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Techniquest's Pre and Post BP9.0 Bashes, 16/18th September 2011

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Techniquest

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19 Jun 2005
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Nowhere Heath
Evening all,

A slightly different order than planned, just to mix things up. The Buffer Puffer 9.0, Chilterns bash and LM 150 Farewell trip reports all coming eventually still, don't worry! Without further ado:

16th September 2011 - The WMDR before the tour

Up and about by 0750, 40 minutes early, breakfast consisting of a bowl of Weetos and a coffee, before heading out for a lift up town to get the 0850 bus to Hereford. We arrive there at 0957, so plenty of time to get a coffee from Morrisons and buy my WMDR for £13.20. The time before the 1040 to Birmingham flies by and I get 170634 to Birmingham New Street. Time to get to work on the Southern Quail me thinks, I've well over an hour to get on with it. I consider alighting at one of the Malvern stations to get the 150s on the 1134 from Great Malvern, but stay with 170634 so as to get more work done on the Quail. I then see 37s on a test train, so think how foolish it was to not get off at Great Malvern. They may not have gone that far though, who knows. The rest of the journey passes quickly, and we arrive at platform 9b at New Street, from where I head straight to Moor Street. A delay on a working from Marylebone sees it terminating at Moor Street, and required haulage with 168109 on it then works the 1215 to London. I get it as far as Warwick, and due to misreading the timetable I have to wait until 1327 for the next train. Lunch time then with some ham rolls and a can of Coke.

66556 is filmed at 1258 passing with a Lawley Street-bound Freightliner, and I get on with even more work on that Quail. The gel pen finally gives up, and 66589+518 passes at 1314 on a northbound light engine move. Tomorrow's tour will be followed and coloured in with the old Quail then. 168005, dud, is on the 1327 to Birmingham so I go with the fall-back option of the 1336 to Leamington. Good move as it turned out, as it produced 165012 which I needed for haulage, and a required micro-grice at platform 4 at Leamington. Nicely done, and I get the same 165 back to Warwick Parkway. 165026 is required haulage next on the 1405 to Leamington, at which I get a large tea (for a change) and join dud 165013 on the 1434 to Stratford-upon-Avon. Where I'm alighting I don't yet know, but I did need platform 1 at Leamington so quite pleased with that. I chose to alight at Hatton in the end, as I could grice that one and have a 20 minute wait for the next train to Lapworth, at which I have 44 minutes for the next train back out. I observe 67015 on the 1337 from Marylebone as I wait at Hatton, it being on a scratch set of coaches, some blue/grey, some ex-Virgin and the Chiltern blue/white DVT, altogether it looked odd! 165012 produces on the train to Lapworth, at which I filmed 168215 going south as well as 168002 towards Birmingham and 220002 on an Edinburgh. After the wait at Lapworth, I get 165012 again to Leamington, this time we terminate in platform 3. I had hoped for a crossover into platform 1, but I found out when I got home that no such crossover exists. Oh well!

168111 produces for my next move, dud. Bah, can't be arsed with hanging around here so on I get. At Dorridge, I spy 150107+150002 waiting to leave on the 1646 to Worcester Shrub Hill. Much better than a 168 and my first 150 all day. Don't recall ever getting 150107 before, so definitely worth doing. A nice and noisy journey this one, most enjoyable one of the day. I bail at Tyseley for a station grice, which I had been waiting to keep until I visit the museum, but that gap in my atlas has been bugging me for too long. 66572 is filmed heading south at 1704, with 153334+150019 providing the power and raising the roof soon after with the 1704 to Dorridge. 5 new station grices today so far, not bad. Disappointed how little 150 action I've had, but then I needed those shacks and the Baker will look better. Arrival into Dorridge is at 1725, 3 minutes late. Straight over the bridge for the 1728 to London, as far as Warwick Parkway. After a quick photo, I end up running to the footbridge to join 168111 yet again. If 67014 produces on the 1650 from London and I make it, I'll be well happy!

I finally find the more useful Chiltern timetable at Warwick Parkway which tells me that I'm here too early, so I join 165013 for a quick leap to Leamington to join the 1650 from London there. Just as well, as 70001 turned up on a northbound Freightliner there, which was a required sight. Lovely juvely! No 67014 this time, 67012 produced. Onwards and upwards back to Birmingham and as we leave Leamington at 1803, 66504 passes southbound. No 150s off Dorridge until 1858, so pass on that option. I alight at Moor Street at 1833, 2 minutes early, and I rush to New Street. No 390 on the next Euston yet, then I discover the inward working is 27 down, so I change plans and get to platform 5a for an LM service instead. 350264 turns up so another red-pen move. We wait until 1900 to leave, probably to let the 390 in and load up. Most annoying though, if I'd known I'd have got something for tea! We finally leave and it's a dull journey all the way, thank Goodness I have the MP3 player. Passing the airport, G-JMCG is seen, a definite requirement. I tick off 172334+340 from the earlier sighting of them on Tyseley earlier, and we finally reach Coventry at 1926. A newsagents nearby gets me a small bottle of Dr Pepper, that'll do me for now. No decent food nearby, bah. 90049 rolls in on 1K39 to Crewe, but not before 66620 on a ballast train towards Leamington. We leave about 10 minutes late at 1952, and later in the journey I meet up with some The Messroom members. The whole journey is spent talking trains, and I discover 67015 was swapped with 67014 earlier, d'oh! We arrive at Crewe at 2122 and after a quick photo stop I disappear to the Travelodge for a good night's rest, ahead of a very busy day of touring tomorrow!

18th September 2011 - The trip home

The night soon passes, and an excellent night's sleep was had. De-rancification time, as well as dosing up on coffee before leaving well refreshed. I stop off at Poundland to get some drinks and a new highlighter. Tesco Express is also visited for a lunch stock-up, where I get a sausage, cheese and bacon sandwich, a can of Lucozade and a Twirl for £2.50. At the station, I'm fortunate a Virgin service isn't far away as I get a Virgin only ticket without looking for £1.90. I head to the platform to await a possible red pen move, alas it's 390023 on the 1125 to Wolverhampton, dud. No Virgin service for another hour, so I jump on anyway. I like the Chiltern billboard at Birmingham International "Still a Virgin?", quite well placed! I see in the timetable there's a possible move on the 1217 from Moor Street to Great Malvern, although there'd still be plenty of time to kill in Malvern. We'll see I decide. Our arrival at New Street is at 1147, 2 minutes early and into platform 3. That finishes that platform road for me then, bonus! Off to Moor Street, and yep the 1217 is running right through. 150019 does the honours and we leave 1 minute late due to a fairly high volume of passengers loading and unloading. 150005 is seen as we arrive at Snow Hill on a Stratford-upon-Avon service, and 150002 is filmed from my seat on a Dorridge service at Rowley Regis. Hard to believe it won't be long until the 150s are done with on the Snow Hill lines.

I have my lunch now, and that sandwich was rancid. Why they had to put tomatoes and tomato relish in there I don't know, but I'll be checking the ingredients more thoroughly from now on! The Lucozade and Twirl went down well, and thank Goodness I still have some crisps in my bag. 172345 is seen at Hagley on the 1251 from there to Stratford-upon-Avon, glad I wasn't on that! On Worcester depot was 150001, 150106, various 170s, 153334 and 172213. First 172/2 for sight then, and 150109 was on the siding next to platform 1b. A 14 minute fester here passes relatively quickly, so glad those women got off at Shrub Hill, they were getting on my nerves! The fester at Great Malvern is just shy of an hour, but no problem since I need to get my Baker updated, review photos and video and get my shots of 150019. We arrive at 1342, and sadly my camcorder's touch-screen controls have gone wrong so can't review the footage. Typical as I only recently bought a 10-pack of tapes for the thing. Everything else seems to work, and the thing has put in over 3.5 years of sterling service. I'll try it again at some point, but it does mean another tape is added to the backlog of tapes to work through!

When 150019 returns from its shunt move, it gets shut down, resulting in a very quiet station. When it gets started up again, I record the start-up and departure with the 1435 to New Street. 170634 turns up to take me home and we leave 2 minutes late at 1438. Time for some more tunes before a lift home from Hereford, which we reached at 1510. A brief review of the trip: A damn good trip, very enjoyable and I'd love to do it again. Going to have to find a job which doesn't involve working on Saturdays I think! Some stats:

Total mileage for the two days before and after the tour: 341m48c
Highest mileage on one train: 55m05c on 170634
Lowest mileage on one train: 1m75c on 165012
Best bit of the trip: 150107+150002 on the Dorridge to Tyseley move
Worst bit of the trip: 350264 on the Birmingham to Coventry move

No random quotes as weren't listening out for them then.
 
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