Class 37/0 Tail Lights

[admiles]

Trying to find out if class 37/0s in the late 80's / early 90's had one or two tail lights operational.

 

Obviously there are two fittings but were both illuminated at the same time? Any one know for sure?

 

I know class 50's for example although fitted with two only ever had one lit and it could be switched

between drivers and secondmans side. Were the 37/0s the same?

[keefer]

I mistakenly posted this in another thread, but it does apply here!

Locos historically only showed one tail light, as did trains (except Royal trains)

However with the Edinburgh-Glasgow push-pulls, there was an instruction that they had to show two reds at the back. This started with the cl.27 + MK2 trains and carried on with the cl.47 + DBSO sets.

If one of the loco tail lights failed, then a tail lamp had to be carried as well.

But this all only applied when a loco was on the rear of a p-p train.

 

Light loco moves would still have only one tail light.

[Ken.W]

By the late 80s the rule would have been for for both to be lit.

IIRC, the change  came in the early 80s and prior to this it would have been only one, two tail lamps being restricted to the Royal train.

 

EE locos always had individual switches  for each side, others like 47s which had an either or switch were modified to switch both on together when the change took place

 

This rule change also applied to trains fitted with electric tail lamps

Edited July 27, 2020 by Ken.W

[cravensdmufan]

Interesting and informative replies there from @keefer and @Ken.W

 

A pet hate of mine are models of older diesel and electric locos with two rear red lights which even after CV adjustments are always too bright anyway.

 

I have modified most of mine that have LEDs in a very Heath Robinson way - small blob of black tac over one to block it entirely, and masking tape coloured over with black Sharpie pen to further dim the other, so it just glimmers.  I use the tape method for front marker lights as well.  Very crude, but it works.  Electronics experts will have far better work arounds I'm sure!

Edited July 27, 2020 by cravensdmufan
To specify "LEDs" (which do not emit heat)

[keefer]

Another one to consider is 1st. Gen. DMUs - think it was only early/mid '80s when the red electric tail lights were allowed. Up until then all they showed at the back was a good old fashioned tail lamp. I'm sure I've read it was because there wasn't a back-up power supply for the market lights.

So anyone with an all-singing and dancing recent model with switchable LEDs, but based before say, 1982, will be wasting their time seeing up the red lights.

And as you point out, the old 40/60w bulbs were so dim as to be invisible in decent daylight!

Edited July 27, 2020 by keefer

[Ken.W]

 The marker lights on 1st Gen DMUs had two bulbs in them, but both white, so if one failed you could switch over to the other.

 

Sometime around the time of the change in using both electric tail lamps referred to above, one of the white bulbs in the DMU markers was replaced with a red one to be used as tail lamps.

 

I passed on DMUs mid-81, the change was I think shortly after, or maybe just before, then.

[Ken.W]

3 hours ago, keefer said:

And as you point out, the old 40/60w bulbs were so dim as to be invisible in decent daylight!

 

40/60w? that's generous, more like 2 candle power I think.

 

I remember a close encounter with a cow on a 101, 3am, pitch black, 50mph

 

... saw the thing standing in front of us at about 3 yards!!

 

"Oh there's a cow"...

 

then it was already dragging under the leading bogie by the time I banged the brake on

[The Stationmaster]

14 hours ago, keefer said:

Another one to consider is 1st. Gen. DMUs - think it was only early/mid '80s when the red electric tail lights were allowed. Up until then all they showed at the back was a good old fashioned tail lamp. I'm sure I've read it was because there wasn't a back-up power supply for the market lights.

So anyone with an all-singing and dancing recent model with switchable LEDs, but based before say, 1982, will be wasting their time seeing up the red lights.

And as you point out, the old 40/60w bulbs were so dim as to be invisible in decent daylight!

They were really not much different from a trimmed oil lamp and that is what they should be compared with.  They were only there so that various members of staff could see that a train was complete and for no other reason.  And the big problem using the inbuilt lights as tail lamps in earlier years on 1sr generation DMUs was the lack of battery power to keep them illuminated for any length of time with the engines shut down - hence the need to use a proper tail lamp.

 

As Ken has related they certainly were not meant as headlights in the sense of the way a motorist would think of his car headlights  and it was of course just as easy to hit a cow etc in broad daylight but with the big difference, especially on a DMU, that it gave the Driver a chance to 'head for cover' in case the windscreen went (or worse).

[admiles]

Thanks for the answers and info everyone. Most interesting!

 

I'll go with both lit and yes they'll be dimmed down to a suitable level.

[F-UnitMad]

16 hours ago, keefer said:

the old 40/60w bulbs were so dim as to be invisible in decent daylight!

To the extent that I don't even bother with lights on my BR diesels, disconnecting or otherwise disabling them entirely, & that's in O Scale!!

[daveyb]

When I was on work experience at St. Pancras in '85, I was told that the 127s had only been allowed to use their built in taillights for the last 18 months of their life. The reason I was given was that the unions had not agreed the phasing out of the lamp lighters job, but he retired and they quickly and quietly forgot about it!

Edited July 29, 2020 by daveyb
Auto corrects not correct!

[Covkid]

On 29/07/2020 at 03:29, daveyb said:

When I was on work experience at St. Pancras in '85, I was told that the 127s had only been allowed to use their built in taillights for the last 18 months of their life. The reason I was given was that the unions had not agreed the phasing out of the lamp lighters job, but he retired and they quickly and quietly forgot about it!

 

On 27/07/2020 at 19:36, keefer said:

Another one to consider is 1st. Gen. DMUs - think it was only early/mid '80s when the red electric tail lights were allowed. Up until then all they showed at the back was a good old fashioned tail lamp. I'm sure I've read it was because there wasn't a back-up power supply for the market lights.

So anyone with an all-singing and dancing recent model with switchable LEDs, but based before say, 1982, will be wasting their time seeing up the red lights.

And as you point out, the old 40/60w bulbs were so dim as to be invisible in decent daylight!

 

I started on BR in July 1978 (was it really 42 years ago !!!) and in those days our station porters spent a portion of the time in the lamp hut preparing both oil lamps for signals, and tail lamps for the trains. It always struck me as odd that the DMUs had to carry an oil lamp on the back, even though there were electric lights on the cab fronts.  I may not have known at the time that the standard DMU marker light had slots in the lower half to take coloured shades - actually red coloured shades.

 

It was explained to me back then by a signalman, that the white oil tail lamp on the rear of a train was to allow the "bobby" to note the train was complete.  An electric light on the end of the train was not sufficient apparently. As Ken suggested, this practice changed around 1981 or 1982, but I had transferred into freight by then so wasn't aware.    

[Ken.W]

On 30/07/2020 at 15:57, Covkid said:

I started on BR in July 1978 (was it really 42 years ago !!!)  

 

Yes , I'm afraid it was. I took retirement last October, having started Sept.77.

 

As others have also commented, the marker and tail lights on 1st gen locos / units were very poor. Basically, unless you're running your trains in the dark then, if you can see they're lit at normal scale viewing distance, then they're too bright!

Also consider locos with headcode blinds where you see models with the lights shining brightly through them. Really? These used the same dim bulbs, shining through characters in effectively  blackout  blinds - you'd just about see them lit in the dark! In the incident I related above of DMU vs cow, at least with the DMU's markers I had the advantage of knowing afterwards what it was that I had hit!!

 

As Mike The Stationmaster brought up earlier,there was also the issue of battery power. Probably the most common question I had from enthusiast friends about the DMUs was why we never shut them down when leaving them stabled in platforms? Well, quite frankly, because you would never trust the b*****s to start back up again.

 

An even bigger issue though with lights as fitted to models, most have no way of switching the head and tail lights separately. As Covkid has said above, tail lamps have a very specific purpose in the regulations - to indicate to signalers, or any other staff observing it, that the train's complete. As such, having tail lights lit between any vehicles - the rear of a loco haling a train, or between units coupled, should be an absolute anathema - no train should be seen running like this  - it wouldn't have got further than the first signal box.

 

With these issues with them, I tend to see working lights, at least on 1st gen stock, as train set gimmickry, and feel they're best turned off or disconnected.

 

It's not just 1st gen. stock that could have problems with lights being seen either. I've had occasion, having left Kings X with an HST being stopped at Holloway for the signaler to inform me the station staff's reported the tail lights weren't lit. On having to walk back along the ballast to check I find, as expected, they are lit, it's just the sun shining directly on them.

Edited July 31, 2020 by Ken.W

[45125]

On 31/07/2020 at 23:31, Ken.W said:

 

Yes , I'm afraid it was. I took retirement last October, having started Sept.77.

 

As others have also commented, the marker and tail lights on 1st gen locos / units were very poor. Basically, unless you're running your trains in the dark then, if you can see they're lit at normal scale viewing distance, then they're too bright!

Also consider locos with headcode blinds where you see models with the lights shining brightly through them. Really? These used the same dim bulbs, shining through characters in effectively  blackout  blinds - you'd just about see them lit in the dark! In the incident I related above of DMU vs cow, at least with the DMU's markers I had the advantage of knowing afterwards what it was that I had hit!!

 

As Mike The Stationmaster brought up earlier,there was also the issue of battery power. Probably the most common question I had from enthusiast friends about the DMUs was why we never shut them down when leaving them stabled in platforms? Well, quite frankly, because you would never trust the b*****s to start back up again.

 

An even bigger issue though with lights as fitted to models, most have no way of switching the head and tail lights separately. As Covkid has said above, tail lamps have a very specific purpose in the regulations - to indicate to signalers, or any other staff observing it, that the train's complete. As such, having tail lights lit between any vehicles - the rear of a loco haling a train, or between units coupled, should be an absolute anathema - no train should be seen running like this  - it wouldn't have got further than the first signal box.

 

With these issues with them, I tend to see working lights, at least on 1st gen stock, as train set gimmickry, and feel they're best turned off or disconnected.

 

It's not just 1st gen. stock that could have problems with lights being seen either. I've had occasion, having left Kings X with an HST being stopped at Holloway for the signaler to inform me the station staff's reported the tail lights weren't lit. On having to walk back along the ballast to check I find, as expected, they are lit, it's just the sun shining directly on them.

You most have the same with MK4s and 91s Ken, as the we have to check then at Donny numerous times.

Al Taylor