William Rufus Deeble
Deeble, William, M.I.M.E (1856-1936)
William Rufus Deeble was probably the most innovative locomotive engineer in the history of Australian railways. Working for an impoverished state and railway the temptation would have been to use proven designs and minimise risk. Deeble looked for novel solutions to solve special problems. In each case they worked. He was an innovator and world leader yet he is little recognised or remembered.
William Rufus Deeble’s parents were Joseph and Henrietta Deeble and he was born near Plymouth, England, in 1856. He left England with his parents the following year for Australia.
Deeble was privately educated and from 1868 to 1875 he served an articled apprenticeship at the Phoenix Foundry in Ballarat. He attended evening classes at the Ballarat School of Mines during 1874 and 1875, studying mechanical engineering.
In 1878, Deeble was recruited by William Cundy, the Locomotive Superintendent of the Tasmanian Main Line Railway Company (T.M.L.R.) and in June 1878 he started with the company as leading engine fitter and erector. By 1888, he was General Foreman of the T.M.L.R.’s Locomotive Department. In 1890, the T.M.L.R. was taken over by the Tasmanian government and it became part of the Tasmanian Government Railways (T.G.R.). In July 1895, he was transferred to Strahan to take charge of the T.G.R.s locomotives and rolling stock on the West Coast of Tasmania. He remained at Strahan for the next three years until he appointed as the T.G.R.s acting Locomotive Superintendent (later changed to Chief Mechanical Engineer) in June 1898. He was permanently appointed to the position in October 1898, when W.E. Batchelor retired.
Initially Deeble ordered new locomotives to an existing design. However, the building of the 2 ft gauge North East Dundas Tramway on the west coast of Tasmania presented challenges few other locomotives had to face. This line was opened in 1898 to serve the silver mines at Williamstown, with grades of 1 in 25 and curves as sharp as 1½ chains radius. The use of sharp curves and gradients was due to the nature of the country and to keep the cost of construction under control.
The steep grades and curves severely limited the load that conventional locomotives could haul. Deeble had been responsible for the locomotives on this line when he was at Strahan and became interested in a new design concept called the Hagan’s patent locomotive (United States patent 638113A - approved 1899). He put together a specification and sent it to Erfurt Locomotives Works in Germany and an order was placed for a single locomotive. It was delivered in 1903. It was described by the Locomotive Magazine as “the heaviest and most powerful [Locomotive] yet built for a 2-ft gauge railway.” In the end, although successful, its weight proved damaging to the track and was normally confined to the working around Zeehan.
To reduce the weight of the locomotive on the track and yet achieve the desired pulling power, in 1909 Deeble ordered two locomotives to his specification to an, as yet, unproven design, patented by Herbert William Garratt (Australian patent 12079 (1907), Great Britain patent 17165 (1908) and United States patent 912303A (1908). The Garratt locomotive consists of two engine units, each driven by a pair of cylinders at its outer end and these are connected together by a steel frame known as the cradle, which carries the boiler.
These Garratts were the first of that type built anywhere in the world. They were unusual with respect to later examples worldwide in that they were arranged as compounds and the cylinders faced each other, normally they were at either end of the locomotives. The two locomotives entered service in 1910 and remained operating the line until the line closed in 1929.
Shortly after the order had been placed with Beyer Peacock, the Railway Gazette stated that “it is not often that we have to record anything connected with locomotive design and construction of such interest and importance [and] marks a real improvement on many existing standards and has possibilities which are unobtainable in any other form of construction.” They were successful and economical returning the line to an operating profit.
The Garratt would become a highly successful design and these two locomotives were the first of over 1600 Garratts constructed around the world, mostly by Beyer Peacock of Manchester, the builder of the first two.
The two little Garratts attracted local as well as overseas interest and, in April 1910, E.S. Hume, the Chief Mechanical Engineer of the West Australian Government Railways travelled to Zeehan to inspect the locomotives in service and, within a few months, Hume had ordered six Garratts for Western Australia.
Deeble ordered further Garratts for use on the 3’6” gauge main line between Hobart and Launceston. These locomotives were two 2-6-2+2-6-2 goods engines, class “L”, and two 4-4-2+2-4-4 express passenger engines, class “M”. Deeble had specified four wheel bogies for the express engines to improve their ride characteristics and these were the only eight cylinder Garratts ever built. The two express engines were the first to arrive in September 1912, followed shortly afterwards by the two goods engines.
Of the first twelve Garratt locomotives built in the world at that time, T.G.R. had six. They were all to provide reasonably successful with some of the M and L type operating until after World War Two.
By late 1916, the purchase of nine new locomotives had become an urgent necessity for the TGR, “if the railway service is to be continued on present lines with regard to the number of trains, and the general transport facilities given to the public.” Tenders had been called for the construction of six locomotives, however, shortages of materials and increased shipping costs owing to the First World War had increased the cost of a locomotive from England from a pre-war price of £6,000 to at least £8,500 by 1916. The TGR delayed purchasing these locomotives in the hope that the war would end and the price of locomotives would fall as a consequence. However, the war continued and, when the TGR finally attempted to order the locomotives, it was “informed that on account of the demand for locomotives for war purposes it was impossible to obtain engines in Great Britain.”
Deeble had put together specifications for new locomotives and he now sought an Australian company that could build the locomotives. A tentative contract was signed with Perry Engineering of Adelaide, but there were no drawings for the locomotives. While the search for a company to build the locomotives had been underway, Deebles plans for the new locomotives had gradually evolved. He had concluded that, as well as the 4-6-2 originally proposed, “the best plan would be to get a heavier type of engine 8-wheeled coupled that would be available for the southern express and for goods working.” At one point, Deeble had investigated purchasing a 4-8-0 locomotive that had originally been designed for the Benguella Railway in Africa. However, Deeble had decided that “on looking into the matter, having in view the necessity for designing a 4-6-2 for the other work, it appeared to me the best engine to adopt was the 4-8-2 which is almost universally used on the South African Railways. All the parts of each of these engines will closely correspond with the exception of the length of the boiler, but all the parts of the maintenance will be exact duplicates.”
The person chosen to turn Deeble’s concept into reality was Leslie Cecil Leslie, who had previously been the Chief Draftsman of the Commonwealth Railways. The T.G.R. did not have a locomotive draftsman, so L.C. Leslie was engaged to design the locomotives for a “fee of 2% on the contract price.” On the Tasmanian Government railways the locomotives would become the ‘Q’ class (4-8-2) and ‘R’ class (4-6-2).
The drawings for the new locomotives were completed in August 1920 and then reviewed by A.E. Smith, the Chief Mechanical Engineer of the Victorian Railways. The Tasmanian Minister for Railways then announced, in October 1920, that the first locomotive would be delivered from Perry Engineering (Adelaide)in nine months. Due to shortages of materials the first locomotive, Q1, was not shipped to Tasmania (in pieces) until July 1922, arriving in Launceston on the 31 July. It was then sent to the Launceston Railway Workshops for re-ection. Completed on the 18 August, the locomotive underwent its official trial trip between Launceston and Hobart, hauling a load of 220 tons, on the 21st, with both the Commissioner and Deeble on the footplate of the locomotive. A further two ‘Q’ class arrived in late October, followed by another two in January 1923. The last ‘Q’ class and the first ‘R’ class both arrived on the same ship in March 1923 and R1 underwent its trial trip on the 19th March. The rest of the R class followed.
When introduced, the ‘Q’ class engines were the most powerful non-articulated narrow gauge engines in Australia and the ‘Q’ class were the first locomotives with a 4-8-2 wheel arrangement in Australia.
William Rufus Deeble retired in 1923 from the position he had held since 1898. However, Deebles retirement had been planned for some time and his replacement, the manager of the Launceston Workshops, Harold Bruce Bennett, had been recruited by the T.G.R. in May 1922.
When the locomotive position again became a problem with extra traffic, and old and inefficient locomotives, more of Deeble’s Q class were ordered in small batches, each batch with further enhancements and they continued to be built until 1945, by which time nineteen had been delivered. Only four R class were delivered.
Deeble was elected as a Member of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (M.I.M.E.) in 1900. The seconder and one of his supporters were William Thow and Thomas Roberts, the Chief Mechanical Engineers of New South Wales and South Australia respectively. Deeble served as a member of the Australian Advisory Committee of the Institution from 1922 until he death. He was also a member of the American Master Mechanics Association. William Rufus Deeble died at New Town, Hobart, on 25 July 1936.
Summary: For the Chief Mechanical Engineer of a small and often impoverished railway, Deeble did not take the easy way out of using existing locomotive designs when seeking new locomotives. Deeble in two instances looked for innovative and often untried solutions to meet his needs. The risks were huge for such a small railway and in each the locomotives were successful. His final designs were unusual for an Australian railway with a consultant designing a very successful locomotive to his specifications. No other senior railway engineer was as innovative and took such risks with new design. He was truly the greatest locomotive engineer in Australia.
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