Rainhill Trials
The Rainhill Trials end with Rocket as the only locomotive to complete the test
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Original prompt & settings (JSON) ↗Rocket's own endurance run had happened six days earlier. It won on the 14th because every remaining challenger failed, withdrew, or was refused another attempt.
The last day at Rainhill
On 14 October 1829, the final day of the trials, Novelty's repaired apparatus failed again: a flue collapsed, steam pressure was lost, and its builders John Braithwaite and John Ericsson withdrew it.
Timothy Hackworth asked the judges for another trial for Sans Pareil, and was refused.
Perseverance could manage only about five miles per hour without a train, after which Timothy Burstall withdrew it too.
Not a race — an endurance test
Rainhill was a controlled test of load, speed, fuel consumption, smoke, weight, safety and reliability: twenty runs representing approximately 70 miles, separated by refuelling, over a short level course whose full-speed section was 1.5 miles.
Rocket had completed its measured test on 8 October, averaging 13.4 mph over the first half and 14.2 mph over the second.
The Liverpool and Manchester Railway's directors were using it to decide between self-propelled locomotives and fixed winding engines, with £500 advertised as the prize.
Winner on the day, prize weeks later
Rocket was left as the only entrant to have completed the prescribed trial without incident, and once the field had collapsed it ran back and forth in a demonstration reported at up to 35 mph.
The railway abandoned the plan to use fixed engines on the main route and ordered seven more Rocket-type locomotives from Robert Stephenson's firm.
A contemporary newspaper report reprinted by Tring Local History Museum says the directors adjudged the £500 prize on Tuesday 27 October, after receiving the judges' report — so 14 October is the competitive result, not the formal award.
Sources
Researched 24 Aug 2026 4 sources not yet audited Date disputed
How this was checked
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Date disputed. Sources disagree about when this happened.
What the sources leave uncertain
- October 14 is securely documented as the final trial day and the day Rocket became the uncontested practical winner.
- The exact formal-award date is less secure. A contemporary newspaper report reprinted by Tring Local History Museum says the directors adjudged the £500 prize on Tuesday, October 27, after receiving the judges' report. Therefore 'Rocket wins on October 14' describes the competitive result, not necessarily the board's formal award.
- Accounts differ over whether Novelty's final failure was a flue collapse or failed sealing at recently repaired joints; both agree that it lost pressure and withdrew.