Railway action if the U.K North west

kevsmith Jun 16, 2019

  1. Doug Gosha

    Doug Gosha TrainBoard Member

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    I looked up some more pictures of 34046 and it's beautiful. Those huge Boxpok drivers (at least they look like Boxpoks)!

    Doug
     
  2. BoxcabE50

    BoxcabE50 HOn30 & N Scales Staff Member TrainBoard Supporter

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    Great to see that steamer escaped the cutting torch.

    BTW- How are the efforts with building new engines coming along? Any news about those various projects, amid this pandemic?
     
  3. BoxcabE50

    BoxcabE50 HOn30 & N Scales Staff Member TrainBoard Supporter

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    The first scene showing 34046, were you up in the signal box?
     
  4. kevsmith

    kevsmith TrainBoard Member

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    Hi all

    I'd set one of the other camcorders up on the signalbox veranda, the panning shot on the platform was done from where I was stood. The signaller is a realy friendly guy who gave Brooklyn a tour of the box whilst we were there,

    In the August video Braunton comes through again. Seen passing the classic Park South Signalbox and taking the single line section to Barrow


    It was in fine form as it attacked the climb from Lindal tunnel up to the summit.


    Another rare one was a Retro railtours excursion from Chesterfield to Workington hauled by classic traction supplied by ROG (Rail Operations Group) Two class 37s and a 57. One of these is a former DRS loco, 37 510, which was one of the most difficult re-railing jobs I ever had to do when it split the points inside the Sellafield nuclear plant in some of the worst weather the Irish sea could throw at us

    Brooklyn and I first caught it at Plumpton Junction


    Storming through Askam


    Another fine attack on the climb to Lindal summit


    The video finishes with a short clip, this time the Lakeside and Haverthwaite railway's Bagnall 0-6-0ST 'Victor'


    video at



    Doug's prompting has reminded me I havn't done an update on the new-builds recently (not been out much anyway!) so i'll do some digging and give you all an update soon

    Kev
     
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  5. kevsmith

    kevsmith TrainBoard Member

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    In July the Barrow Town Council held the annual Festival of Transport in the town centre and also at the Dock museum. At the dock the main attraction was Furness railway No. 20. This had been sidelined for a while as the Boiler was due a major exam and I was suprised to see it listed as an attraction when only recently I had seen it in a thousand bits. Talking to Tim Owen, the leader of the group that maintains and runs it, he admitted that sat on the low-loader lorry some of the paint was still wet!

    [​IMG]

    Brooklyn was quite taken with the 5 inch version of it

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    Although not trains i thought you'd like to see some Yankee cars displayed in the main show in town

    a arare 1930 Buick coupe

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    A full hot rod Chevy ( Ithink it was a Chevy)

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    And a classic Mustang

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    Lots of Rolls Royces, MGs, etc

    Kev
     
  6. Hytec

    Hytec TrainBoard Member

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    Kev, "....MGs, etc." may seem boring local cars to you. I owned an MGA and a TR3A for many, many years and loved every minute of them. (even got used to the Lucas positive neutral 6VDC electrical system...sorta. :rolleyes:)

    Brooklyn has good taste. Amazing how quickly he's growing.
     
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  7. kevsmith

    kevsmith TrainBoard Member

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    Hi Hank
    never said they were boring.

    Over the years I have had MG Midget, various MGBs, MG 1300 saloon, Y type saloon and two ZA Magnettes. Miss them all!

    These are some of the other entrants

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    This was up for sale but no price on it

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    I've had a few of these over the years as well

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    Never had one of these but dad did when he moved out to Santa Barbara

    [​IMG]

    Kev
     
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  8. Doug Gosha

    Doug Gosha TrainBoard Member

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    My friend in high school (1969 - 1971) had an MGB and it had been in an accident and the frame bent so when I followed him in my '50 Ford pickup or '59 Chevy, I could easily see it was definitely dog-legged with the front end of the car noticeably over to the left compared to the rear end.

    Also, the floor in it was completely gone (rust) on the driver's side so he had a board cut to fit in there and he just threw the driver's seat on the top that. So safe.

    :D

    Doug
     
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  9. BoxcabE50

    BoxcabE50 HOn30 & N Scales Staff Member TrainBoard Supporter

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    That Number 20 is absolutely gorgeous!

    BTW, yes that is a Chevy. An early 1960's Nova, 2 door post, somewhat modified.... :)
     
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  10. kevsmith

    kevsmith TrainBoard Member

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    Yesterday was the running of the 'Three Peaks by Rail' charity train where competitiors tackle the three highest peaks in the U.K Snowdon, Scafell Pike and Ben Nevis. over four days they live on the train as it crosses the country.

    This was always a job DRS supplied the traction for but this year LSL were hauling it with their classic class 37 and 47s.

    37 521 leads 366 667 through a mist shrouded Kirkby in Furness on the Barrow to Ravenglass ona rake of Intercity liveried Mk III coaches

    [​IMG]

    More tomorrow

    Kev
     
  11. kevsmith

    kevsmith TrainBoard Member

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    Leg one of the trip was from Bangor in North Wales where the teams had climbed Mt Snowdon to Ravenglass where they would disembark to climb Scaffel pike. The empty stock returned to Barrow CS for tanking (Toilet emptying and water tanks filling up) at Northern Rail's depot

    The 37s ran round at Sellafield so all three locos were on the front

    [​IMG]

    On the video you can see the manouvres in Barrow yard and when I left all seemed O.K for the empty stock to return to Ravenglass early evening, I walked down to Askam station in the daylight to get it going North and waited and waited, checking on realtimetrains to see when it left Barrow. Nothing!

    Finally the signaller told us that the lead loco had failed. Now this caused a lot of problems. It had missed its timetable path and now was going to have to find a slot amongst the regular passenger trains which always take precedence. Ninety minutes late it finally apeared the dark with just one Class 37 on the front which was going to have to take the whole lot onwards to Fort William in Scotland.

    37 521 had been abandoned in the long siding at Barrow and was still there the morning after

    [​IMG]




    If I find out when they are rescuing it I'll go down and take a look

    Kev
     
  12. kevsmith

    kevsmith TrainBoard Member

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    Steam worked tours are thinning out a bit but we still had a couple over the last few weeks

    Royal Scot 4-6-0 46115 Scots Guardsman was on the Cumbrian Coast in September. Brooklyn and I had worked out that any station was going to be a Zoo as it was all over facebook so we went to Park South signalbox where we hoped it would be less busy and then fired round to Furness Abbey to get it agai

    It turned out that it had been held at Askam to allow a passenger train through so ambled through at 5 miles per hour. made up for it attacking the climb up to Furness Abbey tunnel though

    [​IMG]

    Peppercorn A1 60163 Tornado, the first of the new generation of new builds to hit the mainline was more problematic to film. Getting it at Carnforth attaching to the train after the Class 86 electric had come off.

    86 401. These locos are getting very rare now

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    So the A1 sat in the down sidings for quite a while so went it sety off the driver kept the draincocks open for a very long time

    [​IMG]

    "Are you chasing it up to Shap!? one of the other photographers asked. "Not really" I replied, "the weather up there is going to be really rough and I've got a car full of concrete blocks"!, He never asked why.

    Another rare visitor was the Ultrasonic test train. I sat at Dalton station for two hours and it never turned up finally appeaing very late at Askam. 37 116, despite appearances is actually pushing it[​IMG]

    The driver was in the DBSO driving trailer at the other end

    [​IMG]

    more in a Mo.
     
  13. kevsmith

    kevsmith TrainBoard Member

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    Went to the Autumn steam gala at the Ribble Steam railway in Preston. Not as busy as previous ones and they were having reliability issues with some of the locos

    I got the impression the injectors on SL 21 were playing up

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    This Hawthorn & Leslie 0-6-0ST was built in 1937.

    Mainstay of operations was the rare Grant Richie 0-4-0ST of 1894

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    You'l recall earlier in the summer Furness No. 20 had appeared at the Barrow Transport festival on a low loader with the paint still wet. At the gala it was in light steam. Apparently this was the day the boiler inspector was coming to do the Steam test to get it back in traffic.

    [​IMG]

    Anyway, we got a private tour of the Furness Railway Trust shed where Great Western Railway 4-6-0 4979 Wooton Hall is progressing niceley

    [​IMG]

    Video at



    Lots of variety on it again

    Kev
     
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  14. BoxcabE50

    BoxcabE50 HOn30 & N Scales Staff Member TrainBoard Supporter

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    Those headlamps seem quite small. Did they actually provide illumination for the train crew to see ahead? Or were they just to warn other trains?
     
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  15. kevsmith

    kevsmith TrainBoard Member

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    Just as a warning. We never went in for big headlamps over here

    Kev
     
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  16. Doug Gosha

    Doug Gosha TrainBoard Member

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    They save the "big" for the "pints" in the pubs!

    :D

    Doug
     
  17. kevsmith

    kevsmith TrainBoard Member

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    Well into the bad weather now. dark days, driving rain and howling winds

    Took Brooklyn to the Settle & Carlisle at half term to fulfil a promise to him to see a HST 125 in action. LSL had the green set running a holiday campaign of 'Staycation expresses'

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    The weather was holding off at this stage. The HSTs have been withdrawn from front line service as newer stock takes over but they are far from disappearing from the rail scene as they get a second life

    Brooklyn has got my EOS 450D now and this was his shot of the GBRF class 66 on the Hunslet-
    Arcow quarry empties

    [​IMG]

    This was the main point of the trip 60163 'Tornado' the famous new-build Peppercorn A1 4-6-2 charging towards the climd to Ais Gill

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    Now this next picture might look a bit ordinary, maybe even mundane, but it was in fact the first football special (Soccer) seen on the Cumbrian Coast line since ,we reckon, about 1964. The occasion was the first meeting of Carlisle United and Barrow in Furness in living memory . Two class 156s were allocated and there were no intermediate stops but sadly they didn't see fit to put the units through a carraige washer first

    [​IMG]

    LSL's other HST, painted in the retro 'Midland Pullman' colours was the first one I have ever seen on the Furness line. Of course, it came through Dalton in the dark but the following day was in the yard at Barrow flanked by Class 195 DMUs

    [​IMG]

    Working the empty stock through Lindal on its way back to Crewe I did the classic mistake of pressing the REC button twice on the camcorder,

    so it was on pause as it went past!!

    [​IMG]

    More in a minute, Time for a top-up

    Kev
     
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  18. kevsmith

    kevsmith TrainBoard Member

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    66 122 came through on a CWR (Continous welded rail) train in daylight hours which was a bonus

    [​IMG]

    latest video here.



    I've edited Brooklyn's footage over the last few weeks and will bump it onto youtube later and post the link here. He is getting the hang of it and still only nine years old

    Kev
     
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  19. Doug Gosha

    Doug Gosha TrainBoard Member

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    Brooklyn is doing a fine job! A regular bobby dazzler!

    It looks like some fairly heavy rail being used in some of the pictures/videos and those passenger coaches are beautiful!

    Doug
     
  20. Hytec

    Hytec TrainBoard Member

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    Kev, great sequence of videos. You and Brooklyn have talent.
    Loved hearing Brooklyn say the colliery engine was "Scary". Don't blame him. It's massive!
    Interesting to see four carriages with two locomotives, yet 12-15 with only one.
    Are you still using vacuum brakes? Or have you changed to pressure braking?
     

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