Talk:Lynton and Lynmouth Cliff Railway

Data

Might it be necessary if some information is added on how fast the train travels, and how long it takes for the train to go uphill and downhill? BrayLockBoy (talk) 17:47, 5 April 2014 (UTC)

It might be useful, if that information is available.I don't know where it could found though. Regards, Lynbarn (talk) 18:06, 5 April 2014 (UTC)

3ft 8in track gauge?

There is a discussion about the 3ft 8in? track gauge here. -DePiep (talk) 10:25, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

Arrangement of cables

Reference 2 states that the cars are attached to a single continuous cable that passes over pulleys at the top and bottom. But that is wrong. The photo on the Wikipedia page itself clearly shows two cable in each direction (up and down) from the car, not one, and the photo in reference 2 itself is good enough to show that the (two) cables terminate at the car rather than being continuous. I suspect the description as "continuous" is intended to convey, correctly, that the two cars are constrained to move in synchronisation rather than being independent.

(Historic photos displayed on-site do show only one cable each way, so at some point, they doubled up.)

I leave it to more experienced editors as to the correct protocol to follow in this situation. I cannot find another written source that describes the cable arrangement correctly. It is easy to ascertain the actual arrangement by visual inspection, but that is not a citable source. Is it better to stick with the available reference and give factually incorrect information, that, for good measure, is contradicted by the photo in the article? Or to give correct information but without a specific citation?

(Reference 2 is wrong in at least one other respect, too, albeit a minor one, in that the two foot bridges are not at the one-third and two-thirds points, as it states - they are both roughly at or below the half-way point.) Johnstoo (talk) 19:41, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

On the question of the cable - there were different arrangements at different times, which may be the cause of the confusion between the sources. If you look at the pre-1900 photograph in the article, you can see it is a single cable that extends above and below the cars - it has to be continuous. At some point they switched to two continuous cables - presumably as a failsafe in the event of one breaking. You can see this if you look at the top photograph in the article - the cables extend below the upcoming car. So I think we can update the article to reflect that it is a continuous cable arrangement, originally a single cable, now a double cable.

Re the overbridges - there are three, two below the passing loop and one above. I can clarify this in the text. The Mirror Cracked (talk) 19:58, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

Yes, we're getting there, thanks. But the cables are not continuous. They terminate on shackles at each end of the cars (this is a personal photo that shows this). "Continuous" could legitimately apply to the function of the cables but not to the physical arrangement. --Johnstoo (talk) 06:17, 9 October 2019 (UTC)

I have tried out another edit to this section. The contentious bit seemed to be whether the cables are continuous or not, and I think part of the problem there is different understandings of "continuous", so the best solution seems to be to word it in a way that conveys the same information without using the word "continuous" at all. I've also added the explanation of why the bottom cables exist at all, by linking to the place in the page "funicular" where this is already explained.Johnstoo (talk) 17:04, 12 October 2019 (UTC)

Passing bay or loop

The previous version said that there was a passing "loop" half way up. The thing that happens half way up is clearly not a passing "loop" which is a concept applicable to single track railways (and the link that was made to the Wikipedia page confirms this). I have tried passing "bay" but I'm not sure that's exactly right either. Does anyone know the correct technical term?--Johnstoo (talk) 17:12, 12 October 2019 (UTC)