RailRiders

Decided to give this thread a bit of an airing, to actually say, not mentioned on here previously, that Gaugemaster commissioned, in 2015, a run of 512 editions of 47406, in Intercity livery, with "Rail Riders" nameplates. I just wonder how popular they were!

As regards 47406, although it carried Intercity livery, its regular haunts were the Newcastle - Liverpool trains. The reason given by the club for moving the nameplates to 47488 was that 47406 had been moved to the railfreight sector. In fact, 47406 was moved from provincial to Intercity, for restricted use, namely hauling 225 sets on the non electrified section to Bradford, and weekend diversions.

robertclark125 said:

Decided to give this thread a bit of an airing, to actually say, not mentioned on here previously, that Gaugemaster commissioned, in 2015, a run of 512 editions of 47406, in Intercity livery, with "Rail Riders" nameplates. I just wonder how popular they were!

As regards 47406, although it carried Intercity livery, its regular haunts were the Newcastle - Liverpool trains. The reason given by the club for moving the nameplates to 47488 was that 47406 had been moved to the railfreight sector. In fact, 47406 was moved from provincial to Intercity, for restricted use, namely hauling 225 sets on the non electrified section to Bradford, and weekend diversions.

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That’s interesting about it being used to haul 225 sets. It’s ringing a bell with me now you say it.
A couple of other little details about 47406 too. The high intensity headlight was slightly more offset than usual on the 47s which made it quite distinctive when approaching, along with the fact that (I think) all the Generators had the ETH/ETS supply fitted to the actual bufferbeam.
They also had the boiler ports on the roof still I think, although they had a circular plate fitted over them.
Re the model - I posted a couple of pictures of mine (the one you mentioned) in post #20.

Re 47406 - turns out I did see it; at the weekend my Dad gave me a pic of me leaning out the cab window of said loco! Albeit at an open day.

Bald Rick said:

Re 47406 - turns out I did see it; at the weekend my Dad gave me a pic of me leaning out the cab window of said loco! Albeit at an open day.

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That’s some pretty conclusive evidence.

Cowley said:

That’s some pretty conclusive evidence.

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I know. Particularly embarrassed, as I’m really not interested of trains.

Bald Rick said:

I know. Particularly embarrassed, as I’m really not interested of trains.

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Ah but you had your head out of a class 47 window Rick*. So I put it to you that this evidence, along with the 6000 plus posts on this forum in last eight years, make you very much on the ‘interested’ side of railways...

* The first loco I ever cabbed was a 47, in Nottingham (Midland) station in the 70s.

Cowley said:

Ah but you had your head out of a class 47 window Rick*. So I put it to you that this evidence, along with the 6000 plus posts on this forum in last eight years, make you very much on the ‘interested’ side of railways...

* The first loco I ever cabbed was a 47, in Nottingham (Midland) station in the 70s.

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Railways, guilty m’lud.

Trains, nope. Despite photographic evidence (I was put up to it, guv)

Bald Rick said:

Railways, guilty m’lud.

Trains, nope. Despite photographic evidence (I was put up to it, guv)

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Bet you had a smile on your face though...?

robertclark125 said:

As regards 47406, although it carried Intercity livery, its regular haunts were the Newcastle - Liverpool trains. The reason given by the club for moving the nameplates to 47488 was that 47406 had been moved to the railfreight sector. In fact, 47406 was moved from provincial to Intercity, for restricted use, namely hauling 225 sets on the non electrified section to Bradford, and weekend diversions.

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47406's nameplates were transferred to 47488 in 1988, but the first 225 sets didn't enter service on King's Cross-Leeds(-Bradford) until October 1989, but I would guess that 47406 started seeing use on the King's Cross-Bradfords from that date (and maybe even from March of that year when some temporary sets were formed using a 91 and an HST set, with one HST power car acting as a DVT - does anyone know if 47s such as 47406 were ever used to "drag" those sets?).

The P5 Combined volumes for 1987 and 1988 have 47406 as allocated to Gateshead depot, and although it was a regular on the Liverpool-Newcastle trains it used to get all over the country on Provincial and InterCity trains (and even occasionally on Network SouthEast: I remember seeing it at London Waterloo in 1986 during a Network Day when it had brought in the stock for the Waterloo-Exeter train that I was going on).

The 1990 P5 Combined has 47406 as allocated to Immingham. That is the last year in which it appears in there, and according to http://www.class47.co.uk/c47_numbers.php?s_loco=47406 it was scrapped in December 1995.

AY1975 said:

The P5 Combined volumes for 1987 and 1988 have 47406 as allocated to Gateshead depot, and although it was a regular on the Liverpool-Newcastle trains it used to get all over the country on Provincial and InterCity trains (and even occasionally on Network SouthEast: I remember seeing it at London Waterloo in 1986 during a Network Day when it had brought in the stock for the Waterloo-Exeter train that I was going on).

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Thankyou -- that's confirmed a memory of mine. I was fairly certain that I'd seen 47406 or its successor with the same name passing through Surbiton with an up train in the mid/late 1980s, and I think I had a vague idea that it was on the September 1986 Network Day; your memory suggests that indeed it probably was.

In the 1988 publication "Rail portofilos 7 - the 47s" there's a photo of 47406, with the Rail Riders nameplates, leaving Clapham Junction, 20 minutes late, with the 16:15 Manchester Piccadilly - Newhaven service, so it did find use anywhere!

robertclark125 said:

In the 1988 publication "Rail portofilos 7 - the 47s" there's a photo of 47406, with the Rail Riders nameplates, leaving Clapham Junction, 20 minutes late, with the 16:15 Manchester Piccadilly - Newhaven service, so it did find use anywhere!

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I had a couple of runs behind it around Exeter that year, and I know that it did a Brighton - Exeter run around then too.
In 1988 I managed runs behind a few Generators in Devon. At least 406, 411 and 417.