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Hibernia was a steam locomotive designed by Richard Roberts and built by Sharp, Roberts and Company in 1834 for the Dublin and Kingstown Railway (D&KR). The locomotive had vertical cylinders driving via bell cranks.
The D&KR left it until August 1833 before inviting nine firms to tender for 6 identical engines to enable part swapping to be delivered by 1 May 1834, the seven firms replying indicating timescales were short given the infancy of locomotive engineering with manufacturers on a steep learning curve. The D&KR engaged John Urpeth Rastrick who had been judge at the 1830 Rainhill Trials to visit the manufacturers. Rastrick visited six as well as the L&MR works and delivered to board a specification which strongly matched the L&MR No. 32 Experiment from Sharp, Roberts and Co. D&KR's Bergin visited the L&MR and expressed concerns over Experiment's unique features, vibrations and fuel consumption. The D&KR's consultant engineer Charles Blacker Vignoles was particularly concerned with the vertical mounting of the cylinders. A D&KR committee then re-worded the specification to give firms more opportunity to submit their preferred design. [2]
With time running short the D&KR were forced to order from suppliers most likely to be able to deliver within the required timescale. They eventually order three from Sharp, Roberts and Co., the first of which would be Hibernia, the other two being Britannia and Manchester. Three were also ordered from George Forrester and Company's Vauxhall foundry at Liverpool based on their Swiftsure locomotive that were to become Vauxhall, Dublin and Kingstown. [3] [lower-alpha 2]
Hibernia was completed in 1834 and was to be followed by her class sisters. Power transmission from the vertical cylinders was via bell cranks. [4]
The engine was expected to be able to haul a train of 60 to 80 tons in weight at 20 miles per hour (32 km/h). [5]
For delivery Hibernia made her way from the Manufacture at Manchester to Liverpool under her own steam. She was transported by the City of Dublin Steam Packet Company at a cost of £21 plus for £7/10/- for the tender with Forresters' Vauxhall on the same sailing. At Dublin they were taken through the streets on a temporary "portable railway" before 50 men hauled them up to rail level at Westland Row. [6]
The L&MR permitted the locomotives to be tested on their line before being shipped to Ireland. In Ireland an "engine hospital" had been set up at Serpentine avenue to allow for their maintenance. [6]
on 9 October 1834 Hibernia hauled a train of eight carriages which was the first to traverse the complete length of the line carrying members of the public. [7] While this was the first trial to traverse the length of the line from Westland Row to Salthill the locomotive Vauxhall had done a shorter trial run with a small train from Dublin to the Martello Tower at Williamstown which is now part of Blackrock Park. [8]
In a test run on 1 November 1834 running with just the engine and tender Hibernia was claimed to have achieved a maximum speed of 60 miles per hour (97 km/h) over 0.25 miles (0.40 km) by Charles Blacker Vignoles. [9]
The design is assessed in ( Lyons 2015 , p. 81) as not being a great success. Lyons suggests the issue may have been the use of piston valves rather than the bell crank transmission. The vertical cylinders caused considerable pounding resulting in damage to the locomotives axles and springs; significant damage was also caused to the track with rail fractures and subsidence being noted. [1]
Hibernia was withdrawn after blowing up at Kingstown in 1842. The two sister engines Britannia and Manchester were also withdrawn. [10]
An O Gauge model of Hibernia built by Cyril Fry exists in the Fry Model Collection along with examples of its associated carriages.
The Rainhill trials was an important competition run from the 6 to 14 October 1829, to test George Stephenson's argument that locomotives would have the best motive power for the then nearly-completed Liverpool and Manchester Railway (L&MR). Ten locomotives were entered, of which five were able to compete, running along a 1 mile (1.6 km) length of level track at Rainhill, in Lancashire.
Stephenson's Rocket is an early steam locomotive of 0-2-2 wheel arrangement. It was built for and won the Rainhill Trials of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway (L&MR), held in October 1829 to show that improved locomotives would be more efficient than stationary steam engines.
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The Dublin and South Eastern Railway (DSER), often referred to as the Slow and Easy, was an Irish gauge railway in Ireland from 1846 to 1925. It carried 4,626,226 passengers in 1911. It was the fourth largest railway operation in Ireland operating a main line from Dublin to Wexford, with branch lines to Shillelagh and Waterford. The company previously traded under the names Waterford, Wexford, Wicklow & Dublin Railway to 1848, Dublin and Wicklow Raillway (D&WR) to 1860 and Dublin, Wicklow and Wexford Railway (DW&WR) until 1906.
Novelty was an early steam locomotive built by John Ericsson and John Braithwaite to take part in the Rainhill Trials in 1829.
Sharp, Stewart and Company was a steam locomotive manufacturer, initially located in Manchester, England. The company was formed in 1843 upon the demise of Sharp, Roberts & Co.. It moved to Glasgow, Scotland, in 1888, eventually amalgamating with two other Glaswegian locomotive manufacturers to form the North British Locomotive Company.
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The Dublin and Kingstown Railway (D&KR), which opened in 1834, was Ireland's first passenger railway. It linked Westland Row in Dublin with Kingstown Harbour in County Dublin.
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Alexander Allan was a Scottish mechanical engineer. He was born at Montrose, Angus, in 1809 and died at Scarborough, Yorkshire on 2 June 1891.
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Star was a locomotive designed by Isaac Dodds of the 2-2-0 configuration and built in 1833 at the Horsley Coal & Iron Company, Tipton, Birmingham, England. Despite rebuilds it was never a successful engine and was scrapped in 1840.
Burgoyne was the class lead for a set of four locomotives built by the Dublin and Kingstown Railway (D&KR) in their own Grand Canal Street works from 1845.
William Fernihough was locomotive superintendent of the Eastern Counties Railway (ECR) from 1843 to 1845. He is noted for his work on the balancing of railway engines in particular the counterbalanced driving wheel
Thomas Fleming Bergin was an Irish civil engineer and early Irish railway official. He was the Company Clerk of the Dublin and Kingstown Railway (D&KR), the first public railway in Ireland. He was also responsible for the design of the Bergin Patent Spring Buffer, the buffering system that it used.