Electrification/modernisation of LSW Waterloo-Salisbury-Exeter

30907 · 17 May 2018

randyrippley said:
There were also Yeovil Town - Exeter services as well, though I don't know how many - anyone know?

Two down in the morning, none the other way - though it was common for the stoppers to change engines at the junction and stand there for a while. Basically there were stoppers every couple of hours both ways, but not all of them did the whole route at one go, and there were various short workings at the Exeter end.
There were 7 expresses including the Brighton- Plymouth, but the 5pm down called almost everywhere from Basingstoke and got overtaken by the 6pm AND (after it was introduced in 1957) the 7pm.

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Helvellyn · 17 May 2018

If the route had stayed with the Southern Region I wonder if a case could have been made for electrification to Salisbury as part of the Bournemouth Mainline electrification scheme? Ordering four additional REP units would have allowed an hourly fast Waterloo to Salisbury service, with either one or two TCs then operating to Exeter with a 33/1. Slower services could have been VEPs operating Waterloo - Salisbury (all stations Basingstoke - Salisbury) or just extend Basingstoke stoppers.

70014IronDuke · 17 May 2018

Helvellyn said:
If the route had stayed with the Southern Region I wonder if a case could have been made for electrification to Salisbury as part of the Bournemouth Mainline electrification scheme? .... .

I suspect the SR considered this at the time in any case, but felt it would have risked the whole caboodle to Bournemouth being refused. Remember even the last bit to Weymouth was considered a section too far.

In fact, perversely, had Salisbury-Exeter stayed with the SR, it might have meant even LESS chance of getting Worting Jcn -Salisbury electrified at that time, because it would have been seen as the SR trying to recast the entire line as the main route to the West Country by stealth.

This, and what with the WR saying they could spare Warships (if they got new 47s for S Wales, Bristol and Snow Hill) and do away with steam west of Salisbury probably made a good case - on paper. Of course, the Warships failed on an almost daily basis, or it felt like it whenever I was down there c 65-66.

Warwick · 18 May 2018

randyrippley said:
Pedant mode back on, the county border was moved from the Barwick stream to the River Yeo around 20 years ago placing Yeovil Junction in Somerset. Or at least the operational part of the station......the revised border appears to follow the track and bisect the site, with the abandoned platforms (now part of the preservation group's site) still in Dorset.

Pedant mode off, the more I read about Fiennes, the more convinced I am that he was a fool.

Try reading, "I tried to run a railway". You'll change your mind. Fiennes was enthusiastic about railways but he wasn't a railway enthusiast.

Taunton · 19 May 2018

70014IronDuke said:
In any case, he would probably have been there when - I suppose - the SR pleaded to reinstate the Yeovil - Jcn to .... is it Templecombe? - double track section. And presumably he was open minded enough to agree.

If I recall correctly (if not loads of you will be along to correct me) the double track on Yeovil to Templecombe was actually disconnected at the same time as the rest of the singling, but was reconnected shortly afterwards when it was apparent that reliability had taken a nosedive, the track not yet having been physically lifted (unusual for the WR demolition gangs). The signal box at Templecombe was reopened, although the station had been closed, and its presence was a key part of the station itself being reopened much later.

randyrippley said:
There were also Yeovil Town - Exeter services as well, though I don't know how many - anyone know?

The intermediate steam loco depot between Salisbury and Exeter was not at Yeovil Junction, but down the branch at Yeovil Town, where it was alongside the station. Therefore loco operations commonly started from there. There was also a lot of light engine running between Town and Junction to change locos there, or even just to take relieving crews if there was not a convenient shuttle passenger service at the time. It was actually quite a big shed, with both WR and SR locos allocated to it, plus there were always, as at other West of England SR sheds, quite a number of Exmouth Junction main line locos on shed there, including Pacifics.

Although Templecombe loco depot was partly visible from the line, but at right angles to it and not directly connected, where the S&D went underneath, locos from there played no part in L&SW line operations. It was long a mystery to me why the high speed Plymouth to Waterloo boat train involved in the Salisbury accident before WW1 had changed locos at Templecombe, until I found the locos had for some reason run light to/from Salisbury instead of being changed at the station there.

70014IronDuke · 19 May 2018

Taunton said:
If I recall correctly (if not loads of you will be along to correct me) the double track on Yeovil to Templecombe was actually disconnected at the same time as the rest of the singling, but was reconnected shortly afterwards when it was apparent that reliability had taken a nosedive, the track not yet having been physically lifted (unusual for the WR demolition gangs). ...

Yes, that's my understanding too. That was what I meant by "reinstate" - perhaps I should have said "put back into operation" or some such. I believe I read somewhere the signalling had not been disconnected either, or at least was very easy to wire up again.

Taunton said:
Although Templecombe loco depot was partly visible from the line, but at right angles to it and not directly connected, where the S&D went underneath, locos from there played no part in L&SW line operations.

Well, it was an S&D shed, I suppose. But presumably, had there been a loco failure at Templecombe LSW, they would have arranged to steal a loco from the S&D shed, if something suitable were available and in steam?

Taunton said:
It was long a mystery to me why the high speed Plymouth to Waterloo boat train involved in the Salisbury accident before WW1 had changed locos at Templecombe, until I found the locos had for some reason run light to/from Salisbury instead of being changed at the station there.

Strange, I agree. I mean, why bother to send the loco light 20 miles to Templecombe? If the trains had Plymouth crews, perhaps this was the half way point?

coppercapped · 19 May 2018

70014IronDuke said:
Interesting. So in Gerry Fiennes the WR had a manager that did care about this offshoot grafted onto his traditional territory, it would seem. Nontheless, even if Exeter-Salisbury made it out of the "any other business" section of WR management meetings at Paddington, and even with the best of intentions and planning, the artifical interface between SR and WR would not have helped developments.

I don't buy this argument. Although the ideal was that both ends of a route should be under the same management, there were several cases in BR days where this was not true and it did not cause issues either operationally or commercially. Think Scottish Region and London Midland or Scottish Region and North Eastern (later Eastern Region).

coppercapped · 19 May 2018

70014IronDuke said:
SNIP

Interesting that Fiennes considered the introduction of Warships as a positive development! Was it advertised like that at the time to the public? I'm not sure if the fitters and electricians at Waterloo would have agreed.

Yes, it was sold to the public as an improvement. They were powerful and quick with the light loads they had to haul, the steep hills of the Southern route did not slow them up very much. What the fitters thought of them was irrelevant - they were the same locomotives that Old Oak, Laira and Bath Road could maintain.

70014IronDuke said:
AIRI, the 'fast' Waterloo - Exeter Warship-hauled services after 1964 only stopped at Andover twixt Basingstoke and Salisbury. Didn't they use Hampshire DEMUs on the stoppers?

For quite a long period in the 60s and 70s the Basingstoke - Salisbury stoppers were extensions of the Reading - Basingstoke stopping service which was operated almost exclusively by the Southern although the line had been built by the (True) GWR - the 'Hants' bit of the 'Berks and Hants'.

coppercapped · 19 May 2018

Taunton said:
I don't think Fiennes was particularly into the singling either, but it was presented as a fait-accompli from above at 222 Marylebone Road. Because of the simplistic way in which 1960s costs were reported, all civil engineering costs were put into a central bucket and then just reallocated on the basis of track-miles. So if you lost track, your allocated costs were reduced, regardless of reality.

Notably he never did it on the East Anglian routes he saved with his Basic railway approach from the previous management's reduction techniques, such as Ely to Norwich.

It was the same with rolling stock. The purge on less-used carriages of the era was because they looked expensive and not worthwhile because all carriage maintenance costs were pooled and then reallocated by the vehicle. A pre-nationalisation design one which rarely saw a fitter or a repaint was charged at exactly the same per vehicle as a new Mk2 one. Likewise for revenue, this was allocated per vehicle - actually it was allocated to the service group, and then divided equally by the vehicles on it, which completely concealed first class accommodation on lesser lines which was never sat in from one year end to the next (except of course by any visiting railway management on free passes).

It was a fait accompli. Fiennes wrote after explaining the reason for concentrating London - West Country traffic on the Western:

Secondly although the line from Exeter to Salisbury must survive on the traffic which it generated itself, the disappearance of the West Country trains on a Saturday - this single fact - would enable such a simplification of track and signalling and staff that the line would pay its way.
At this moment, the great and good Doctor threw a spanner in the works causing a shower of sparks and ugly grinding noises. He had not many outward signs of human frailty, but one sign was his love of maps and another his love of publishing them.

Fiennes describes the presentation of the maps to senior management comparing it with the production of the Authorised Version of the Bible and then says:

Back in the office, I sat forlornly in front of my authorised version. No railway west of Plymouth. No Exeter - Salisbury. No Taunton - Westbury - Reading. In a while I rallied. I said to myself (I have a shocking habit of communing silently with myself in words) 'Look chum; you got a personal reproof from the Minister for saying that the principal effect of the 1962 Act will be to make another Transport Act a certainty. Likewise this map ensures the next. A lot of it is nonsense. The person who wants something is stronger than the person who doesn't want him to have it. Do you want these railways? So...'

Regarding the timing of all this, Fiennes was Chairman of the Western Region Board and General Manager of the Western Region from Autumn 1963 until 1965 when he was moved to the same posts on the Eastern Region. He ~~was fired~~ retired in 1967.

70014IronDuke · 20 May 2018

coppercapped said:
Yes, it was sold to the public as an improvement. They were powerful and quick with the light loads they had to haul, the steep hills of the Southern route did not slow them up very much.

Do you know if they improved on the timings for light pacifics on the route?
EDIT - Obviously I mean on like-for-like services: not the non-stop expresses.

coppercapped said:
What the fitters thought of them was irrelevant - they were the same locomotives that Old Oak, Laira and Bath Road could maintain.

It wasn't irrelevant to the passengers sitting - as the often did - behind a failed Warship at Waterloo or some Southern station along the line.
And it is an unfair comparison. The fitters (and electricians) at Old Oak, Laira etc 'grew up' with the locomotives on a daily basis, performing all regular exams. Not only were the locos new and unknown to the Southern maintenance staff, they did not maintain them in any way on a regular basis, so they could not 'get to know them' through their every-day work.

In fact, now I write this, I wonder if I remember reading that Old Oak used to sometimes send men to Waterloo to fix a failed Warship - but this could be a total figment of my imagination. (Or, I might indeed have read it, but it could have been a 1960's version of fake news.)

coppercapped said:
For quite a long period in the 60s and 70s the Basingstoke - Salisbury stoppers were extensions of the Reading - Basingstoke stopping service which was operated almost exclusively by the Southern although the line had been built by the (True) GWR - the 'Hants' bit of the 'Berks and Hants'.

Right, confirms my memory. Funny, how the WR 'lost' Basingstoke - Reading to the SR. I suppose that happened in the ... late 50s or very early 60s?

70014IronDuke · 20 May 2018

coppercapped said:
I don't buy this argument. Although the ideal was that both ends of a route should be under the same management, there were several cases in BR days where this was not true and it did not cause issues either operationally or commercially. Think Scottish Region and London Midland or Scottish Region and North Eastern (later Eastern Region).

I find your argument/comparisons here unrealistic. You ignore history. Even before the 1923 grouping, the LNWR had cooperated on a daily basis with the Caldonian Railway at Carlisle, as did the Midland and G&SWR, and across on the East Coast, the NER with NBR. This cooperation was only reinforced once these railways were merged into the LMS and LNER. I doubt anything really changed when it came to operations under BR - except perhaps some new job titles.

The Salisbury - Exeter transfer was totally different. The line was grafted - planted, if you like - lock, stock and barrel onto the WR, which had earlier only needed to cooperate with the SR at Exeter St Davids (and, yes, they cooperated on the Exeter - Plymouth routes).

Futhermore, the ex LSWR line was not Paddington's main concern - far from it. If you were in WR HQ on operations and you learned that, say, during one week, you had had four failures due to loco casualties on Bristol trains, four on Exeter/Plymouths, three on South Wales and seven on Exeter-Waterloo workings, which do you think caused you most concern?

I'm pretty damn sure that - unless by some quirk the PM happened to live in Yeovil or some such and his office had complained to the WR GM about things - it would not be the Warship problems on the former SR territory, even though they constituted the largest single group of failures.

I'm not saying it could not be made to work - indeed, it seemed to work, although perhaps after a fashion- but it added another interface that had previously not existed. The business world if full of plans that should work - but often end in disaster. We only need to think of a certain transport industry's 'privatisation' history to know that.

yorksrob · 20 May 2018

I agree with others on here that the transfer West of Salisbury to the Western Region was a massive historical mistake. Quite apart from anything, I see no benefit to a main line London service switching region half way through.

Taunton · 20 May 2018

70014IronDuke said:
The fitters (and electricians) at Old Oak, Laira etc 'grew up' with the locomotives on a daily basis, performing all regular exams. Not only were the locos new and unknown to the Southern maintenance staff, they did not maintain them in any way on a regular basis, so they could not 'get to know them' through their every-day work.

But the same was true of any diesels. The South Western had been emus and steam right up until the Warships came along. They were the first diesels they had seen. The few Class 33 that had penetrated on freight to the SW division previously were on through workings and maintained by Hither Green.

I suspect the real problem was the SW didn't bother with much staff training and familiarisation on diesels at all. The Warships were on out-and-back diagrams from Exeter, they were maintained by Newton Abbot depot. Waterloo to Salisbury services were still steam for some years after the Warships arrived, right up to the final changeover in Summer 1967. I can't recall if they could do an Exeter return without even refuelling at the London end, but think they could, at least in summer when the fuel-voracious steam heat boilers were not in use.

. Funny, how the WR 'lost' Basingstoke - Reading to the SR. I suppose that happened in the ... late 50s or very early 60s?

This actually went back to GWR days, when the coaching stock at least was more often than not SR, and sometimes the locos as well, and quite possibly dated back to thr closure of the separate GWR station at Basingstoke in 1933, when GW terminating trains at Basingstoke SR would be a bit of a nuisance if they had to be shunted across rather than prolonged to Salisbury or Southampton. Was it a maybe mileage balance against GWR services from Didcot and Newbury running on from Winchester on the SR to Southampton Terminus?

Just in case you might think those Newbury services from Southampton carried few passengers, they did a lot of local work on the Southampton-Eastleigh-Winchester bit. The classic happened in the late 1950s, when the WR got City of Truro back from York museum, and it was allocated between special runs at Didcot, who would send it off when available (doubtless encouraged by both Swindon and Paddington) on a leisurely lunchtime run down to Southampton, but which came back from there at 4.55pm, just in time to stop at Eastleigh to pick up large numbers from the SR works there going home to Winchester - to show them what a proper old, beautifully polished (as it was kept) loco could do

randyrippley · 20 May 2018

70014IronDuke said:
................I'm pretty damn sure that - unless by some quirk the PM happened to live in Yeovil or some such and his office had complained to the WR GM about things - it would not be the Warship problems on the former SR territory, even though they constituted the largest single group of failures.............

But John Peyton, the Yeovil MP was Minister of Transport 1970-74. Did he help get the Warships off the route?

Taunton · 20 May 2018

Well they were withdrawn anyway in that period.

Replaced by Class 33 (SR maintained), reliable but underpowered to the extent of losing/unable to regain time, and needing extended timings. Replaced in turn by the Class 50s (WR maintained again), which had worked OK on the LMR but didn't on the WR, and failures were back.

randyrippley · 20 May 2018

Taunton said:
Well they were withdrawn anyway in that period.
one
Replaced by Class 33 (SR maintained), reliable but underpowered to the extent of losing/unable to regain time, and needing extended timings. Replaced in turn by the Class 50s (WR maintained again), which had worked OK on the LMR but didn't on the WR, and failures were back.

I've read somewhere that the class 50 failure rate was due to Western Region hubris.
It seems that when the 50s were transferred, all offers to second fitters and engineers for a handover/skills exchange were declined by the Western, with the result that problems which had been eliminated returned. One example I saw cited was the WR's total inability to understand the centrifugal air filter, resulting in oil leaks and engine failure

Taunton · 20 May 2018

randyrippley said:
I've read somewhere that the class 50 failure rate was due to Western Region hubris.
It seems that when the 50s were transferred, all offers to second fitters and engineers for a handover/skills exchange were declined by the Western, with the result that problems which had been eliminated returned. One example I saw cited was the WR's total inability to understand the centrifugal air filter, resulting in oil leaks and engine failure

Bit of an urban legend. The Class 50 were on an initial 10 year lease from English Electric, which took them well into their WR time, and EE were primarily responsible for their maintenance arrangements. The air filter issue was finally addressed in the big overhaul at Doncaster just after the end of the lease when BR bought them, which led to the end of the "vacuum cleaner sucking" noise they made.

coppercapped · 20 May 2018

yorksrob said:
I agree with others on here that the transfer West of Salisbury to the Western Region was a massive historical mistake. Quite apart from anything, I see no benefit to a main line London service switching region half way through.

Note that London - Edinburgh trains ran through three regions and London - Newcastle through through two until the North Eastern was abolished in 1966/7.

That didn't seem to cause any problems with the planning and introduction of the Deltic hauled services which were introduced from 1962 onwards.

Assertion is not proof.

At the same time that the Southern's area west of Salisbury was transferred to the Western, all the Western's territory north of Birmingham, including the lines to Birkenhead and Aberystwyth, was transferred to the London Midland.

Was that a 'massive historical mistake' as well?

yorksrob · 20 May 2018

coppercapped said:
At the same time that the Southern's area west of Salisbury was transferred to the Western, all the Western's territory north of Birmingham, including the lines to Birkenhead and Aberystwyth, was transferred to the London Midland.

Was that a 'massive historical mistake' as well?

Given that it led to the closure of Birmingham Snow Hill, which ended up having to be put back at great expense, I'd say yes, it was. Unfortunately this tidying up of the regions exercise seems to have led to over-zelous rationalisation of the former competitors networks.

randyrippley · 20 May 2018

Taunton said:
Bit of an urban legend. The Class 50 were on an initial 10 year lease from English Electric, which took them well into their WR time, and EE were primarily responsible for their maintenance arrangements. The air filter issue was finally addressed in the big overhaul at Doncaster just after the end of the lease when BR bought them, which led to the end of the "vacuum cleaner sucking" noise they made.

I thought the lease was ended prematurely when GEC made a give-away offer to get out of the contract?

hexagon789 · 20 May 2018

randyrippley said:
I thought the lease was ended prematurely when GEC made a give-away offer to get out of the contract?

I had thought BR bought them at the end of the full 10 years and then went about refurbishing them?

randyrippley · 20 May 2018

hexagon789 said:
I had thought BR bought them at the end of the full 10 years and then went about refurbishing them?

The way I understood it, the "refurb" was actually a simplification to remove all the advanced technology the WR tech support didn't understand and couldn't make work.
Centrifugal air filter, slow speed control, rheostatic brakes, wheelslip control.......... sanding gear

hexagon789 · 20 May 2018

randyrippley said:
The way I understood it, the "refurb" was actually a simplification to remove all the advanced technology the WR tech support didn't understand and couldn't make work.
Centrifugal air filter, slow speed control, rheostatic brakes, wheelslip control.......... sanding gear

That's what it entailed yes, perhaps simplification is a better term than refurbishment.

randyrippley · 20 May 2018

hexagon789 said:
That's what it entailed yes, perhaps simplification is a better term than refurbishment.

Funny that the kit worked while they were on the LMR but the WR couldn't make sense of it and had to strip it out

hexagon789 · 20 May 2018

randyrippley said:
Funny that the kit worked while they were on the LMR but the WR couldn't make sense of it and had to strip it out

Perhaps because the LMR dealt with electric traction but the WR was more used to Diesel Hydraulics?

Taunton · 20 May 2018

By the time the Class 50 moved to the WR hydraulics were pretty much gone, and the WR had been using large fleets of Class 37 and 47 for about 15 years by then; the former were pretty similar in concept. The bogies were apparently interchangeable.

I think a key problem was on the LMR they actually passed the EE maintenance team HQ at Preston, and Crewe was an hour down the M6 in a van. Laira was like an overseas trip.

slow speed control

Apparently never used or needed. They never did merry-go-round heavy freight.

hexagon789 · 20 May 2018

Taunton said:
By the time the Class 50 moved to the WR hydraulics were pretty much gone, and the WR had been using large fleets of Class 37 and 47 for about 15 years by then; the former were pretty similar in concept. The bogies were apparently interchangeable.

I think a key problem was on the LMR they actually passed the EE maintenance team HQ at Preston, and Crewe was an hour down the M6 in a van. Laira was like an overseas trip.

Apparently never used or needed. They never did merry-go-round heavy freight.

So it was more a case of trying to simplify maintenance because of the greater distance from the manufacturer?

70014IronDuke · 21 May 2018

Taunton said:
But the same was true of any diesels. The South Western had been emus and steam right up until the Warships came along. They were the first diesels they had seen. The few Class 33 that had penetrated on freight to the SW division previously were on through workings and maintained by Hither Green.

Well, that is a point. Had they used 33s though, the could have sent staff for training quite easily to Hither Green. But of course, they were low on power for these trains of 8 or so carriages and the up-down nature of the line.

re Basingstoke - Reading

Taunton said:
This actually went back to GWR days, when the coaching stock at least was more often than not SR, and sometimes the locos as well, and quite possibly dated back to thr closure of the separate GWR station at Basingstoke in 1933, when GW terminating trains at Basingstoke SR would be a bit of a nuisance if they had to be shunted across rather than prolonged to Salisbury or Southampton. Was it a maybe mileage balance against GWR services from Didcot and Newbury running on from Winchester on the SR to Southampton Terminus?

Intriguing. I've never noticed this issue discussed anywhere.

Taunton said:
Just in case you might think those Newbury services from Southampton carried few passengers, they did a lot of local work on the Southampton-Eastleigh-Winchester bit. The classic happened in the late 1950s, when the WR got City of Truro back from York museum, and it was allocated between special runs at Didcot, who would send it off when available (doubtless encouraged by both Swindon and Paddington) on a leisurely lunchtime run down to Southampton, but which came back from there at 4.55pm, just in time to stop at Eastleigh to pick up large numbers from the SR works there going home to Winchester - to show them what a proper old, beautifully polished (as it was kept) loco could do

I know that they used 3440 on this line around that time a bit - hadn't realised it was so regular. An N or U would have probably climbed the Berkshire Downs more efficiently, of course. Even a 2251. But then the GWR always did like their bit of drama.

70014IronDuke · 21 May 2018

randyrippley said:
But John Peyton, the Yeovil MP was Minister of Transport 1970-74. Did he help get the Warships off the route?

Well, this was the time when the Warships were taken off, wasn't it? ie about 1972-73 or so. So maybe he had a role. Was he in the Heath govt? I should imagine sort of 68-72 time - when the twin impact of singling and Warship failures wreaked the worst havoc with timekeeping - must have been a bad period for the line.

70014IronDuke · 21 May 2018

coppercapped said:
Note that London - Edinburgh trains ran through three regions and London - Newcastle through through two until the North Eastern was abolished in 1966/7.

That didn't seem to cause any problems with the planning and introduction of the Deltic hauled services which were introduced from 1962 onwards.

SEE my post 41. Very different scenarios.

coppercapped said:
At the same time that the Southern's area west of Salisbury was transferred to the Western, all the Western's territory north of Birmingham, including the lines to Birkenhead and Aberystwyth, was transferred to the London Midland.

Was that a 'massive historical mistake' as well?

It might have been, but it needs to be examined on its own merits. The essential commercial feature of the Exeter-Salisbury route was its integration into a service to Waterloo - a traditional feature that enabled commuting arguably beyond Salisbury and even as far as Yeovil.

There were very few Cambrian-Paddington through services (was it just the one a day Cambrian Coast Express?) so that doesn't really compare. There was no singling to Shrewsbury to add to the misery, was there? And even in GWR days traffic north of there was more of a secondary or branch line status to Chester and Birkenhead. Both those populations had fast, alternative routes to London Euston. (at least after 1966/7).

Electrification/modernisation of LSW Waterloo-Salisbury-Exeter

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