Gresley was sure that steam could do equally well with a decent fare-paying load behind the locomotive. Following trials in 1935 in which one of his A3 Pacifics No.2750 "Papyrus" recorded a new maximum of and completed the journey in under four hours, the LNER's Chief General Manager Ralph Wedgwood authorised Gresley to produce a streamlined development of the A3. Initially four locomotives were built, all with the word 'silver' in their names. The first was 2509 "Silver Link", followed by 2510 "Quicksilver", 2511 "Silver King" and 2512 "Silver Fox". During a press run to publicise the service, "Silver Link" twice achieved a speed of , breaking the British speed record and sustained an average of , over a distance of .