Kev's Autumn round-up Well it going dark at 17.00 and when it is daytime the light and weather is appalling so time to look at the stuff I've shot over the last few months. Travelling the length and breadth of the U.K with the Z gauge model railway layouts during the show season gives me the chance to poke my camera over the fence at a lot of different locations on my travels. Bear with me as this thread will ramble on quite a bit! Zedex 2018, our annual convention, was held in Abingdon in Oxfordshire again so I had decided to take a bit of a cross country trek on the way down to visit the Battlefield line in the Midlands. They were holding their steam gala over the weekend and I hadn't visited the line since 1992 so was due another visit. It takes its name from its location. The station halfway along the line is Market Bosworth, near to the scene of one of Englands most famous battles where Richard the 3d was defeated by Henry Tudor in the 'War of the Roses' to become Henry the 7th, immortalised by Shakespeare (A Horse, a Horse, My kingdom for a Horse etc) The Battlefield itself has a visitors centre so the railway picks up some trade from visitors in the area The Gala was a bit strange as all the locos in steam were former Great Western classes, the line itself was a joint line between the Midland railway and the London North Western but finding the little 64xx pannier tank working push-pull with a restored great Western Autocoach was a bonus The 64xx 0-6-0PTs were a Collet design introduced in 1932, designed from the outset with Push-Pull gear and eventually a total of 40 were introduced. They weighed 45 tonnes and had a tractive effort of only 18,010 lb so were not really sluggers but the loco is ideal for a small preservation line, simple to maintain and economical The 45xx 2-6-2ts were designed by George Jackson Churchward in 1906 for work on light branch lines and construction carried on until 1927 with a variant with larger side tanks following . weights varied between 57 and 61 tonnes and some of the class were fitted with push-pull gear in the 1950s to increase versatility A rare survivor is the former Port Talbot railway 0-6-0ST number 913 built in 1901 The railway was absorbed by the Great Western in 1923 and the loco sold into industrial service in 1934 and amazingly is still with us today. On the last ride I had on the railway we ground to a halt on the climb out of Shackerstone but the root cause turned out to be dragging brakes not a fault with this redoubtable veteran loco The closure of the Electric railway museum this year has meant their collection of electric locos and EMUs has been dispersed and the cute EE steeplecab electric E905 has landed at Shackerstone More tomorrow kev
Class 45 peak 45 015 is looking as sorry site as nature buries it At Market Bosworth a timber structure suffices as the station building But tantalisingly the original, classic station building is just out of reach serving as a car breakers and service station! Market Bosworth signalbox K
Shackerstone taken from the train Former British rail Class 02 shunter stabled at Market Bosworth British rail Class 33 D6508 'Eastleigh' Kev
