Mark 2b, By Accurascale and IRM!

[mevaman1]

A question that may have already been answered!!

 

Were all the NSE Padd-Oxfords and Padd-Herefords run with sets with the darker NSE blue?  Likewise were all the Waterloo-Exeters run with sets with the lighter NSE blue?

 

Were sets ever mixed with dark and light blue?

 

Any help much appreciated.

 

Andrew

Edited September 15, 2021 by mevaman1
Typo

[BR Blue]

Sets were indeed mixed. Also add blue grey and NSE branded blue grey to the mix. The lighter blue came first so the period you are modelling will also make a difference.

[Waverley47708]

On 15/09/2021 at 14:43, mevaman1 said:

A question that may have already been answered!!

 

Were all the NSE Padd-Oxfords and Padd-Herefords run with sets with the darker NSE blue?  Likewise were all the Waterloo-Exeters run with sets with the lighter NSE blue?

 

Were sets ever mixed with dark and light blue?

 

Any help much appreciated.

 

Andrew

 

I suspect You Tube may be the place to look.  Ive seen plenty of videos from the late 80s.

 

Here are a couple for starters. There are a lot of HSTs in the second video but there are NSE stock as well.

 

 

 

 

[IRC]

1 hour ago, Waverley47708 said:

 

I suspect You Tube may be the place to look.  Ive seen plenty of videos from the late 80s.

 

Here are a couple for starters. There are a lot of HSTs in the second video but there are NSE stock as well.

 

 

 

 

Great stuff.

It proves, by the first video alone, that anything goes! Mk1’s mixed with early mk2’s, mixed with air cons. NSE (both varieties) mixed with BR blue, mixed with inter city.

[Flood]

11 minutes ago, IRC said:

Great stuff.

It proves, by the first video alone, that anything goes! Mk1’s mixed with early mk2’s, mixed with air cons. NSE (both varieties) mixed with BR blue, mixed with inter city.

What it proves is that air braked stock runs together and vacuum braked stock runs together.

[Ian J.]

Would I be right in assuming that many Mk1s, 2s, 2As were vacuum braked, and that 2Bs, 2Cs, and all aircon Mark 2s were air braked?

[Mark]

45 minutes ago, Ian J. said:

Would I be right in assuming that many Mk1s, 2s, 2As were vacuum braked, and that 2Bs, 2Cs, and all aircon Mark 2s were air braked?

I think pretty well all the MK1 coaches left in service by then were dual braked.

 

Mark

[turbos]

52 minutes ago, Ian J. said:

Would I be right in assuming that many Mk1s, 2s, 2As were vacuum braked, and that 2Bs, 2Cs, and all aircon Mark 2s were air braked?

Mk1s and Mk2s were built vacuum braked only, although many were later fitted with air brakes. Mk2As were built air braked only from new but a few had vacuum brakes fitted later. Mk2b onwards were air braked only.

 

I agree with Flood, as long as the coaches had the same type of brakes then any Mk could (and Mk1-3 did) work with any Mk. In theory a Mk5 could work with a pre-grouping coach!

 

Brian.

[MJI]

Mark 1s, there were quite a few dual braked ones as well, usually buffets but also some normal stock.

 

Mark 1 FO on the WR air braked and used as SOs with 2ABC stock.

 

I am building sets with

1 2A 2D 2E 2F (3 TSOs next to each other 2D 2E 2F)

2C D E F

1 2A 2B 2C

 

Apart from all Mark 1 sets, the only all same version train I have is a set of Mark 3s

[The Evil Bus Driver]

These are looking seriously good. It's going to take a year to build up a 6 or 7 coach rake unless they're sold in packs or discounted from RRP so might buy some on Black Friday hehe. Will there be an abundance of TSOs? These are the ones that go for the crazy money on the Bay of E as Bachmann never make enough of them. 

[The Evil Bus Driver]

On 15/09/2021 at 15:21, BR Blue said:

Sets were indeed mixed. Also add blue grey and NSE branded blue grey to the mix. The lighter blue came first so the period you are modelling will also make a difference.

Pre Sectorisation Blue/Grey era for me. 

[McC]

9 minutes ago, The Evil Bus Driver said:

These are looking seriously good. It's going to take a year to build up a 6 or 7 coach rake unless they're sold in packs or discounted from RRP so might buy some on Black Friday hehe. Will there be an abundance of TSOs? These are the ones that go for the crazy money on the Bay of E as Bachmann never make enough of them. 

 

You can avail of 10% at checkout if you order two or more coaches and 70% of this run are TSO's so you should be safe that way  

[The Evil Bus Driver]

42 minutes ago, McC said:

 

You can avail of 10% at checkout if you order two or more coaches and 70% of this run are TSO's so you should be safe that way  

Excellent! I'll certainly build up a few, got to build a layout to run things on first hehe

[mevaman1]

7 hours ago, Waverley47708 said:

 

I suspect You Tube may be the place to look.  Ive seen plenty of videos from the late 80s.

 

Here are a couple for starters. There are a lot of HSTs in the second video but there are NSE stock as well.

 

 

 

 

Great videos - thanks Waverley.

 

All the NSE stock appears to be in the lighter blue.

 

I am now thinking that the darker blue sets were on the Cambridge services.  
 

Does anyone have confirmation of this?

 

Andrew

[InterCitySpud]

These will be far too good to mix with Bachmanns 2a, something about them I've never liked anyway.

 

Better to buy and run a whole rake and occasionally throw in some MK1s, maybe a RMB or even one or two Mk2e/f latest versions that might just look ok within a full rake.

 

I used to be regularly take trips between Oxford and New Street in the mid eighties and I don't remember an awful lot of Mk2as at that time, mostly b,c,d's and catering often provided by a TSOT. This was at a time they were routed via Solihull as opposed to Coventry and always a Duff or Hoover up front.

[Flood]

4 hours ago, mevaman1 said:

Great videos - thanks Waverley.

 

All the NSE stock appears to be in the lighter blue.

 

I am now thinking that the darker blue sets were on the Cambridge services.  
 

Does anyone have confirmation of this?

 

Andrew

There was some dark blue stock on the Wat-Exe services from 1990 but a lot of the stock had already been repainted to light blue by then. Once in a corporate livery there was no real need to repaint a coach unless it had an interior refurb (which the Wat - Exe stock didn't get under NSE anyway). There was not a concerted effort to paint the stock to match the 47/7s (and some class 50s), such as the repainting from blue and grey to NSE. I think it was only the fact that NSE light blue sometimes faded so badly that repaints to dark blue actually occurred.

After just checking Flickr from 1991 onwards there is the occasional NSE dark blue coach on Wat - Exe but not very many.

Edited September 17, 2021 by Flood

[Wickham Green too]

Unless my mind has got itself TOTALLY confused over the years, I'm sure light blue NSE came before the - infinitely nicer - dark blue variant !

[Covkid]

6 hours ago, InterCitySpud said:

These will be far too good to mix with Bachmanns 2a, something about them I've never liked anyway.

 

Better to buy and run a whole rake and occasionally throw in some MK1s, maybe a RMB or even one or two Mk2e/f latest versions that might just look ok within a full rake.

 

I used to be regularly take trips between Oxford and New Street in the mid eighties and I don't remember an awful lot of Mk2as at that time, mostly b,c,d's and catering often provided by a TSOT. This was at a time they were routed via Solihull as opposed to Coventry and always a Duff or Hoover up front.

 

Personally think Bachmann's Mk2As are fine, and i would rather match them the Mk2Bs than Mk1s. 

 

Are you sure air braked Mk1s were that common in Mk2B rakes ?

[Flood]

42 minutes ago, Covkid said:

 

Personally think Bachmann's Mk2As are fine, and i would rather match them the Mk2Bs than Mk1s. 

 

Are you sure air braked Mk1s were that common in Mk2B rakes ?

Air braked Mk1 stock could be found with Mk2B stock in blue and grey days, declassified FOs as well as RBRs and BGs, but by the time of NSE the Wat - Exe rakes were Mk2a, b and c with the Oxfords being vacuum braked Mk1 stock along with vacuum braked Mk2 stock.

Prior to the May 1987 timetable there was still the S.R rake of air braked Mk1 TSOs used on Wat - Exe alongside the Mk2 stock but I never saw the two types mixed.

There was also a rake of six dual braked Mk1 TSOs, with a Mk2a BFK, used on a Summer Saturday train to Penzance in 1987.

Edited September 17, 2021 by Flood

[Down_Under]

I have a question for the group - most of the B&G coaches have Western Region running numbers. Would these have travelled outside of  the Western Region in in the 70s? (in particular the east coast). Should I be waiting for some Eastern Region numbered stock, or did the transfer to the eastern region only happen later (80's?) 

[Flood]

As Western Region stock they worked on the Plymouth - Edinburgh (and return) and Penzance - Leeds (and return) services from 1976 until 1979 so you could see them on those services on the Eastern Region from Sheffield Northwards.

In 1987 5463 went to Heaton, and gained Trans-Pennine livery; 5438, 5478 and 5486 went to Bounds Green and 5440, 5483, 5489 and 5492 went to Norwich Crown Point. I doubt that any of these carried regional prefixes. This were the first Mk2b TSO stock ever allocated to the Eastern Region.

There were 5 Mk2b FKs allocated to the Eastern Region in the 1970s which, I'm guessing, worked with their Mk2a stock.

Edited September 18, 2021 by Flood

[Waverley47708]

23 hours ago, mevaman1 said:

Great videos - thanks Waverley.

 

All the NSE stock appears to be in the lighter blue.

 

I am now thinking that the darker blue sets were on the Cambridge services.  
 

Does anyone have confirmation of this?

 

Andrew

 

Another video for you. Paddington to Oxford.

 

 

I am no expert on these matters but it looks like there were more mk2b or possibly mk2c coaches in Volume 3 West Country.  Whilst a higher proportion of Mk2a in Volume 1 Paddington to Oxford.

 

 

Edited September 18, 2021 by Waverley47708

[MJI]

Back to my memories

 

Definatly went north of New Street.

 

MR 2A/C went up the WCML and WR 2B up to the north east.

 

Now to the 2Bs in 70s and earlier 80s they ran in general WR non aircon airbraked trains.

 

The BFKs were rare to be seen, but a mix of 2B TSO, 2B FK ,1 BG, 1 RMB, RBR or RU, 1 ex FOs was pretty common.

 

The odd one ended up strengthening a 2DEF rake.

 

There were  a few 2C but the BSOs appeared to run with 2DEF a lot.

[InterCitySpud]

On 18/09/2021 at 04:39, Covkid said:

 

Personally think Bachmann's Mk2As are fine, and i would rather match them the Mk2Bs than Mk1s. 

 

Are you sure air braked Mk1s were that common in Mk2B rakes ?

Yes, sorry wasn't too clear, I was generally talking blue and grey days, the rakes out of New Street towards Reading and beyond.

 

The MK1 stock I referred to was BG's, and catering. Second class was almost all b/c with first class often d/e. I think the New Street - Paddington used TSOT's, for catering, the Poole, Southampton, Bournemouth services RMB or RBR/RB(R)

 

Bachmanns 2a are fine but no need to mix them with Accurascales and risk any slight differences in window profile, colour etc. Just stick with 2b's for now and chuck in a Bachmann RMB and 2e FO!

[murphaph]

On 17/09/2021 at 12:58, turbos said:

Mk2b onwards were air braked only.

I guess most folks aren't super interested in the Irish stuff but for the sake of completeness it should be mentioned that CIE mk2d's (probably closer to BR mk2f's) were vacuum braked only from new.