Friday 02/06/78
50033 1756 Reading – Paddington
47158 2300 Liverpool Street – Ipswich (continued tomorrow …)
Saturday 02/06/79
A summer Saturday in Yorkshire. Usually it would be a case of “So many trains, so little time” but this morning I started late, and there didn’t seem to be a lot on offer, until the 0900 Chesterfield – Scarborough arrived:
37082 1045 York – Scarborough
At Scarborough my plan was to board the 1240 Scarborough – Leicester behind 46033, which did the line via Beverley then the Hull Avoider. However I overheard the station supervisor saying to a colleague “It’s 41 minutes late. They say there’s a pair of Type 1s on it.” The train concerned was the 1031 Hull – Scarborough – normally a DMU turn. One of the 20s on it had suffered a bogie fire en route, so the crew had stopped and doused the flames, then continued. At Scarborough it entered the platform very slowly, as they had requested a platform where they could work on the loco, but it had been routed into a bay platform with platform faces at both sides. I was on tenterhooks to see whether or not the locos would work back – I’d never had any class 20s for haulage, and I’d never done the Hull – Scarborough line with anything. Eventually both the 20s were pronounced healthy, and after the resident 03 had shunted the stock, it formed:
20092 + 20131 1402 Scarborough – Hull (all stations)
The rest of the day was an anticlimax.
DMU Hull – Selby
There I waited for the 1405 Kings Cross – York, which was 55021 (or so I was led to believe)…
47404 1645 Selby – York (25’ late having replaced 55021 at Doncaster - cheers).
Wednesday 02/06/82
More Pontificating – this time the Pope is in Cardiff, and 40148 had worked down the Marches on an additional service. Also, some of the Barry Island services were being loco hauled (for reasons that escape me, possibly due to the DMUs being used for Pope shuttles?).
43141 + 43142 1510 Paddington – Cardiff
37295 1825 Cardiff – Barry Island
37295 2005 Barry Island – Cardiff
40148 2110 Cardiff – Crewe
It was a lovely warm evening, and 40148 was in charge of 10 mk 1 coaches, and it was in top form. The train was 50 minutes late start, waiting drivers (there were 5 of them in the cab leaving Cardiff). We had a crew change at Newport, then set off up the Marches, destination unknown!
- The Western Region Special Traffic Notice showed the train terminating at Craven Arms
- The London Midland Special Traffic Notice showed the train terminating at Shrewsbury
- The Public timetable supplement showed it as a through train to Holyhead
On arrival at Shrewsbury the train “terminated”, and the Ebbw Junction men were relieved by Bescot men taking the ECS to Oxley carriage sidings. This is where we opened negotiations with the Shrewsbury supervisor, showing him the public supplement, and asking politely how we were supposed to get to Holyhead please? It was arranged for the Ebbw Junction men to have their PNB, then conduct the Bescot men through to Crewe with us all on board. Excellent result. On arrival at Crewe, the forward service train to Holyhead was a nice Crewe ETH 47, so suddenly everybody lost any interest in going to Holyhead, and dispersed quietly into the night. In my case I hung around for a Roarer to take me home to Euston:
(Thu 03/06/82)
81001 0330 Crewe - Euston (That’ll do very nicely, thank you.)
Sunday 02/06/85
Summer Sunday mornings at Carlisle were interesting in those days. The overheads were switched off between Glasgow and Carlisle for maintenance late Saturday evening until around 3pm Sunday – hence my arrival behind 47490 (see previous post). There were various northbound passenger and newspaper services which needed to be found diesel locos. They were all on paper diagrammed for ETH 47s, and there were never enough to go round. The favourite to produce something different was the 1935 Paignton – Glasgow, which was a rake of 12 old Mk 1 coaches which had headed south from Glasgow on Friday night. This morning they scraped the bottom of the barrel and I hit the jackpot:
27103 0325 Carlisle – Glasgow Central
A single 27 – not a pair – on load 12, from Carlisle to Glasgow under the wires, with the little matter of 10 miles of 1 in 75 of Beattock to face. What manner of madness is this?
From the platform end at Carlisle until passing Abington (on the downhill run after Beattock) the power handle was wide open for 72 minutes. It took until passing Lockerbie for us to achieve 60 mph. The sun rises early in June in these latitudes, so we slogged up Beattock at a sedate 17 - 18 mph in early morning sunlight. The guard stood with me in the front vestibule admiring the 27 thrashing its guts out and the sunlit scenery passing by very slowly indeed. What an epic thrash this was. 27103 performed faultlessly. On arrival (somewhat late) at Glasgow Central, I’d have every excuse to go home to bed, but there was more to follow. Of course, 27103 couldn’t be expected to work back south, but it had arrived in a 47/4 diagram, so something had to be found to replace it on its next working, the 0905 Glasgow Central – Poole via Dumfries. How about a required NB 37 on your Air Cons sir? That’ll do nicely!
37004 0905 Glasgow Central – Carlisle via Dumfries
Sunday 02/06/85. 37004 has just arrived at Carlisle with the 0905 Glasgow Central – Poole, which 81011 is waiting to re-engine.
The preceding 0805 Glasgow – Euston had been worked by 47550, but that was short on hours for an “A” exam, so it got stopped and sent to Kingmoor upon arrival at Carlisle. That meant 37004 had to be turned straight round and work straight back north again:
37004 1303 Carlisle – Glasgow Central via Dumfries – also on Air Cons.
To finish off the day, how about a pair of 37s out of Queen Street? Oh, go on then …
37037 + 37014 1750 Glasgow Queen Street – Crianlarich
37192 1942 Crianlarich – Glasgow Queen Street
Incidentally, on one of the weeks when I was unable to cover the Paignton turn ex Carlisle, it got a pair of class 20s from Carlisle to Glasgow via Beattock. I expect they were somewhat quicker than 27103 on the uphill sections!
Tuesday 02/06/87
37430 1719 Crewe – Leominster
47481 1958 Leominster – Crewe
Tuesday 02/06/88
37426 0757 Crewe – Liverpool
37426 0915 Liverpool – Crewe
Although I do have to agree, the 185s are rather good fun.
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