPipe 4 года назад

Ben Ketteridge Thanks Ben! It’s difficult to understand all the technicalities so good to have more details!

@DevonPixie1991 4 года назад

It sounds cliché but I’m from Exmouth and it looks like you got lucky with the weather

@RandomRailways 4 года назад

It used a partial vacuum to create the propulsion, air pressure on a piston attached to the train pushed it along. There are several sections of the original pipework on display at Didcot Railway Centre: didcotrailwaycentre.org.uk/article.php/20/broad-gauge-railway

@stephenlittle7534 4 года назад

Nice to see you down here. Here is where I live Dawlish. I hope you had a great time. As it looked like you did. At the end it's a shame you didn't see the new trains come through o well next time

@lfewell2161 4 года назад

There was a small museum at Starcross, it was featured in the VIDEO 125 "hst west" VHS from 1986, I think it was privately run, not sure if it was open to the general public or not. What became of it?

@pp37903 4 года назад

Someone should attempt to recreate this technology! Great video. Like the jacket. :)

@ChasMusic 4 года назад

I thought you were saying River X, like in, the unknown river. And an atmospheric railway sounds like you'd use it to travel into space, especially with Starcross in the name. Lovely to see these interesting little side trips throughout the UK.

@MidnightVisions 4 года назад

Atmospheric railways did evolve into the Pneumatic Tube, a system for moving paper messages or small parts, but the problem when its scaled up to move a train, is the amount of energy required to keep the system constantly charged costs more than a self contained train. Scale the system up to be several block or kilometers long, and the costs to operate are excessive.

@fl-v8843 4 года назад

5:02 We could make a mechanically viable atmospheric railway with modern technology. The way the railway works is that inside the pipe is a plug that gets pushed and pulled by the pressure in the pipe. The plug is connected to the train so that as one moves so does the other. The reason that it was hard to maintain pressure is that connecting the plug to the train was a metal truss meaning that the pipe needed a resealable gap running along the whole top. With modern magnets you could link the plug and train without having a hole in the pipe. Whether that's cheaper than a modern electric trains is another matter

@John900C 4 года назад

You've got it! The reason the Victorians came up with cumbersome systems like this is because electric power distribution had not been worked out. That was always going to be the most effective and economical alternative to prime movers attached to the trains.

@davidholden2658 4 года назад

There are modern atmospheric railways in use in several places. A company called Aeromovel makes them.

@dougf94912 4 года назад

I believe there was an atmospheric railway closer to (your) home when the Crystal Palace was moved to South London. The line ran from downtown Croydon to the exhibition site. I think the Croydon terminus was in the Katherine Street Gardens.

@PhilipStorry 4 года назад

Hi Doug! You're right that there was an atmospheric railway terminating in Croydon, but it terminated at West Croydon railway station not the Croydon Central station at Katherine Street Gardens. It was on a the line from Forest Hill (then Dartmouth Arms, after a local pub) through Norwood Junction (then Jolly Sailor, also after a local pub) and finally terminating at West Croydon (then just called Croydon - what no pubs?). The line was also used for normal trains. The pnuematic railway at Crystal Palace was a demonstration track of ~550 yards, with no connection to any other rail networks. It also operated as a tourist attraction, with tickets costing sixpence. It was only open in 1864, and no visible trace of it exists today.

@dougf94912 4 года назад

@@PhilipStorry thanks for posting. I was born and raised in Croydon but never knew all these details!

@TheNgandrew 4 года назад

Very enjoyable video. I was expecting you might try to answer your question at the end. I don't have any expertise, but I understand leather was used quite a lot, which rats enjoyed gnawing (thus affecting pressure), so I would have thought there are better materials available now which rats aren't so partial to. Keep up the very good work.

@garethrawlings9719 4 года назад

Great video. There is a guy in America trying to get atmospheric railways going again. It uses magnet to get around the whole leaky pipes and rats problem. I think David Jason visited on he's plane train and automobile show. It looked really good running around a vine yard.

@rjmunro 4 года назад

Great video about it here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-KniP3T_PPB4.html

@Johnnyboyo 4 года назад

The pump house in Starcross used to house a museum dedicated to the atmospheric railway

@carolinegreenwell9086 4 года назад

I think I remember a moquette the same pattern as your top, Vicki. Anyway, great video.

@rich-rothschild1400 4 года назад

I have to say you come across as a very charming young lady. Which in context would make a very good Tour guide pun not intended. You come across as a very clear and concise view point to the world. Very bright and charming which is a novelty in itself thank you very much I do appreciate this video and more to come 🤞.

@jgodfrey546 4 года назад

Great video! I noticed you guys didn't heed Mr De Burgh's advice not to pay the ferryman 'til he got you to the other side, though...☺Nice title pic, btw...

@adriananderson4530 4 года назад

Sheer brilliance performance

@almostanengineer 4 года назад

A rare view of the wall at a Dawlish that will no longer be visible once they’ve finished the resilience works, both a happy and sad time for Dawlish

@geoffwbaU 4 года назад

Nice video and it's a lovely area but as some have pointed out, the explanation of how the system worked was incorrect!

@batman51 4 года назад

I did the same Exmouth to Dawlish trip in 1960 while on a school holiday. Unfortunately no video!

@jackfoster971 4 года назад

I’ve been waiting for you to return to Devon! (I live in Exeter)

@Braddurs 4 года назад

I have lived in both Starcross and Exmouth so this was quite an odd video to watch, seeing such familiar places. Did the Atmospheric Railway Inn still have the featherless Parrot?

@pras12100 4 года назад

Vicki, you did not have to go all the way to Devon to explore long-gone atmospheric railways. There was one much closer to South London. The London and Croydon Railway tried it from Forest Hill to West Croydon in 1845-1847. See: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_railway#London_and_Croydon_Railway I am glad you went anyway - South Devon is a bit more scenic :-)

@dglcomputers1498 4 года назад

Weird seeing on RU-vid someone walking past the flat we used to stay in for summer holidays with my Gran/Grandad, went there about 3 years in a row and have video of us taking the ferry to starcross.