BR Type 3s - Regional Preferences

[hexagon789]

I thought the 25s in two-tone green looked quite smart when new out of shops.

They do in my opinion as well, so do the 27s. Two-tone green looks best on a 47 though, but that's just my opinion.

 

[70014IronDuke]

The GE not having type 4 power is no surprise: there were no hills to need it! What type 4 locos that were available were better sent elsewhere.
As to why the WCML getting class 40s and not Peaks, my guess is that they had little choice. The BR workshops couldn't keep up with a decent rate of production while EE could - so EE got more orders even though the product was inferior, and someone had to use them once they were built. The LNWR got the short straw

The LNW NEVER got the short straw by design, certainly not over the Midland. I admit the 40s on the WCML and 45s on the Midland has puzzled me for some time. The only rational I have been able to come up with is that series production of the 40s was about 12 months or so ahead of series production of the 45s. In other words, the LNW grabbed what it could as soon as it could. But having made the standardised choice, they decided to stick with it, rather than retrain drivers and move all the spares about, all for a few years before the electrics came on.

 

[ge-gn]

The GE not having type 4 power is no surprise: there were no hills to need it! What type 4 locos that were available were better sent elsewhere.
As to why the WCML getting class 40s and not Peaks, my guess is that they had little choice. The BR workshops couldn't keep up with a decent rate of production while EE could - so EE got more orders even though the product was inferior, and someone had to use them once they were built. The LNWR got the short straw

This is a misnomer. The GE mainline, as one of the lesser engineered mainlines, is extremely up and down. They more or less layed the railway over the rolling hills of Suffolk and Norfolk! Indeed, the climb out of Norwich alone up to Dunston from the stops would have been a challenge for a type 4 with 14 on, on a summer Saturday.

 

[Western Lord]

But probably a sight more reliable than the 27s. And in the 1970s there were rather fewer train services out there than now - opportunities to thrash trains all the way on the limit are rather harder to find in 2018.

In the 1970's the Edinburgh-Glasgow service was half hourly all day with one train per hour non stop from Haymarket to Queen Street and the other making one stop at Falkirk High. There may be more trains today, but they stop more frequently and are therefore slower end to end than forty five years ago.

 

[jimm]

In the 1970's the Edinburgh-Glasgow service was half hourly all day with one train per hour non stop from Haymarket to Queen Street and the other making one stop at Falkirk High. There may be more trains today, but they stop more frequently and are therefore slower end to end than forty five years ago.

I wasn't just referring to the Edinburgh-Glasgow via Falkirk services - I was referring to the general number of extra services Scotrail is running in the Central Belt and to places further north that need to be accommodated these days, without big changes in track capacity on sections of the route they share with the Waverley-Queen Street fast services.

More trains running mean shorter headways and mean fewer opportunities to create spaces in the timetable for 37-minute dashes between Haymarket and Glasgow. Which didn't do much for anyone who lived between the two cities - these days serving Falkirk and Cumbernauld (at Croy) are clearly seen as bigger priorities than pure end-to-end speed.

 

[HSTEd]

Bit of an off topic- but related to the regional preferenes thing.

When Electric Train Heating was adopted by the southern, it appears they adopted 750V (dc?), I assume so they could use third rail power directly on the 4REPs and 73s etc etc

Why, when the other regions adopted ETH, did they not adopt the same standard rather than a nominal 1000V supply?

(Is ETS/ETH on non HST units DC or AC? I can imagine it might even be both as required because the only loads originally will be things like series wound motors and heaters that can run on either)

 

[randyrippley]

This is a misnomer. The GE mainline, as one of the lesser engineered mainlines, is extremely up and down. They more or less layed the railway over the rolling hills of Suffolk and Norfolk! Indeed, the climb out of Norwich alone up to Dunston from the stops would have been a challenge for a type 4 with 14 on, on a summer Saturday.

Suffolk and Norfolk? Hills? Come on, you're having a laugh

 

[ge-gn]

Suffolk and Norfolk? Hills? Come on, you're having a laugh

No mirth here. I'm not pretending there are any 6 mile one in eighty climbs through the fells, but barring the Acle-Yarmouth, Downham Market-Lynn, and west of Brandon towards Ely, Suffolk and Norfolk railways and the GEML as a whole are seriously undulating, with some challenging gradients!

 

[Shaw S Hunter]

No mirth here. I'm not pretending there are any 6 mile one in eighty climbs through the fells, but barring the Acle-Yarmouth, Downham Market-Lynn, and west of Brandon towards Ely, Suffolk and Norfolk railways and the GEML as a whole are seriously undulating, with some challenging gradients!

I'm sure many students of loco performance are aware of Brentwood bank. And the climb out of Liverpool Street is quite sharp too.

 

[hexagon789]

I'm sure many students of loco performance are aware of Brentwood bank. And the climb out of Liverpool Street is quite sharp too.

From videos I've seen, the climb out of Queen St seemed to produce pleasing amounts of thrash from locos.

 

[edwin_m]

Bit of an off topic- but related to the regional preferenes thing.

When Electric Train Heating was adopted by the southern, it appears they adopted 750V (dc?), I assume so they could use third rail power directly on the 4REPs and 73s etc etc

Why, when the other regions adopted ETH, did they not adopt the same standard rather than a nominal 1000V supply?

(Is ETS/ETH on non HST units DC or AC? I can imagine it might even be both as required because the only loads originally will be things like series wound motors and heaters that can run on either)

I can't remember the spec in detail but it permits a very wide range of voltage and either AC or DC, probably a range of frequencies too. 750V is probably within the limits for the nominal 1000V.

 

[Cowley]

From videos I've seen, the climb out of Queen St seemed to produce pleasing amounts of thrash from locos.

I’ve been up Cowlairs bank on the Fort William sleepers in the 80s behind a 37 (I seem to remember that being a fairly big load actually), and it was some struggle with wet rails and a roaring exhaust as it kept slipping while trying to get some purchase. It must surely have woken the people in sleeper carriages!

 

[hexagon789]

I’ve been up Cowlairs bank on the Fort William sleepers in the 80s behind a 37 (I seem to remember that being a fairly big load actually), and it was some struggle with wet rails and a roaring exhaust as it kept slipping while trying to get some purchase. It must surely have woken the people in sleeper carriages!

That’s definitely one of few sounds I wouldn't mind being woken to!

 

[hexagon789]

That or a Shove Duff

 

[fowler9]

I’ve been up Cowlairs bank on the Fort William sleepers in the 80s behind a 37 (I seem to remember that being a fairly big load actually), and it was some struggle with wet rails and a roaring exhaust as it kept slipping while trying to get some purchase. It must surely have woken the people in sleeper carriages!

Yeah, I've done that on the sleeper. Amazing.

 

[Taunton]

From videos I've seen, the climb out of Queen St seemed to produce pleasing amounts of thrash from locos.

Even in the mid-1970s bankers were still employed here, typically the loco which had brought in the incoming stock. Class 47s to Aberdeen and Class 27s on West Highland trains were assisted out of the station and up the bank. On right away, horn from the train loco, and horn from the rear loco, which then started to push. Departures from the east side platforms would be out on the inbound side of the approach tunnel, then over the crossover at the tunnel mouth to the outbound track, by when if both crews had used full power quite a speed might be obtained, and the unattached banker would make a notable rock and roll as it negotiated the crossover. The morning 2x27 push-pull I regularly took to Edinburgh was preceded by an Aberdeen-headed Class 47, and I always went to the platform end before departure to watch the spectacle.

 

[hexagon789]

Even in the mid-1970s bankers were still employed here, typically the loco which had brought in the incoming stock. Class 47s to Aberdeen and Class 27s on West Highland trains were assisted out of the station and up the bank. On right away, horn from the train loco, and horn from the rear loco, which then started to push. Departures from the east side platforms would be out on the inbound side of the approach tunnel, then over the crossover at the tunnel mouth to the outbound track, by when if both crews had used full power quite a speed might be obtained, and the unattached banker would make a notable rock and roll as it negotiated the crossover. The morning 2x27 push-pull I regularly took to Edinburgh was preceded by an Aberdeen-headed Class 47, and I always went to the platform end before departure to watch the spectacle.

Sounds like quite the performance. The only videos I've seen are all late 1980s, 1986-1990. In all those, no loco hauled trains were banked, did the practise end towards the mid to late '80s do you know?

 

[D5645]

That or a Shove Duff

47/7's were great fun blasting up the Queen Street tunnel.

Most of the drivers seemed to give them some hammer.

 

[hexagon789]

47/7's were great fun blasting up the Queen Street tunnel.

Most of the drivers seemed to give them some hammer.

Unless they were DBSO leading, then you had to take it easy I've been told. They do sound good thrashing up Cowlairs though.

 

[Bevan Price]

Sounds like quite the performance. The only videos I've seen are all late 1980s, 1986-1990. In all those, no loco hauled trains were banked, did the practise end towards the mid to late '80s do you know?

From the mid-1980s until dmus arrived, all the Glasgow - Edinburgh fasts, and most of the Aberdeen services were booked for 47/7 + push-pull set, and these were not banked.

 

[hexagon789]

From the mid-1980s until dmus arrived, all the Glasgow - Edinburgh fasts, and most of the Aberdeen services were booked for 47/7 + push-pull set, and these were not banked.

I knew that, sorry. I was more meaning when bankers became redundant.