Jump to content
 

Class 22 areas of operation


TravisM
 Share

Recommended Posts

  • RMweb Gold

I know that Class 22's worked in the Exeter/Plymouth area for the Devon banks, the Gloucester area for the Forest of Dean and Old Oak for ECS duties but did they work anywhere else.  I remember seeing several at Bristol Bath Road at a open day approx 1969/70? but I don't ever recall seeing them at Weston-super-Mare or Worle Junction (my local spotting area), just loads of Peaks, Warships, Western's, Class 47's, Hymek's and units.

 

Julian Sprott

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

I have a copy of a 1963 Working Timetable for Bristol which gives several trip workings for D63xxs. There's one for a pair which visited Stoke Gifford, Pilning, and Portishead during the day. There were 6 other workings for single locos covering similar locations, as well as Avonmouth, Westbury, and Ashton Meadows. At the time Bath Road had 9 locos allocated, with about 7 diagrammed daily to these trip workings......

Edited by stovepipe
Link to post
Share on other sites

....North Devon former LSWR routes Plymouth to Exeter via Okehampton....Padstow to Meldon jnc....Barnstaple to Meeth/Exeter....Paignton Kingswear branch....Barnstaple to Ilfracombe....Calstock branch.....Bodmin to Wadebridge.....Hemyock milk.....Helston branch....Newquay branch....track recovery on the Somerset & Dorset.....Wallingford branch.....Fowey to Lostwithiel and Par.....Chard jnc to Exeter....

 

Dave

Edited by Torr Giffard LSWR 1951-71
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

They famously worked demolition trains over the S&D in the late 60s, and I've seen photos of them working into the Fry's sidings at Keynsham. The pilot D63XXs were confined to the South West due to their incompatibility with other locos except the D600s. I'm pretty sure they worked Bason bridge milk trains, and I've got photos of them on Hemyock milks. They also worked into North Devon with many photos out there at Barnstaple.

Neil

Link to post
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

I think it is fair to say that after the early 1960s the class 22s mostly carried out local work only.

The Old Oak locos mostly did ECS and local freight work in the London Division.

The Bath Road locos did local freight trips around Bristol/Avonmouth, and Gloucester.

The Newton Abbot locos worked local freight trips around Newton Abbot, and in the Exeter Area.

The Laira locos did local clay trips and branch freight in Cornwall, with some summer saturday passenger work.

 

They would not normally have done long distance main line work. There were not many regular freight trips between Bristol and Taunton

and in any case much of the long distance freight traffic passed at night during darkness, so they were probably not much seen around Weston,

 

cheers

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Premium

Add to the above list St. Ives and Hayle Wharves branches.  

 

Famously and to the chagrin of enthusiasts hoping for steam the final day on the Tiverton - Barnstaple line saw D6348 in use.  The regular 14xx plus auto-train had been replaced by a 6-car rake of Mk1 stock in anticipation of heavy loadings.

 

A shame, then, that the same didn't happen in that other class 22 stamping ground of North Cornwall where they ran the Wadebridge Goods via Bodmin until 1971 several years after the fiasco of the final single-car DMU passenger services over the route from Okehampton via Halwill.

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

I think it is fair to say that after the early 1960s the class 22s mostly carried out local work only.

The Old Oak locos mostly did ECS and local freight work in the London Division.

The Bath Road locos did local freight trips around Bristol/Avonmouth, and Gloucester.

The Newton Abbot locos worked local freight trips around Newton Abbot, and in the Exeter Area.

The Laira locos did local clay trips and branch freight in Cornwall, with some summer saturday passenger work.

 

They would not normally have done long distance main line work. There were not many regular freight trips between Bristol and Taunton

and in any case much of the long distance freight traffic passed at night during darkness, so they were probably not much seen around Weston,

 

cheers

The Old Oak allocation also saw use on Sunday PW trains too, taking them out along the Berks & Hants and beyond Didcot, I think Hymeks were the first choice for these duties though. Likewise Gloucester used Class 22s for the same purposes too I believe.

 

Kevin

Link to post
Share on other sites

In addition to the above I have seen phot's of them on passenger workings at Glastonbury, Highbridge, Yatton, Exmouth, Seaton and Seaton Junction.

For those who like a 'prototype for anything', there's a shot on p45 of 'The Western's Hydraulics', dated 24/07/1965, of D6324 at Sidmouth Junction. According to the caption, it's just backing on to the Exmouth portion of a Waterloo- West Country train; however, the most unusual bit is that the first coach is an oval-windowed Thompson..

The only areas they seem to have avoided are South Wales and the West Midlands.

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Premium

 

The only areas they seem to have avoided are South Wales and the West Midlands.

 

South Wales had the "teddy-bear" class 14 locos which covered some of the workings a 22 might otherwise have been rostered.

 

Personally I always avoid the West Midlands unless I am absolutely forced to go there ;)

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

I think the simple answer is anywhere/everywhere on the Region with the exception of South Wales where they were extremely unusual and only penetrated a short way.   If one wishes to take things a bit further they were seen on different parts of the Region at different times - for example they only really got to the London Division fairly late in their working lives but once there they could be seen all over the Division but with no passenger work (although I believe they had at least one newspaper train turn, possibly more, on intra-Divisional 'paper workings).

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

For those who like a 'prototype for anything', there's a shot on p45 of 'The Western's Hydraulics', dated 24/07/1965, of D6324 at Sidmouth Junction. According to the caption, it's just backing on to the Exmouth portion of a Waterloo- West Country train; however, the most unusual bit is that the first coach is an oval-windowed Thompson..

The only areas they seem to have avoided are South Wales and the West Midlands.

The mean reason they never got to the West Midlands was that it had ceased to be WR territory by the time the D63XX were spreading beyond the far west.  I would think their failure to penetrate South wales was basically down to the decision to cover as much work as possible with the EE Type 3s plus the D95XX finally becoming available for trip working etc.

Link to post
Share on other sites

As Ziderhead says they certainly worked to Witney, I've also seen a photo of one at Shipton cement works between Oxford and Banbury. Would imagine they also worked to Morris Cowley and Abingdon.

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

According to the caption, it's just backing on to the Exmouth portion of a Waterloo- West Country train; however, the most unusual bit is that the first coach is an oval-windowed Thompson..

 

Thompsons seem to have been quite regular in the West Country as strengtheners. I remember one on a picture of "The Cornishman" at Newton Abbott at the front of a rake of Chocolate and Cream Mk1s.

 

 

The only areas they seem to have avoided are South Wales and the West Midlands.

I don't know the story behind this one at Warwick, other than it is standing in the position where the Hatton Banker used to reside.

 

http://www.warwickshirerailways.com/gwr/gwrw2169.htm

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

As Ziderhead says they certainly worked to Witney, I've also seen a photo of one at Shipton cement works between Oxford and Banbury. Would imagine they also worked to Morris Cowley and Abingdon.

They definitely worked Oxford area trips after they went to the London Division so I think both would have been likely, especially Abingdon.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Oxford men signed them and worked daily trippers to Banbury with them, occasionally getting as far as Leamington or Warwick too (there's a shot of D6348 stabled in the north end bay at Warwick on the Warwickshire railways website). Although rarely photographed on the Chiltern line they did have regular trips out that way, often at night on P/Way duties with Old Oak men in charge.

 

If you spent a couple of hours going through all the usual printed Hydraulic scourses, you'd easily get the impression that the 22s rarely strayed from any of their WR home depots but logic dictates they they must have been driven between all of those places at some point in their daily rostered duties. Think about all those trips between outlying West Country locations and Swindon Works for attention / overhaul etc, they must have got there somehow!

 

Some 'local' workings involved quite a bit of mileage all within the regular daily diagrams - take the down evening 'local stopper' from Exeter to Newton Abbot c.1971 which departed around 20.10, the 22s booked to it often appeared in pairs on this and started the day working up and down the Paignton branch before working that 20.10 service and after depositing passengers at N.Abbot the whole shebang would go to Laira as empty stock.

 

;)

Edited by Rugd1022
  • Like 3
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...