Recent content by Saltleyman

The main reason I remained at Saltley at privatisation was that although Saltley became a Railfreight Distribution Depot the diversity of work was far better than Inter City XC or Central trains.Also Rfd had a far varied route knowledge requirement.

The man who said the above was a Gloucester Driver in the messroom at Horton Road shed. I was actually there when he said as we were watching the moon landing on the tv. As you can imagine there was quite a loud cheer went round and lots of laughter ! 1638180614 At Saltley we had route...

I see you have heard of the famous "Seagulls" then.

I certainly forgot that aspect I had a few "heavy handed" drivers in my short time firing steamers on the mainline!

The coal shovelled by the fireman depended mainly on the weight of the train being hauled and a lot depended on the mechanical state of the locomotive they all were different beasts i have relieved the return working of the Carlisle on many occasions on arrival at Washwood Heath mainly with a...

The 9f's used on the Carlisle jobs were the only three fitted with Berkeley Automatic Stokers and were used as a "test bed" to see if it was worth fitting the equipment to more locos, they decided to allocate these locos to Saltley Depot for use only on the Water Orton to Carlisle(Glasgow) and...

re the Saltley to Carlisle work, before the 9f's were allocated to Saltley (92165/66/67 for this work) Saltley kept a special stud of black 5's 44805/10/12/13/14 for the Carlisles they only worked these trains working local trip work in between. The idea was to keep the locos "in house" and...

I think that the hostel at Camden still exists on the Up side just before Chalk Farm, Monument Lane men used to lodge there in the 1960/70's after the hostel at Willesden closed, i lodged at both places on loan from Saltley to Monument Lane also re Saltley men lodging they also at one time...

The Railway owned and staffed all the "Railway lodges" there were numerous lodges throughout the country.Saltley at one time just after nationisation lodged at Carlisle, Leeds,Rowsley,Peterboro',Lincoln,Sheffield and Swansea!As to the routeing of these trains Saltley was an ex MR depot and the...

I was a fireman at Salltley in the early 1960's and remember the Carlisle jobs at the depot well.I was eventually boked on these jobs several times (but after they were steam allocated),We usually had a class 25 or 45 diesel on these jobs. there were in fact two jobs a day one booking on at...

Hi Tony Hope you are well ? What a wonderful sight that is after all these years ! Where is it to be found now ?

At Saltley we regularly changed the shunt loco at Banbury and also Three Spires Junction(Coventry).

I can recommend the book "Tales of the Glasgow & South Western Railway" by David L. Smith ( SBN 7110 0168 5) you might get a copy from Amazon or BAE books first published in 1961 reprint in 1970, Hope this helps.

retired driver

A lot of coal trains ran during the miners strike worked by certain Depots Drivers, mainly because they feared for their jobs. But i can assure you certain coal trains were allowed to run by ASLE&F to certain destinations such as Stoke Manderville Hospital.