Hawksworth County 4-6-0 from Rapido

[Bigmet]

The last 4-6-0 design from Swindon, which lacks a current standard model; inevitable that a brand would step in to provide a new version.
https://rapidotrains.co.uk/gwr-county-4-6-0/

[Mountain]

It is fascinating how GWR locomotives (Even those of a more unusual design) can be replicated purely due to the companies use of standard parts, and yes, the boilers of this loco may well have been built to an LMS "Design" but was it? As one of the main designers for the LMS learned his trade with the GWR and used many GWR design ideas on LMS locomotives such as the Black 5's which looked very much like a Castle had it not had external valve gear which the LMS preferred. (GWR always preferred internal valve gear as it gave extra protection being inside the frames, and only departed from this on their very last design which was a pannier built at the time they knew that the new British Railways were being formed, and they knew that BR generally were looking for the easiest lowest maintenance ways of producing locos. (Outside valve gear, though exposed, was easier to get at to oil the moving parts, but they did have the odd rare catastrophic failure when rods hit rods (Usually after having been bashed about) which the inside valve gear generally avoided... Unusually, despite adopting "Standard designs", so successful were the GWR Castles that they continued building them right up to the last days when BR had decided to abandon steam. I read many a GWR engine drivers and fireman's account in how they much preferred the Castles to anything else. They found the more powerful Kings to be harder to work as and only 3mph quicker at their top speed. (King was a 112mph machine while castles topped out at 109mph), mainly because the castles even when run flat out would use far less fuel and had a lovely ride. Is not surprising that the Castles took the worlds first regular express with timetabled booked speeds for 100mph running with the famous "Cheltenham Flyer" as they not only could do such speeds, but make up for lost time when doing it!
But yes. Is fascinating how different designs used parts of other designs. Even in BR days right through into privatization certain parts were salvaged and reused on "Brand new" trains. Things like instrument panels, pressure gauges, speedometer dials and things like that would obviously look old even though the loco itself was new! As the railways always have recycled what they could. Going back to the GWR, the most famous recycling of all were the 3800 class of "Dukedogs", and is something that modellers like me, who love to rebuild or repurpose them for many more years use love to do in our models. Gerald H comes to mind as the ultimate modeller to do this and a modeller I know on a narrow gauge site who comes up with all sorts of ideas on his lovely layout! But where the real railways are concerned, the truth is that they probably could not always afford to build a completely new loco unless they recycled a few older parts. And why scrap parts from disused locos which were salvagable?

[BHD]

Yes quite a bit of LMS influence on the 2nd County class. Aforesaid boiler, boiler and firebox stays and saddle - along with plate frames, from my poor recall.

Perhaps most unusual was Hawksworth's tender, which used the Stanier 8F tender chassis and was also seen with the BR-built Castles.

On a controversial/conversational note, Stanier's Duchesses are oft-quoted as the final development of the GWR 4-Cylinder family !.

Looking forward to the Rapido version without the flaky Dapol ringfield mechanism.

[Bigmet]

...On a controversial/conversational note, Stanier's Duchesses are oft-quoted as the final development of the GWR 4-Cylinder family...

One step back first! The Princess Royal was clearly a hybrid of previous work by Fowler and Hughes, mostly at the rear, and the King, mostly up front. But from entry into service the development of this class trended away from Swindon's practise, which was inadequate to deliver the LMS operation's power requirements.

And this development was insufficient, such that a few years later a clean sheet pacific design was worked up and put into service, with no greater relation to Swindon's King than being a four cylinder six coupled express class. If there was outside influence it came from elsewhere, Chapelon's ideas of adequate internal steam passages and valve events, and the use of much higher superheater:grate ratios, first proven in the UK on the GNR large atlantic, both of which were immediately demonstrated to be effective when the A4s went into service and proved 'rather speedy'.