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Peterborough North


great northern
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4 hours ago, jazzer said:

 

Long station stops on the ECML have always puzzled me .  According to my 1960 timetable almost everything that went through PN stopped for around 3-5 minutes  even without an engine change, and it wasn’t only PN. A train stopping at PN, Grantham Retford and Newark might easily have over 12or 13 minutes journey time standing at stations before it got to Doncaster. They weren’t all waiting for parcels, and any connecting services would be timed to arrive before the mainline train, and anyway it doesn’t take 5-6 minutes to load a few parcels in the guards van. 

I have no explanation for these long stops but I do sometimes wonder if it was just lethargy by those making the timetables. We spoke earlier about the effect on morale as a result of poor management in the ‘50’s. Were they just making the timetables on auto pilot because it had always been done that way with no thought for improvement ?  It was certainly the case, for example that some trains on the Southern and Western were scheduled for stops of up to 10 minutes when milk churns had to be loaded then these long stops remained in the timetable for no good reason long after milk churn traffic ceased, because it never occurred to anybody to change it or maybe there was some obscure working directive that was never rescinded.

 

I don’t suppose we will ever know the real answer but at a time of motorway building and loss of traffic to road transport it is rather surprising that so much time was wasted standing in stations.

But it was a slower pace of life back then wasn' it?  Besides which, main line trains could load up to 13 or more cars, and that meant at some stations they would have to pull up twice. That certainly happened at PN on the Down which could only hold 11. Then add in the fact that it was necessary to let down the window before opening the doors, and I can remember that could be fiddly and time consuming, and four minutes doesn't seem so unreasonable.

 

Then we have splitting of portions, and addition of cars to services which were known to be full before getting to their next port of call, and of course some engine changing. As I recall, it was the addition of loads of recovery time which slowed things down, and gave crews little incentive to run hard.

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1 hour ago, great northern said:

But it was a slower pace of life back then wasn' it?  Besides which, main line trains could load up to 13 or more cars, and that meant at some stations they would have to pull up twice. That certainly happened at PN on the Down which could only hold 11. Then add in the fact that it was necessary to let down the window before opening the doors, and I can remember that could be fiddly and time consuming, and four minutes doesn't seem so unreasonable.

 

Then we have splitting of portions, and addition of cars to services which were known to be full before getting to their next port of call, and of course some engine changing. As I recall, it was the addition of loads of recovery time which slowed things down, and gave crews little incentive to run hard.

 

10 mins 25 sec - 12 mins approx:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X1b9yprvXHA

 

 

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3 minutes ago, great northern said:

No more than a minute and a half then?  Very thought provoking. And a lot was done during that time.

 

But that was a highly edited sequence - in fact, it may not all be of the same train.

 

It doesn't really tell us anything about the duration of station stops.

 

Regards,

John Isherwood.

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25 minutes ago, great northern said:

No more than a minute and a half then?  Very thought provoking. And a lot was done during that time.

 

19 minutes ago, cctransuk said:

 

But that was a highly edited sequence - in fact, it may not all be of the same train.

 

It doesn't really tell us anything about the duration of station stops.

 

Regards,

John Isherwood.

 

The narrative says "all within ten minutes".

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6 minutes ago, 31A said:

 

 

The narrative says "all within ten minutes".

Ah, I shouldn't have taken my hearing aids out before watching it then?

 

26 minutes ago, cctransuk said:

 

But that was a highly edited sequence - in fact, it may not all be of the same train.

 

It doesn't really tell us anything about the duration of station stops.

 

Regards,

John Isherwood.

Oh dear, Very gullible, aren't I?  That never occurred to me.

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7 hours ago, jazzer said:

 

Long station stops on the ECML have always puzzled me .  According to my 1960 timetable almost everything that went through PN stopped for around 3-5 minutes  even without an engine change, and it wasn’t only PN. A train stopping at PN, Grantham Retford and Newark might easily have over 12or 13 minutes journey time standing at stations before it got to Doncaster. They weren’t all waiting for parcels, and any connecting services would be timed to arrive before the mainline train, and anyway it doesn’t take 5-6 minutes to load a few parcels in the guards van. 

I have no explanation for these long stops but I do sometimes wonder if it was just lethargy by those making the timetables. We spoke earlier about the effect on morale as a result of poor management in the ‘50’s. Were they just making the timetables on auto pilot because it had always been done that way with no thought for improvement ?  It was certainly the case, for example that some trains on the Southern and Western were scheduled for stops of up to 10 minutes when milk churns had to be loaded then these long stops remained in the timetable for no good reason long after milk churn traffic ceased, because it never occurred to anybody to change it or maybe there was some obscure working directive that was never rescinded.

 

I don’t suppose we will ever know the real answer but at a time of motorway building and loss of traffic to road transport it is rather surprising that so much time was wasted standing in stations.

Another feature of the station stops - particularly of "Down" long distance trains - at Peterborough North, that sticks in my memory, were the attention of the "Wheel tappers" with their long hammers checking that each wheel was "Sound as a bell". This would occupy a number of minutes.

 

Now most coach wheels are of the monobloc type and are subject to regular Ultrasonic or other "Non Destructive Testing" as part of depot maintenance - but in the 1950s most wheels had separate shrunk-on tyres and the availability of modern NDT methods (beyond the long-handled hammer and the wheel-tapper's ear) were well in the future.

 

Regards

Chris H

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7 hours ago, great northern said:

But it was a slower pace of life back then wasn' it?  Besides which, main line trains could load up to 13 or more cars, and that meant at some stations they would have to pull up twice. That certainly happened at PN on the Down which could only hold 11. Then add in the fact that it was necessary to let down the window before opening the doors, and I can remember that could be fiddly and time consuming, and four minutes doesn't seem so unreasonable.

 

Then we have splitting of portions, and addition of cars to services which were known to be full before getting to their next port of call, and of course some engine changing. As I recall, it was the addition of loads of recovery time which slowed things down, and gave crews little incentive to run hard.

 

So have you answered your own question as to why  Green Arrow was allowed a six minute stop when there was no need fo an engine change ?

If, as you say , the engine only came on at Doncaster , the train would almost certainly have originated in Hull and and therefor is very unlikely to have been loaded to anything like 13 coaches , probably more like 9, hence V2 haulage unlike the heavier Leeds trains that usually had Pacific’s.  I fully agree that if it came on at Doncaster it wouldn’t have been changed at PN. In fact there was at least one diagram where KX men rode “Down “ to Doncaster “on the cushions” and brought the afternoon Up train all the way back.

Lots of speculation about “ station movements “ but I don’t think we’ll ever know the true answer. 

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18 minutes ago, cctransuk said:

 

Sorry - I rarely put my earphones on when watching those Youtube clips.

 

Regards,

John Isherwood.

 

I'm the same - I usually have my computer on silent!  I had watched the film on DVD on my television, before finding it on Youtube.  However on this occasion it's worth listening as the narrative describes all the tasks that are undertaken during the train's station stop.

 

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15 hours ago, great northern said:

Time for the return of the empties from Little Barford, with our borrowed 04/8, running tender first now. We have two angles as it moves along the Down slow.931691954_337851.JPG.e127cc4e43e2c58c88c65972489b42c2.JPG671277910_437852.JPG.eb7474d3b306bb6d2e7ef91e2c77a186.JPG

 

Very poor light conditions, so black and white seems the best option.

Great pictures there G. Really like them.

P

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Culture shock! First golf with a new group who tee off just when I'm usually thinking about getting out of bed. Here is gleaming 60054 with the Up Ripon, while I continue trying to wake myself up.

 

 

1260241067_1541.JPG.319c283b877063680709f1df57a0bf7a.JPG

 

Oh yes, and before that 62530 was arriving at the old engine shed area, passing 61630 as it went.

 

 

1791436156_52530.JPG.2e47ba232f470a2fa1dd18249a3bc37a.JPG

 

 

 

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Don't know what happened this morning, which is when I thought I had posted the images above. Perhaps it was a bit too early in the day for me to function properly. Having played a full round of golf for the first time in three months, I am now somewhat fatigued, and shall shortly retire.

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9 hours ago, FoxUnpopuli said:

You did - you made an identical posting 14 hours previously.   Looks like the post was still on your screen (or in your cache) even though you hit the 'submit' button.  Not to worry.  Nice shots as always, but the black&white ones are truly excellent. 

Ah well, I was very tired, and forgot that I should never believe what a computer told me. Nor could I be ar*ed to go back to the previous page and check.

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5 minutes ago, Oldddudders said:

I am slightly concerned at the pair of Southern parcels vans looking a little lost across turnouts. At least the signalman can keep an eye on them, I suppose. 

The shunting move will be completed very shortly Ian.:rolleyes:

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2 hours ago, phil.c said:

When I bought SMP many years ago there was a choice of either Phosphor Bronze or nickel silver.

Ten years since Norman did the track Phil, and by sheer coincidence I've recently deleted all the correspondence we had at the time. My memory says nickel silver, but it isn't totally reliable these days.

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