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Edward Woods (engineer)
Encyclopedia
Edward Woods was a British
civil engineer
.
Woods was born in London
on 28 April 1814, the son of Samuel Woods, a merchant
. After education at private school
s, and some training at Bristol
, he became in 1834 an assistant to John Dixon, recently appointed chief engineer of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway
. Woods was placed in charge of the section, 15 miles in length, between Liverpool
and Newton-le-Willows
, including Wapping Tunnel
, then under construction, between Crown Street
and Park Lane
goods stations; and in 1836 he succeeded Dixon as chief engineer, taking also charge of the mechanical department. The Liverpool and Manchester railway was amalgamated with the Grand Junction Railway
in 1845. Woods remained until the end of 1852 in charge of the works appertaining to the Liverpool and Manchester section, including the construction of the Victoria Tunnel
(completed 1848) between Edge Hill station and the docks, a large goods station adjoining the West Waterloo Dock
, and a line between Patricroft
and Clifton
, opened in 1850. In 1853 he established himself in London as a consulting engineer.
due to condensation in the long pipes conveying steam a quarter of a mile to the winding engine
s used for hauling trains through the Edge Hill tunnel, the gradient
of which was then considered too steep for locomotives. He was a member of a committee appointed by the British Association in 1837 to report on the resistance
of railway trains. In 1838 he presented to the Institution of Civil Engineers
a paper ‘On Certain Forms of Locomotive Engines,’ which contains some of the earliest accurate details of the working of locomotive
s, and for which he was awarded a Telford Medal
. The consumption of fuel in locomotives was the subject of a paper presented by him to the Liverpool Polytechnic Society in 1843 (published in 1844), and of a contribution to a new edition of Tredgold's ‘Steam Engine’ in 1850.
In 1853 Woods carried out, with W. P. Marshall, some experiments on the locomotives of the London and North Western Railway
, between London
and Rugby
, and three joint reports were made to the general locomotive committee of the railway, recommending certain weights and dimensions for various classes of engines. These were followed, in 1854, by a joint report on the use of coal
as a substitute for coke
, which had been used hitherto.
, including the Central Argentine Railway
, the Copiapo
extension, Santiago
and Valparaiso
, and Coquimbo
railways in Chile
, and the Mollenda-Arequipa
and Callao
-Oroya
lines in Peru
. He was responsible not only for surveys
and construction
, but also for the design of rolling stock
to meet the somewhat special conditions. Other engineering work included a wrought-iron pier
, 2400 feet long, built in 1851 on screw piles at Pisco
on the coast of Peru, and a quay-wall built at Bilbao
in 1877.
In the ‘battle of the gauges’
he favoured the Irish gauge (5 feet 3 inches) or the Indian gauge (5 feet 6 inches). He regarded break of gauge as a mistake.
on 7 April 1846, he became a member of its council in December 1869, and was president between November 1886 and November 1887. His presidential address contains much information as to the early history of railways. In 1884 he was president of the Smeatonian Society of Civil Engineers.
, Buckinghamshire
. His portrait in oils, by Miss Porter, is in the possession of the Institution of Civil Engineers.
He married in 1840 Mary, daughter of Thomas Goodman of Birmingham, by whom he had three sons and two daughters.
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
civil engineer
Civil engineer
A civil engineer is a person who practices civil engineering; the application of planning, designing, constructing, maintaining, and operating infrastructures while protecting the public and environmental health, as well as improving existing infrastructures that have been neglected.Originally, a...
.
Early life and career
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
on 28 April 1814, the son of Samuel Woods, a merchant
Merchant
A merchant is a businessperson who trades in commodities that were produced by others, in order to earn a profit.Merchants can be one of two types:# A wholesale merchant operates in the chain between producer and retail merchant...
. After education at private school
Private school
Private schools, also known as independent schools or nonstate schools, are not administered by local, state or national governments; thus, they retain the right to select their students and are funded in whole or in part by charging their students' tuition, rather than relying on mandatory...
s, and some training at Bristol
Bristol
Bristol is a city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, with an estimated population of 433,100 for the unitary authority in 2009, and a surrounding Larger Urban Zone with an estimated 1,070,000 residents in 2007...
, he became in 1834 an assistant to John Dixon, recently appointed chief engineer of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway
Liverpool and Manchester Railway
The Liverpool and Manchester Railway was the world's first inter-city passenger railway in which all the trains were timetabled and were hauled for most of the distance solely by steam locomotives. The line opened on 15 September 1830 and ran between the cities of Liverpool and Manchester in North...
. Woods was placed in charge of the section, 15 miles in length, between Liverpool
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...
and Newton-le-Willows
Newton-le-Willows
Newton-le-Willows is a small market town within the Metropolitan Borough of St Helens, in Merseyside, England. Historically a part of Lancashire, it is situated about midway between the cities of Manchester and Liverpool, to the east of St Helens, to the north of Warrington and to the south of...
, including Wapping Tunnel
Wapping Tunnel
Wapping or Edge Hill Tunnel in Liverpool, England, was constructed to enable goods services to operate between Liverpool docks and Manchester, and all points between, as part of the planned Liverpool and Manchester Railway. It was the first tunnel in the world to be bored under a metropolis...
, then under construction, between Crown Street
Crown Street railway station
Crown Street Station was located on Crown Street, Liverpool, England. The station opened on 15 September 1830 as the Liverpool passenger terminus of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, the world's first public passenger line...
and Park Lane
Park Lane railway goods station
Park Lane was the world's first goods terminus on the Liverpool and Manchester Railway serving the south end Liverpool Docks. The station was opened in 1830. Its initial name was Wapping Station...
goods stations; and in 1836 he succeeded Dixon as chief engineer, taking also charge of the mechanical department. The Liverpool and Manchester railway was amalgamated with the Grand Junction Railway
Grand Junction Railway
The Grand Junction Railway was an early railway company in the United Kingdom, which existed between 1833 and 1846 when it was merged into the London and North Western Railway...
in 1845. Woods remained until the end of 1852 in charge of the works appertaining to the Liverpool and Manchester section, including the construction of the Victoria Tunnel
Victoria Tunnel (Liverpool)
-History:The Victoria Tunnel in Liverpool, England is a 2,475 metre long rail tunnel. Opened in 1849, its eastern portal is adjacent to Edge Hill station. The western end opens into a short cutting, between Byrom Street and Fontenoy Street, the short Waterloo Tunnel exits the cutting terminating...
(completed 1848) between Edge Hill station and the docks, a large goods station adjoining the West Waterloo Dock
West Waterloo Dock
West Waterloo Dock is a dock on the River Mersey, England and part of the Port of Liverpool. It is situated in the northern dock system in Vauxhall and connected to Princes Half Tide Dock to the south...
, and a line between Patricroft
Patricroft
Patricroft is a district of Eccles, England, within the historic county boundaries of Lancashire.-History:Patricroft may derive its name from 'Pear-tree croft', or more likely, 'Patrick's Croft'. In 1836, James Nasmyth, in partnership with Holbrook Gaskell, built the Bridgewater Foundry in...
and Clifton
Clifton, Cumbria
Clifton is a small linear village and civil parish south east of Penrith in Cumbria, England.-History and geography:The civil parish of Clifton has its western boundary defined by the River Lowther, to the north and east lie the civil parishes of Brougham and Great Strickland, to the south is the...
, opened in 1850. In 1853 he established himself in London as a consulting engineer.
Academic works
During his eighteen years' work on the Liverpool and Manchester line Woods took a prominent part in various early experimental investigations into the working of railways. In 1836 he made observations on the waste of fuelFuel efficiency
Fuel efficiency is a form of thermal efficiency, meaning the efficiency of a process that converts chemical potential energy contained in a carrier fuel into kinetic energy or work. Overall fuel efficiency may vary per device, which in turn may vary per application, and this spectrum of variance is...
due to condensation in the long pipes conveying steam a quarter of a mile to the winding engine
Winding engine
A winding engine is a stationary engine used to control a cable, for example to power a mining hoist at a pit head. Electric hoist controllers have replaced proper winding engines in modern mining, but use electric motors that are also traditionally referred to as winding engines.Most proper...
s used for hauling trains through the Edge Hill tunnel, the gradient
Gradient
In vector calculus, the gradient of a scalar field is a vector field that points in the direction of the greatest rate of increase of the scalar field, and whose magnitude is the greatest rate of change....
of which was then considered too steep for locomotives. He was a member of a committee appointed by the British Association in 1837 to report on the resistance
Friction
Friction is the force resisting the relative motion of solid surfaces, fluid layers, and/or material elements sliding against each other. There are several types of friction:...
of railway trains. In 1838 he presented to the Institution of Civil Engineers
Institution of Civil Engineers
Founded on 2 January 1818, the Institution of Civil Engineers is an independent professional association, based in central London, representing civil engineering. Like its early membership, the majority of its current members are British engineers, but it also has members in more than 150...
a paper ‘On Certain Forms of Locomotive Engines,’ which contains some of the earliest accurate details of the working of locomotive
Locomotive
A locomotive is a railway vehicle that provides the motive power for a train. The word originates from the Latin loco – "from a place", ablative of locus, "place" + Medieval Latin motivus, "causing motion", and is a shortened form of the term locomotive engine, first used in the early 19th...
s, and for which he was awarded a Telford Medal
Telford Medal
The Telford Medal is the highest prize awarded by the British Institution of Civil Engineers for a paper, or series of papers, in the field of engineering. It was introduced in 1835 following a bequest made by Thomas Telford, the ICE's first president....
. The consumption of fuel in locomotives was the subject of a paper presented by him to the Liverpool Polytechnic Society in 1843 (published in 1844), and of a contribution to a new edition of Tredgold's ‘Steam Engine’ in 1850.
In 1853 Woods carried out, with W. P. Marshall, some experiments on the locomotives of the London and North Western Railway
London and North Western Railway
The London and North Western Railway was a British railway company between 1846 and 1922. It was created by the merger of three companies – the Grand Junction Railway, the London and Birmingham Railway and the Manchester and Birmingham Railway...
, between London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
and Rugby
Rugby, Warwickshire
Rugby is a market town in Warwickshire, England, located on the River Avon. The town has a population of 61,988 making it the second largest town in the county...
, and three joint reports were made to the general locomotive committee of the railway, recommending certain weights and dimensions for various classes of engines. These were followed, in 1854, by a joint report on the use of coal
Coal
Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock usually occurring in rock strata in layers or veins called coal beds or coal seams. The harder forms, such as anthracite coal, can be regarded as metamorphic rock because of later exposure to elevated temperature and pressure...
as a substitute for coke
Coke (fuel)
Coke is the solid carbonaceous material derived from destructive distillation of low-ash, low-sulfur bituminous coal. Cokes from coal are grey, hard, and porous. While coke can be formed naturally, the commonly used form is man-made.- History :...
, which had been used hitherto.
Work in South America
From 1854 onwards his practice was chiefly connected with the railways of South AmericaSouth America
South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...
, including the Central Argentine Railway
Central Argentine Railway
The Central Argentine Railway was one of the Big Four broad gauge, , British-owned companies that built and operated railway networks in Argentina...
, the Copiapo
Copiapó
Copiapó is a city in northern Chile, located about 40 miles east of the coastal town of Caldera. Founded on December 8, 1744, it is the capital of Copiapó Province and Atacama Region....
extension, Santiago
Santiago, Chile
Santiago , also known as Santiago de Chile, is the capital and largest city of Chile, and the center of its largest conurbation . It is located in the country's central valley, at an elevation of above mean sea level...
and Valparaiso
Valparaíso
Valparaíso is a city and commune of Chile, center of its third largest conurbation and one of the country's most important seaports and an increasing cultural center in the Southwest Pacific hemisphere. The city is the capital of the Valparaíso Province and the Valparaíso Region...
, and Coquimbo
Coquimbo
Coquimbo is a port city, commune and capital of the Elqui Province, located on the Pan-American Highway, in the Coquimbo Region of Chile. Coquimbo lies in a valley south of La Serena, with which it forms Greater La Serena with more than 400,000 inhabitants. The commune spans an area around the...
railways in Chile
Chile
Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...
, and the Mollenda-Arequipa
Arequipa
Arequipa is the capital city of the Arequipa Region in southern Peru. With a population of 836,859 it is the second most populous city of the country...
and Callao
Callao
Callao is the largest and most important port in Peru. The city is coterminous with the Constitutional Province of Callao, the only province of the Callao Region. Callao is located west of Lima, the country's capital, and is part of the Lima Metropolitan Area, a large metropolis that holds almost...
-Oroya
Oroya
Oroya is a genus of cacti , originating from Peru....
lines in Peru
Peru
Peru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean....
. He was responsible not only for surveys
Surveying
See Also: Public Land Survey SystemSurveying or land surveying is the technique, profession, and science of accurately determining the terrestrial or three-dimensional position of points and the distances and angles between them...
and construction
Construction
In the fields of architecture and civil engineering, construction is a process that consists of the building or assembling of infrastructure. Far from being a single activity, large scale construction is a feat of human multitasking...
, but also for the design of rolling stock
Rolling stock
Rolling stock comprises all the vehicles that move on a railway. It usually includes both powered and unpowered vehicles, for example locomotives, railroad cars, coaches and wagons...
to meet the somewhat special conditions. Other engineering work included a wrought-iron pier
Pier
A pier is a raised structure, including bridge and building supports and walkways, over water, typically supported by widely spread piles or pillars...
, 2400 feet long, built in 1851 on screw piles at Pisco
Pisco, Peru
Pisco is a city located in the Ica Region of Peru, the capital of the Pisco Province. The city is around 9 metres above sea level. Originally the villa of Pisco was founded in 1640, close to the indigenous emplacement of the same name...
on the coast of Peru, and a quay-wall built at Bilbao
Bilbao
Bilbao ) is a Spanish municipality, capital of the province of Biscay, in the autonomous community of the Basque Country. With a population of 353,187 , it is the largest city of its autonomous community and the tenth largest in Spain...
in 1877.
In the ‘battle of the gauges’
Rail gauge
Track gauge or rail gauge is the distance between the inner sides of the heads of the two load bearing rails that make up a single railway line. Sixty percent of the world's railways use a standard gauge of . Wider gauges are called broad gauge; smaller gauges, narrow gauge. Break-of-gauge refers...
he favoured the Irish gauge (5 feet 3 inches) or the Indian gauge (5 feet 6 inches). He regarded break of gauge as a mistake.
Professional institutions
In 1877, as president of the mechanical science section of the British Association, he delivered an address on ‘Adequate Brake Power for Railway Trains.’ Elected a member of the Institution of Civil EngineersInstitution of Civil Engineers
Founded on 2 January 1818, the Institution of Civil Engineers is an independent professional association, based in central London, representing civil engineering. Like its early membership, the majority of its current members are British engineers, but it also has members in more than 150...
on 7 April 1846, he became a member of its council in December 1869, and was president between November 1886 and November 1887. His presidential address contains much information as to the early history of railways. In 1884 he was president of the Smeatonian Society of Civil Engineers.
Later life
He died at his residence, 45 Onslow Gardens, London, on 14 June 1903, and was buried at CheniesChenies
Chenies is a village in the very eastern part of south Buckinghamshire, England, near the border with Hertfordshire. It is situated to the east of Chesham and the Chalfonts. Chenies is also a civil parish within Chiltern district....
, Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan home county in South East England. The county town is Aylesbury, the largest town in the ceremonial county is Milton Keynes and largest town in the non-metropolitan county is High Wycombe....
. His portrait in oils, by Miss Porter, is in the possession of the Institution of Civil Engineers.
He married in 1840 Mary, daughter of Thomas Goodman of Birmingham, by whom he had three sons and two daughters.