Northern extent of Southern Region 3rd rail in 1960s

[Oldddudders]

2 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

Feltham, Norwood, and Hither Green were the main yards, and as you say there were trips between these and the other big nodal yards Willesden, Brent, Acton, and (to a lesser extent) Ferme Park and, I think, Stratford. This pattern existed from the 1910s to c1980.

Temple Mills rather than Stratford?

[Nearholmer]

That’s right. I knew I was on dodgy ground saying Stratford.

[Nearholmer]

1 hour ago, nigb55009 said:

Unfortunately I haven`t been able to find where this line would have terminated, or if it was meant to go beyond Cambridge Heath.

I’m fairly certain it was to make a junction at Cambridge Heath, not go beyond there. In another thread (no, I can’t remember which!), I described a delve into the parliamentary Acts relating to it, and the fact that some traces of the intended route are visible in street patterns at Cambridge Heath, presumably where land was bought for it, then later sold off for housing development.

[phil_sutters]

In the Wiki page I linked earlier, the spur seems to have been used to access wagon lifts taking 2 10ton wagons up to the GER depot. It is stated that this was to reduce or obviate the need to run goods trains round into Liverpool Street passenger station where they had to be reversed.

[jim.snowdon]

6 hours ago, SteveyDee68 said:

Thank you for the replies - I see I need to do some serious staring at maps and further reading!

 

Understanding reality is step one of trying to determine a plausible "what if" scenario that joined SR 3rd rail to WCML OHLE to allow electric haulage of both freight and passenger long haul trains, avoiding London in the process. Rewriting history (a bit!) to provide a backstory where progressive minded government gave priority to improving the national railways rather than motorway building, for a reimagined Newhaven as a major port, and in the process giving me an excuse to 'backdate' a class 92* to transitional era as a dual-system electric loco.

 

Hat, coat ...

 

 

* Of course, I would lose various diesel classes as never being developed due to an earlier push for electric traction... imagine a world without 'sheds'!! 

 

 

Don't forget that at one time, the North & South Western Junction Railway was electrified, using the LNWR 4th rail system, down as far as Kew Bridge, where it almost met the LSWR's 3rd rail system. With the LNWR's system having an insulated return, compared to the LSWR's running rail return, through running would not have been feasible (although the technology was already in use in the Liverpool area that would allow electric trains to change from 3rd rail to 4th rail by reconnecting the negative terminals of the train to either 4th rail collector shoes or via the wheels for running rail return.

 

Jim

[nigb55009]

Thanks for your replies gentlemen, it`s much appreciated. As stated on the wiki page, coal would have been the main reason for developing the route as a freight artery. I would assume  that the Graham Road curve would have been built much earlier than it actually was. That would give access to the ECML and WCML, via the North London Line, but no mention is made of passenger trains. Would they  terminate at Cambridge Heath or would further electrification via Graham Road have taken trains Dalston Junction then into Broad St? Even trains along the NLL as now, were trains from the  former   Southern Region now run via the ELL and terminate at Highbury and Islington. The present day route of the ELL is over the GEML at Shoreditch and up to Dalston Junction.

I`m in the process of planning a layout based on current NLL/ELL, third rail DC lines run parallel with 25kv overhead lines, but change the traction to the early 1970s. This would allow SR EMUs to run alongside AC electrics, as well as classic diesel traction. My preferred location is between Canonbury Junction and Dalston Western Junction, as this would mean loco hauled services, as well as DMUs could run to Broad St from the ECML. I have always been interested in  the cross London lines because of the wide variety of locomotive classes which used the routes, both steam and diesel. If, like me, you want to run classes which would otherwise be incompatible, it`s the ideal solution.

Unlike other might have been scenarios, history has already made it possible, all I want to do is change the time frame.

Thanks again for all your help, Nige.

[bike2steam]

On 09/06/2021 at 23:34, SteveyDee68 said:

 

I'm trying to determine a route through Southern territory from Newhaven* to join up with the West Coast Main Line, avoiding the congestion of London, in order to provide a fast route to the South coast from the North/Midlands in the 1960s. Trying to find out which lines were powered by 3rd rail during the 1960s is proving harder than I ever imagined!

 

 

The ELL with it's northern end going right into Liverpool Street would be the least option for that kind of working!!!!!!!!!!!! Likewise what was the freight only Snow Hill tunnel line, taking into consideration the restrictions on Blackfriars Bridge.

[Nearholmer]

11 hours ago, nigb55009 said:

third rail DC lines run parallel with 25kv overhead lines, but change the traction to the early 1970s. This

Why not make your fiction a bit less imaginative, and settle for NLL dc, running alongside 25KV? Plenty to extrapolate from in the Willesden area, and it would easy to include Bakerloo line stock and freight too.

[nigb55009]

7 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Why not make your fiction a bit less imaginative, and settle for NLL dc, running alongside 25KV? Plenty to extrapolate from in the Willesden area, and it would easy to include Bakerloo line stock and freight too.

The Willesden area does have its attractions, but my preferred location would be able to run SR EMUs on the DC lines, rather than class 501s. I don`t have the skills to convert Bachmann 2EPBs to NLL stock, I suppose it`s a bit of a compromise really, but it means I can also operate local trains from the ECML into Liverpool St, via the Graham Rd curve, as happened after the closure of Broad St. Cross London freight adds to the variety of locos and rolling stock too.

[Hal Nail]

10 hours ago, nigb55009 said:

The Willesden area does have its attractions

Not a phrase you hear often!

[Nearholmer]

10 hours ago, nigb55009 said:

I don`t have the skills to convert Bachmann 2EPBs to NLL stock,

 

Hornby Dublo made a pretty passable 501, which obviates the need to convert anything, even though they somehow seemed to imply that it was a Southern unit - maybe everything south of the Watford Gap is "southern" from Liverpool.

[phil-b259]

22 hours ago, jim.snowdon said:

Don't forget that at one time, the North & South Western Junction Railway was electrified, using the LNWR 4th rail system, down as far as Kew Bridge, where it almost met the LSWR's 3rd rail system. With the LNWR's system having an insulated return, compared to the LSWR's running rail return, through running would not have been feasible (although the technology was already in use in the Liverpool area that would allow electric trains to change from 3rd rail to 4th rail by reconnecting the negative terminals of the train to either 4th rail collector shoes or via the wheels for running rail return.

 

Jim

 

No need for any fancy changeable stuff on board the train! As the LSWR proved when it Electrified the East Putney to Wimbledon section in partnership with the 4 rail District Railway  you simply bond the centre negative rail to the running rail.

 

i.e. an infrastructure solution rather than a train solution.

 

 

(Does rather make things a pain in the backside for S&T people though)

[Pacific231G]

46 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

 

No need for any fancy changeable stuff on board the train! As the LSWR proved when it Electrified the East Putney to Wimbledon section in partnership with the 4 rail District Railway  you simply bond the centre negative rail to the running rail.

 

i.e. an infrastructure solution rather than a train solution.

 

 

(Does rather make things a pain in the backside for S&T people though)

ISTR there was a bit more to it for the Underground stock as the outer rail was now at a higher voltage than Underground's normal +420V. Not a problem if the electrical systems were designed with that in mind which they probably were. 

[DY444]

8 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

ISTR there was a bit more to it for the Underground stock as the outer rail was now at a higher voltage than Underground's normal +420V. Not a problem if the electrical systems were designed with that in mind which they probably were. 

 

I'm not an electrical engineer so may well be talking through my hat (not for the first time), but I don't see why the train would care what the positive conductor rail voltage was relative to earth as long as the voltage across its shoegear was what it was expecting. 

 

I'm not sure about nowadays but there was a time when negative earth faults on the Underground were relatively common which in effect creates the same situation seen on the dual 3/4 rail sections of the negative conductor rail tied to earth.  Iirc this created a larger risk of a coincident positive earth fault causing an arc and a fire (which is obviously serious) but otherwise as far as I'm aware did not affect the operation of a train's electrical systems.  Designing (and maintaining) shoegear, on board cabling, connectors etc to try and avoid power earth faults is generally a good idea anyway so I'm struggling to see what differences you would expect to find in 1972 stock compared to 1973 stock simply because the former operates north of Queens Park.   However I'm sure someone will enlighten us.

[Nearholmer]

I am a railway traction power supply engineer, and you’ve got it pretty much right.

 

There are a few subtleties, in that creepage and clearance distances, especially around shoegear, which is in a cramped locations on tube trains, have not always been as great on fourth-rail trains as on third-rail trains, because they are designed to operate with split potential. The creepage and clearance distances should still be sufficient to operate with all potential on one pole, but there have been cases in the past where things didn’t go quite to plan, and flashovers occured at negative shoe gear, even when operating on split potential. LU suffered from a few incidents involving very, very nasty persistent arcing under train floors as a result of this in the 1940/50s. Modern trains have very carefully designed protection against this.

 

The LU system operates with the split in potential sensibly fixed by “ballast resistors” connected pole-earth-pole, and for many years has had monitoring systems to detect pole-to-earth faults and procedures to minimise the risk of coincident pole-earth-pole faults. I’ve long tried to discover exactly when the ballast resistors and fault detection were first fitted, and to discover whether the LNWR/LMS network in London had them, and I’m still not totally certain on either point.

 

 

Edited June 12, 2021 by Nearholmer

[roythebus1]

Remember the Snow hill line had a very frequent passenger service since its inception up to W2 when services were suspended. The line was of critical importance to freight as one of the new north-south links.

 

Camden Road was one of the places where 4 rail dc and 25kv ran alongside each other for quite a distance. Indeed special trains were run from Camden Road to Coventry and Birmingham in 1966 or 67 with AM10s to celebrate the opening of "Britain's new electric Railway". I still have my ticket somewhere. Camden provided an alternative change over from electric to diesel for freight liners to to East Anglia for many years.

 

I wouldn't see any benefit running trains from the south east into Broad Street instead of Liverpool Street, the 2 stations were next door to each other and had a mean height difference of about 50'!

 

Otherwise any cross-London stuff was WLL or the Acton Wells-Kew Junction line. 

[phil-b259]

11 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

ISTR there was a bit more to it for the Underground stock as the outer rail was now at a higher voltage than Underground's normal +420V. Not a problem if the electrical systems were designed with that in mind which they probably were. 

 

The point is the potential difference!

 

+420 and -210 (which is how a 4 rail system is configured) gives a potential difference of 630V

 

+660V and 0V gives a potential difference of 660V (i.e. pretty much the same)

 

Post 1932 Southern an British Rail electrification schemes use a higher 750V rating to provide more power, but the inner suburban areas had to say at the lower 660V until either (i) The last of the pre 1932 electric stock (like the Bulleid 4-SUBs) was withdrawn or (ii) London Underground introduced their 'S Stock' which was designed to allow for an upgrading of the power supply to 750V (still split 2/3rds positive, 1/3rd negative)

[mike morley]

I spent most of the 1980's working in Scrubs Lane, NW10.  The bridge over the WCML at Willesden was 100 yards up the road, the bridge over the West of England Main Line at Old Oak Common was 100 yards down the road.  If I looked out of my office window, directly opposite was the back of the signal box at Mitre Bridge Junction, which in those days was the exchange point between freight trains heading north or south.  The actual exchange sidings were immediately behind the old Unigate building, which I think has since been demolished.  Trains from the south were always hauled by 33's, from the north by 86's.

 

The OHLE ended just short of the canal bridge and a fairly common sight was an 86 that in the act of running-round had slightly over-run the end of the catenary and was sat on the canal bridge, all sad and forlorn, with its pantograph waving in the air, waiting to be be rescued.  That often took a surprisingly long time.  If I first spotted a dead engine on the canal bridge at lunchtime, the chances were it would still be there when I went home early that evening.

 

One thing that often puzzled me was that the third rail ended just north of North Pole Junction, a little further down Scrubs Lane.  Surely it would have been far easier for all concerned if the third rail had been extended the 300 yards or so to Mitre Bridge?

[Nearholmer]

59 minutes ago, mike morley said:

One thing that often puzzled me was that the third rail ended just north of North Pole Junction, a little further down Scrubs Lane.  Surely it would have been far easier for all concerned if the third rail had been extended the 300 yards or so to Mitre Bridge?

IIRC, at that time, the third rail was only there for Eurostar’s to access their depot, and the concept of a through suburban service as exists now either hadn’t dawned or was nascent. For ‘cross country’ loco hauled trains a direct 25kV to DC interface wouldn’t have added much to life, because there were so few of them and plenty of 33s to go round.

 

25kV/DC interfaces can get complex and expensive too, especially if signalling system immunisation questions come into the equation, which they may have if the third rail crept that extra few hundred metres.

 

I could have given you a wave, BTW, because for a year or two, I used one of the through trains in the morning to avoid a cross-London transfer in the rush hour, and about once a fortnight it would get marooned for bloomin ages at the loco change point.

[Wickham Green too]

8 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

..... For ‘cross country’ loco hauled trains a direct 25kV to DC interface wouldn’t have added much to life, because there were so few of them and plenty of 33s to go round. ......

Not to mention Little Edwards - who could have coped on diseasal for 300 yards before getting back to the juice.

[mike morley]

13 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

25kV/DC interfaces can get complex and expensive too, especially if signalling system immunisation questions come into the equation, which they may have if the third rail crept that extra few hundred metres.

 

 

A point for nigb55009 to bear in mind if his intended layout comes to fruition.

[Nearholmer]

Would be interesting to know how immunisation was dealt with at Euston in the 1960s. 125Hz or 66.7Hz track circuits? IIRC that was how it was done for the proximity of District Line and LTSR.

Edited June 12, 2021 by Nearholmer

[The Stationmaster]

3 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

IIRC, at that time, the third rail was only there for Eurostar’s to access their depot, and the concept of a through suburban service as exists now either hadn’t dawned or was nascent. For ‘cross country’ loco hauled trains a direct 25kV to DC interface wouldn’t have added much to life, because there were so few of them and plenty of 33s to go round.

 

25kV/DC interfaces can get complex and expensive too, especially if signalling system immunisation questions come into the equation, which they may have if the third rail crept that extra few hundred metres.

 

I could have given you a wave, BTW, because for a year or two, I used one of the through trains in the morning to avoid a cross-London transfer in the rush hour, and about once a fortnight it would get marooned for bloomin ages at the loco change point.

That is correct.  the 3rd railwas added as part of the Eurostar works purely to enable Eurostar trains and Class 73s to get to/from Noth Pole international depot without (in the case of Class373s having to change over traction at any part of their journey to/from Waterloo.  However the 3rd rail was conti more or less as far as the brige over teh GWML - presumably asa run-off in the event of a wrong routing SPAD.   Except on the odd occasion when somebody got it wrong Class 373s between NPI and Waterloo always ran on 3rd rail pickup through out.   One Driver inadvertently  tried it on 25kv and  the panto hit the Westway bridge as it went over-height coming off the overhead at just the right place and speed.t

 

However at about the same time the 25kv overhead was installed from the Willesden side of the bridge over the GWML all the way down to just short of the Westway overbridge  presumably as part of the Eurostar works as it allowed access from the WCML to North Pole International (with a reversal of course) and for current changeover for E'star traction coming off the WCML enroute to Kensington

 

When the through local passenger electrified passenger service started over the WLL it was quite amusing to stand in the International depot control room and watch the EMUs come to a stand. more or less opposite,  just south of the GWML bridge, in order to changeover from 25kv overhead to the 3rd rail current collection.  it always struck me as very peculiar that they didn't/couldn't manage it while moving.

[Nearholmer]

Somewhere in the ‘black museum’ section of my photo collection, I have pictures I took of the third rail substation near Stamford Bridge football ground, which went up in a spectacular blaze of arcing not long after it was installed. It was an early instance of a “dry type”, resin encapsulated I think, rectifier transformer, which suffered a fault deep within the windings. I’d left BR for LU a few years earlier, but my ex-colleagues kindly invited me back to share the fruits of their bitter experience!

Edited June 12, 2021 by Nearholmer

[mike morley]

1 hour ago, The Stationmaster said:

When the through local passenger electrified passenger service started over the WLL it was quite amusing to stand in the International depot control room and watch the EMUs come to a stand. more or less opposite,  just south of the GWML bridge, in order to changeover from 25kv overhead to the 3rd rail current collection.  it always struck me as very peculiar that they didn't/couldn't manage it while moving.

 

My late next-door neighbour, normally a 66 driver for EWS, used to find himself driving those EMU's when EWS was short of work.  He told me how the third rail pick-up shoes would occasionally get choked with brake dust and other grunge thrown up off the track and be reluctant to come down when required.  Apparently all they needed was a kick, but by the time that kick had been administered the panel had gone red, at which point he discovered there was no re-set button.  Shortly afterwards he discovered the nearest person able to re-set the panel was in Maidstone or Basingstoke or somewhere else some distance away . . .