Gresley Conjugated Valve Gear - Problems

Problems

The main difficulty with this valve gear was that at high speeds, inertial forces caused the long conjugating lever to bend or "whip". This had the effect of causing the middle cylinder to operate at a longer cutoff than the outer cylinders, and therefore to produce a disproportionate share of the total power output, leading to increased wear of the middle big end. Sustained high speed running could sometimes cause the big end to wear rapidly enough that the increased travel afforded to the middle piston by the increased play in the bearing was enough to knock the ends off the middle cylinder. Although the problem could be contained in a peacetime environment with regular maintenance and inspections, it proved to be poorly suited to the rigours of heavy running and low maintenance levels of World War 2. This gave rise to big-end problems on the centre cylinder connecting rod on the famous A4 class of streamlined Pacifics and many of these locomotives were fitted with a reduced diameter piston and had the inside cylinder lined up as a temporary measure. Gresley's successor at the LNER, Edward Thompson, was critical of this particular valve gear. As well as introducing new two-cylinder designs, he set about rebuilding Gresley locomotives with separate sets of Walschaerts valve gear for each cylinder.