Three Litre
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Post by Three Litre on Jan 22, 2020 12:36:30 GMT
Yes I've driven 60s, when I worked for EWS before jumping ship to Freightliner in 2006. Of the hundred built I think I drove about half of them. Lovely locos but the cabs are rather small! We used to have one on a regular early morning job, book on at Rugby at 03.40 and relieve the Peak Forest - Bletchley stone in the station, it nearly always ran via Kilsby (known to us as 'the old line' as it was the original 1838 mainline out of Euston before the Northampton loop was built) so you'd get a good run and build up speed to 60mph before crossing over to the slow lines at Hanslope Junction. If you had a green when relieving it at Rugby you'd just open the throttle all the way back and enjoy the deep, warm rumble of the engine until shutting off at Watford Gap alongside the M1, once across Hanslope Jcn you wouldn't need to touch the brake until you got two yellows on the approach to Bletchley. After backing the train into the yard it was feet up for a few hours, read a book or some car magazines and drink copious amounts of tea until it was time to take the empties back to Rugby where a Crewe man would take over. I now go to Toton quite a lot and see the rows of dead 60s rotting away, they're scattered about all over the place there and some have trees and bushes growing in them. Such a waste really, but I was happy to see a freshly repainted one there last week, in a mid shade of blue with a logo on the side saying 'Cappagh', whoever they are! Meant to say in my last post, I was on a ballast job down the Midland Mainline on Saturday and my 66 failed spectacularly whilst on full power, there was a god awful metallic scraping sound, a huge bang and everything went strangely silent - the crankcase pressure sensor went off and the engine dumped it's oil in the four foot, much the same as happened at Bedford last year..! It was two and a half hours before my mate turned up with a rescue loco to tow me back towards Leicester.... Villain Good old Greenflag Villain! Did they check if you were a vulnerable person?
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Sparky
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Post by Sparky on Jan 22, 2020 13:38:30 GMT
My mother lives close to Toton and I often have a wander over to the bank on a Sunday. It is sad to see all the 60s stood there - many have been there for quite a while.
There were two Class 58s close to the back - I gather one is going back on the main line and the other providing spares. I gather some of the "better" 60s are being put back on the main line - sold to another operator?
If I remember, Freightliner used to have quite a bit of variety amongst it's stock - 56s, 66s, 70s, 86s, 90s etc - always quite a range out and about.
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Three Litre
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Post by Three Litre on Jan 22, 2020 13:44:22 GMT
I heard something on the radio the other day saying that our railways are poor in comparison to France and Germany.
Sounds likely as I suspect they invested more.
Anyone have any views on this?
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Villain
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Post by Villain on Jan 22, 2020 14:49:09 GMT
I heard something on the radio the other day saying that our railways are poor in comparison to France and Germany. Sounds likely as I suspect they invested more. Anyone have any views on this? The problem with comparing UK railways with European ones is that it's often overlooked that they're just as fragmented as ours are. When the subject of our national network rears its head someone usually says ''yeah but the French have had their TGV and the Japanese have had their bullet trains for decades, why can't our routes be just like that?'', without realising or accepting that they were built as a dedicated stand alone routes which don't have slow moving heavy freight getting in their way. A similar thing applies to our own Chiltern route from Banbury to Marylebone, it's consistently cited as a good performer but it doesn't have the added problems and congestion of slower traffic competing for train paths, it's pretty much a self contained bit of railway. You have to take a step back and look at the overall picture with regard to the UK network - we live on a relatively small island, London to Glasgow is only 400 miles, London to Penzance is just over 300 miles, on the continent the distances traversed by freight and passenger are often vast in comparison so it's much easier to maintain higher running speeds between stops. The problem with investment in this country is that it is often done only as a short term thing with too many changes of direction, for instance, the massive Modernisation Plan of 1955 which started well was kyboshed by a lack of joined up thinking and subsequent U- turns by governments of 'both flavours'. The rush to dieselise and electrify the entire country was not helped by the decision to build a thousand new steam locos alongside the newer traction and by the Beeching report of 1963 (these new steam locos were supposed to be in service until at least 1980 but recruiting people to shovel eight tons of coal per shift was becoming a problem as it was much easier to walk into a job in a car factory for decent wages at the time). It proposed ripping up many of the secondary, branch and cross country routes that huge numbers of new locos and rolling stock were being built for in the first place, leaving BR with thousands of little used and often very unreliable machinery going for scrap with little mileage under their belts. Because of the political situation after the war it was thought prudent to spread as much of the building contracts around the country as possible using several different firms, this resulted in lots of non standard and incompatible machinery being built under licence with a massive variation in quality and usefulness, some of these firms went out of business as they were building locos leaving BR unable to procure spares and knowledge top keep the new fleets in traffic. The Beeching report also recommended closing the entire Great Central route which had only been finished sixty years before, and the Midland Mainline between Leicester and St.Pancras with the intention of electrifying the short branch from there to Rugby and diverting all the Midland traffic into an already overcrowded Euston. St.Pancras was due to be demolished in 1966 but thankfully it was saved. Bizarrely, the report completely overlooked the fact that the Leicester - Rugby branch had been closed and mostly lifted the year before it was published..! Villain
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Sparky
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Post by Sparky on Jan 22, 2020 16:00:46 GMT
I heard something on the radio the other day saying that our railways are poor in comparison to France and Germany. Sounds likely as I suspect they invested more. Anyone have any views on this? Is it right in saying that trains are shorter so they can cram more services in?
I've noticed there seem to be more signalling problems around Sheffield / Derby since their power signal boxes were closed and control switched to the new computer control rooms. Electronic teething troubles.....
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Cartman
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Post by Cartman on Jan 22, 2020 21:29:59 GMT
Good point in self contained routes, Villain. The Manchester Victoria to Bury line I used for years was virtually self contained, there were no branches off it at all after Queens Road at the Manchester end and no freight traffic on it, as a result it was fantastically reliable.
On the modernisation plan, I've heard it was one of the reasons why the treasury stopped trusting BR with large amounts of money because they wasted a lot of it on this. It really just updated the railway as it stood in 1955 and didn't look at possible future development. Goods wagons without continuous brakes continued for years afterwards and top many unsuccessful diesel types were added, Metrovick class 28,the NBL type 2s and Clayton type 1s spring to mind. Also, they built the big marshaling yards at Kingmoor and Tinsley, just as wagonload traffic was phasing out.
It's sometimes forgotten that the continental railways hung onto steam longer than we did, West Germany and France ran them until 1977, and managed the changeover to modern traction more gradually, saving money.
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Three Litre
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Post by Three Litre on Jan 22, 2020 21:37:46 GMT
As for HS2, doesn't sound like a good way to spend £106bn. Improve some of the northern infrastructure that needs investment.
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Villain
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Post by Villain on Jan 23, 2020 12:13:32 GMT
As for HS2, doesn't sound like a good way to spend £106bn. Improve some of the northern infrastructure that needs investment. The biggest problem with HS2 is the way it's being promoted as a high speed line when it should really be pushed forward on the issue of capacity - I drive trains on the WCML, MML and part of the 'northern' route out of Paddington through Oxford and Banbury to Birmingham, they are all in need of more capacity (train paths) but widening the routes and adding additional lines is just not physically possible for the most part, this is why HS2 is needed, it will allow the faster trains on the other routes to use it, thus freeing up paths for a better pattern of services for freight and passenger on these older routes. It's less than ten years since the Trent Valley route north of Tamworth was quadrupled and it's already pretty much at its full capacity. Making the trains go faster is all very well, but this requires longer sections between signals which actually cuts down the number of paths available per hour. Even going over budget, HS2 will still be cheaper in the long run than attempting to add / widen more lines on the existing routes radiating north from London. With the massive growth in population we're seeing I have no doubts at all that long after everyone on this forum is six foot underground 'HS3' will be needed at some point. Oh and yes, I agree on the northern investment, which would also benefit from HS2s ability to provide better services towards northern destinations. Villain
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Sparky
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Post by Sparky on Jan 23, 2020 12:24:04 GMT
It's sometimes forgotten that the continental railways hung onto steam longer than we did, West Germany and France ran them until 1977, and managed the changeover to modern traction more gradually, saving money. Many of the Diesels that replaced our steam locos had a very short lifespan. I remember a trip past Vic Berry's scrap yard around 1983/4 is, and there were literally 100s of Cabs from Class 20s, 24 & 25s, 31s stacked for scrap. During August 1985, I was at Derby with my Brother - and a Convoy was hauled through going for scrap. That had about another 10 Class 25s and a couple of Peaks on there.
OK, it can be argued that the Class 44s, 23s, 52s, 41,42 & 43 "Warship" were all non standard, so were sadly retired earlier. Even though - many of them had only been in service for a decade.
Ironically, in 1976, the HST was brought in as a stop gap - and that became our saviour!
I was out and out against HS2 due to it's costs, though Villians explanation on why it's needed has swayed me. Though - he's right, how long will it be before that is at capacity, and we then need HS3?
The answer to solve the traffic issues on the Motorway is to add an extra lane.....that never has worked.
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Sparky
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Post by Sparky on Jan 24, 2020 10:02:04 GMT
Some pictures....
Thanks to my Father in Law for this photo!
This is 40126, AKA D326 the loco that was involved in the Gt Train Robbery in 1963. In 1963, it would have been in Green. It is pictured here at Doncaster Works on 08/04/84 - shortly before it was cut up for scrap.
On 28/07/07, we had a trip out and about on a Rail Rover, and somehow ended up at Carlisle. Here's 40145 just outshopped after having new paintwork. You aren't at the controls are you Villian?
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