Hornby Class 71

[bécasse]

Well I lived alongside that part of Hither Green Sorting Sidings at that period and my father's allotment was actually taken back by the railway to provide part of the site for the Continental Freight Depot. 

 

There were two "wired" areas, one on the upside providing the reception roads for Continental Freight Depot and the other on the down side much closer to Grove Park which provided the egress from the down side sorting sidings towards Kent and which is where a little string of 71s was often stabled awaiting their next duty.

 

I can't make the photo fit either area, especially with the lighting tower (the southernmost one of the two being very close indeed to my home), nor can I reconcile what appears to be a home and distant signal in the right background although the area retained semaphore signals until the winter of 1961/62.

[slilley]

I see mention has been made about the fact that the 71s have never really been covered in depth. Following on from the success of book I have just done with John Wenyon on the SR Co-Co locomotives, we are looking at the feasibility of doing another, this time on the 71s and 74s.

 

Any info, photos, or anything else would be gratefully received.

 

Best wishes

 

Simon

[miles73128]

Hi does anybody know where I can get the large font early headcodes for Class 71 ? Thanks.

[crompton 33]

Like this. http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/73227-sr-brs-emu-route-numbers/

[slilley]

Hi does anybody know where I can get the large font early headcodes for Class 71 ? Thanks.

 

Just be aware that to be accurate you can only use that style of roller blind numeral with a loco that has no cab rainstrips, no cab window pillar ventilator and has the ETH cable mounted on the cab front.  No E5004 for example had been changed to the smaller style by June 1960. This was a very early change to the HAs.

 

Just realised that E5004 was so early being altered the ETH jumper was still on the cab front!! That will teach me to write before checking again!

 

Best wishes

 

Simon

Edited June 27, 2017 by slilley

[bécasse]

Although I would be happy to be proved wrong, I have always believed that the original "tall digit" head codes included very few alpha characters in addition to the 0 through 9 numerics and black and white blanks, indeed I am not at all certain that these blinds included red blanks (although the initial experiments on Hastings diesel sets certainly included red and/or red/white diagonal stripes on tall digit blinds, but no alpha characters).

 

It was my belief at the time that the "short digit" blinds were introduced because the red blanks and additional alpha characters could be included on blinds which remained much the same length and therefore still short enough to fit the standard rollers.

 

Initially, the letters A, B, C and G were used with numbers to replicate the disc head codes (alpha-numeric for trains in classes 1-3, numeric-alpha for trains in classes 4-9/0) and I suspect that only these letters appeared on the tall-digit blinds on the E5000 class. Later, with short-digit blinds, the letters D, E, F, H, J and K were added, plus the red blanks.

[bécasse]

To add to my previous comment, the BR-built Euston-Watford 3-car sets were fitted with standard BR(S) tall-digit roller blinds (including the top bar which wasn't actually used, although it may have been the original intention to do so since they could display "- -" which wasn't a standard Southern display at the time). The left-hand (viewed face-on) blind displayed only the class of train letter A, B or C, but the right-hand blind displayed the numbers 1 to 9 and 0, white and black blanks and the letters X, Y and Z, which is only one letter less than the blinds I believe the E5000 class locos were originally fitted with.

Edited June 27, 2017 by bécasse

[slilley]

Although I would be happy to be proved wrong, I have always believed that the original "tall digit" head codes included very few alpha characters in addition to the 0 through 9 numerics and black and white blanks, indeed I am not at all certain that these blinds included red blanks (although the initial experiments on Hastings diesel sets certainly included red and/or red/white diagonal stripes on tall digit blinds, but no alpha characters).

 

It was my belief at the time that the "short digit" blinds were introduced because the red blanks and additional alpha characters could be included on blinds which remained much the same length and therefore still short enough to fit the standard rollers.

 

Initially, the letters A, B, C and G were used with numbers to replicate the disc head codes (alpha-numeric for trains in classes 1-3, numeric-alpha for trains in classes 4-9/0) and I suspect that only these letters appeared on the tall-digit blinds on the E5000 class. Later, with short-digit blinds, the letters D, E, F, H, J and K were added, plus the red blanks.

 

The changes to the blinds will feature in my forthcoming book on the Class 71s and 74s including the reasons why the changes were made to the smaller numerals.

 

Simon