Jump to content
 

LSL Blue Pullman HST


TravisM
 Share

Recommended Posts

  • RMweb Premium
3 hours ago, fiftyfour fiftyfour said:

Not convinced. A lesson in how to make the most successful diesel train ever look like the least successful one.

 

If Hornby do model it they will need to add the cab roof mounted headlight, they certainly don't have a buffet coach to deal with the four window 408xx type and they certainly won't be able to cope with the modified TGF vehicle.


when had that stopped Hornby?   Could even be a Trainset with Limby powercars 

  • Like 1
  • Agree 2
Link to post
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, fiftyfour fiftyfour said:

Not convinced. A lesson in how to make the most successful diesel train ever look like the least successful one.

 

If Hornby do model it they will need to add the cab roof mounted headlight, they certainly don't have a buffet coach to deal with the four window 408xx type and they certainly won't be able to cope with the modified TGF vehicle.

The second kitchen car, 40802, is heavily modified on one side with only 1 window left

 

http://www.carlswatson.com/Trains/Galleries 2020/G202010/20201016ArlingtonEastleighWorks/mk3tk40802eastleighworks16thoctober20203.html

  • Informative/Useful 3
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

London St Pancras International  - St Albans  -  Ambergate - Chesterfield - Hope Valley - Stockport - Crewe - Stoke-on-Trent - Tamworth - Nuneaton - Leicester - Melton Mowbray -  Bedford  -  St. Albans - London St. Pancras International

 

(Published before the new lockdown in England)

Edited by Metr0Land
spelling
Link to post
Share on other sites

19 hours ago, black and decker boy said:

The second kitchen car, 40802, is heavily modified on one side with only 1 window left

 

http://www.carlswatson.com/Trains/Galleries 2020/G202010/20201016ArlingtonEastleighWorks/mk3tk40802eastleighworks16thoctober20203.html

Makes it easier to model at home I guess, just blank the whole lot off bar that one! 

Link to post
Share on other sites

That is the only livery put on an HST since the very first one that has made me say "Oh, yes!". I would actually make the effort to go and see that zooming through the countryside.

 

IMO, the first livery looked superb, suitably "shock of the new" at the time, while this one evokes the earlier Pullman "product" brilliantly. 

 

I do think its about evoking the whole Pullman experience though, not merely some "fancied-up Hastings units" that Triang made models of - the look and feel of retro-luxury has to carry into the interior, the service, the staff uniforms etc, otherwise its just a gricer's paint job.

 

Please confirm that the LSL HST Driver Training includes being issued with a milkman's uniform.

 

 

Edited by Nearholmer
  • Like 6
  • Agree 3
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Premium

When I first heard about this I was quite unimpressed at the idea. Having seen it, I am won over.

 

It just goes to show that people who designed liveries many decades ago sometimes got it right and it is a thousand times better looking, more elegant and stylish than most modern "splash another coloured vinyl on somewhere" styles.

  • Like 1
  • Agree 5
Link to post
Share on other sites

Did everybody get this excited 15 years ago when a rake of ex Virgin Mk2's was done in the same colour?! Livery opinion is of course subjective, for what its worth in my view the finest livery to ever grace a HST was Intercity Swallow, but all of this goes to show that give a failed product long enough (the original Class 250/251 DEMUs had one of the shortest and most inglorious careers in railway history) and some peoples rose tinted specs will have been re-calibrated to forgive and forget just about anything!

  • Agree 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, fiftyfour fiftyfour said:

Did everybody get this excited 15 years ago when a rake of ex Virgin Mk2's was done in the same colour?!

 

I very much doubt it.

 

Its the power cars that do it.

 

And, yes, of course its subjective, but so much about marketing is. To me this is about evoking the Pullman experience, and probably evoking a few cosy memories of Triang train-sets, both of which are very good ways to market anything to the railway-inclined demographic that buys seats on railtours.

 

 

  • Like 1
  • Agree 2
Link to post
Share on other sites

On 02/11/2020 at 09:43, Metr0Land said:

London St Pancras International  - St Albans  -  Ambergate - Chesterfield - Hope Valley - Stockport - Crewe - Stoke-on-Trent - Tamworth - Nuneaton - Leicester - Melton Mowbray -  Bedford  -  St. Albans - London St. Pancras International

 

(Published before the new lockdown in England)

Launch trip postponed to 12th December now.

  • Informative/Useful 3
Link to post
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, fiftyfour fiftyfour said:

Did everybody get this excited 15 years ago when a rake of ex Virgin Mk2's was done in the same colour?! Livery opinion is of course subjective, for what its worth in my view the finest livery to ever grace a HST was Intercity Swallow, but all of this goes to show that give a failed product long enough (the original Class 250/251 DEMUs had one of the shortest and most inglorious careers in railway history) and some peoples rose tinted specs will have been re-calibrated to forgive and forget just about anything!

Hi There,

 

I think there are two reasons that the effect of the whole train works better than the Mk2's, they are that the blue is carried up to the first rib of the roof which is above the level of the gutters on the Mk2's just like the Metro-Camm Pullman, and as Nearhomer mentioned the power cars make a difference also.

 

The train may look better again if the set is reduced length to prevent it from looking too stretched out, also the power cars will have a greater visual effect upon a short set of perhaps just five or six cars rather than eight.

 

Gibbo.

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Premium

Didn't the Mk2 Pullman set last a matter of months if not weeks because FM Rail I think it was went bust or something?

 

Anyway, especially without yellow panels, sorry I think it is hideous....

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

Eager to dust off my second-best frock coat and start saving my pennies for the Restaurant Car experience I was too poor to enjoy when younger, I saw then on the firm's web-pages:

 

"Covid-19 Social Distancing Seating – Bookings of two passengers will be seated together at a ‘guaranteed window table for two’ with a mandatory supplement of £35 per person charged."

 

On top of a charge of £310 each for the "Pullman Dining" menu (unspecified), am I alone in thinking this is 'a bit off'?!  And why do they discriminate against single travellers, demanding a minimum of two persons booking?  I hope it is just a temporary Covid-19 cost, but I have my doubts.  Perhaps I will stay at home and iron my double-damask table-linens instead...

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

11 minutes ago, John M Upton said:

Didn't the Mk2 Pullman set last a matter of months if not weeks because FM Rail I think it was went bust or something?

 

Anyway, especially without yellow panels, sorry I think it is hideous....

 

A faithful replica then.

The original looked like someone had copied a plastic model after it had partially melted. It was the ugliest train I have ever seen by a massive margin.

It was also a technical disaster, failing on its 2 simple design briefs: to provide luxury travel at 100mph. It was quickly downgraded to 90 because it was gutless & the ride at speed was terrible. It provided nothing which was not available from other train designs. (Coronation Scot had air con 23 years earlier).

 

I am stunned anyone fondly remembers something which was such a complete disaster on all levels.

Link to post
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, fiftyfour fiftyfour said:

Did everybody get this excited 15 years ago when a rake of ex Virgin Mk2's was done in the same colour?! Livery opinion is of course subjective, for what its worth in my view the finest livery to ever grace a HST was Intercity Swallow, but all of this goes to show that give a failed product long enough (the original Class 250/251 DEMUs had one of the shortest and most inglorious careers in railway history) and some peoples rose tinted specs will have been re-calibrated to forgive and forget just about anything!

Irrespective of whether the original Blue Pullman was a failed product or not, it is surely about the Pullman brand which Jeremy Hosking is recreating here. He and his people have taken the opportunity of acquiring surplus HST power cars and trailers and making them into a luxury dining cruise using the Blue Pullman brand style. Not many people can do that and I take my hat off to LSL and Saphos wishing them every success.

 

AIUI LSL have enough vehicles to make up two 2+8 sets with a few spares.  Perhaps the second set is going to appear in Intercity Executive or Swallow branding like the loco hauled Mk3s they have. 

  • Like 1
  • Agree 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, Pete the Elaner said:

I am stunned anyone fondly remembers something which was such a complete disaster on all levels.

 

I'd bet that the number of people who have fond memories of travelling on it can be counted on one finger, but that the number of people who saw it from the line-side, caught the glamour from photos in magazines, and, biggest of all, either had or wanted a Triang one is very significant.

 

The recent r-t-r 00 (and N?) models of it are at the more luxury-end of toy trains, but they seem to have sold well enough, and not I'd guess to people who rode on it.

Link to post
Share on other sites

4 minutes ago, Pete the Elaner said:

I am stunned anyone fondly remembers something which was such a complete disaster on all levels.

 

That will be why BR(WR) hung on to theirs for so long then, and didn't immediately consign them to the scrapyards. As for spending money on them fitting multi working equipment to the ex Midland units - clearly a total disaster as you report. !!!

 

 

 

 

  • Agree 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold
12 minutes ago, Pete the Elaner said:

 

A faithful replica then.

The original looked like someone had copied a plastic model after it had partially melted. It was the ugliest train I have ever seen by a massive margin.

It was also a technical disaster, failing on its 2 simple design briefs: to provide luxury travel at 100mph. It was quickly downgraded to 90 because it was gutless & the ride at speed was terrible. It provided nothing which was not available from other train designs. (Coronation Scot had air con 23 years earlier).

 

I am stunned anyone fondly remembers something which was such a complete disaster on all levels.

 

A lot of locomotives and diesel units of that era did not live up to expectations. But railway enthusiasts can be a bit perverse about the failures: Fell, Clayton, Trans-Pennine,......

 

I have always liked the Blue Pullman even though I was not a diesel enthusiast. Never travelled on it but did have my packed lunch on board when it was parked up at OOC (school railway society depot bash). In a more optimistic era for the railways than the 1960s were, I am sure that the problems could have been sorted.

Link to post
Share on other sites

I'd like to go and see this train on Dec 12th but does anyone have details of the outbound route from St Albans to Ambergate please? 

 

Ideally, I'd like to have seen it cross Harringworth viaduct on the return journey but I suspect it will be dark by the time it gets there. It would be nice if it took this route on the way north.

 

Graham

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold
15 minutes ago, dagrizz said:

I'd like to go and see this train on Dec 12th but does anyone have details of the outbound route from St Albans to Ambergate please? 

 

Ideally, I'd like to have seen it cross Harringworth viaduct on the return journey but I suspect it will be dark by the time it gets there. It would be nice if it took this route on the way north.

 

Graham

 

Details of timings on their website.

  • Thanks 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

20 minutes ago, dagrizz said:

details of the outbound route from St Albans to Ambergate please

For the previous date, it was to have been via Leicester (I think) and definitely Toton (not via Ambergate), but the rearranged date isn't on realtimetrains yet.

However, the midlandpullman website as RFS pointed out has:

Quote

...through Kettering and along the Midland Main Line and the Erewash Valley. At Chesterfield we join the Hope Valley...

 

Edited by eastwestdivide
  • Thanks 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold
3 hours ago, Pete the Elaner said:

 

It was also a technical disaster, failing on its 2 simple design briefs: to provide luxury travel at 100mph. It was quickly downgraded to 90 because it was gutless & the ride at speed was terrible. It provided nothing which was not available from other train designs. (Coronation Scot had air con 23 years earlier).

 

Which 100 mph line was it supposed to run on?

 

I thought the main aim of the Midland Pullman was to retain the business passengers between Manchester and London, while the WCML electrification took place. It seemed to have achieved that - the electric Manchester Pullman proved viable for about another 20 years afterwards.

  • Agree 4
Link to post
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, Covkid said:

Irrespective of whether the original Blue Pullman was a failed product or not, it is surely about the Pullman brand which Jeremy Hosking is recreating here. He and his people have taken the opportunity of acquiring surplus HST power cars and trailers and making them into a luxury dining cruise using the Blue Pullman brand style. Not many people can do that and I take my hat off to LSL and Saphos wishing them every success.

 

AIUI LSL have enough vehicles to make up two 2+8 sets with a few spares.  Perhaps the second set is going to appear in Intercity Executive or Swallow branding like the loco hauled Mk3s they have. 

Well, its his money to sink into whatever flight of fancy he likes I suppose! Pullman dining is (or was pre Covid) still available on GWR but the notion of running an all First Class, all dining service train was abandoned by the mid 1980's almost certainly never to return. The product is designed to appeal to the general public and in that respect its starting from scratch as very people alive today were regular travellers on high end Pullman trains back in the day, its beyond the pockets of most enthusiasts even non-dining where a pair of us would have to pay £880 for one of the three day trips without even a morsel of food or any overnight accommodation. 

Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...