What has replaced the TMD?

[chriswright03]

I see a fair few discussions/questions at the moment about TMD's and as I am in the process of doing a layout for home of Buxton I have been taking a fair bit of interest in them.  I can hear moans already of people saying "Oh not another TMD'! 

 

My knowledge is fairly limited to what I read on here really so I was wondering with so many TMD shut down and or demolished what happens to the locos for servicing and repairs now?  There seems to have been so many closed in recent years, Buxton obviously but Immingham and Froddingham in this area along with many others such as Thorganby and no doubt many more I do not know about.

 

I realise the various TOC will have their own facilities and that the flow of traffic is much reduced now but even then there is still a lot of traffic about and nowhere near as many places for routine maintenance as there used to be.  So what happens now?

 

In one of the threads Clive Mortimore wrote.

 

 

Before I carrying on waffling, loco depots were located where predicted traffic flows would end , terminus stations and marshaling yards being the most common. They were there to ready the locomotive for its next duty. they were also ideally located as to provide examination and repair facilities of an appropriate level.  By the 1980s many sheds had either be upgraded or appeared over provided for their work load, this was because of changes to the traffic from the predicted levels of the 1960s.

 

 

With that in mind how on earth did Immingham not need one? 

 

Again going back to the different TOC involved I was at Barnetby the other week and discussing with another man there as to why all of a sudden Colas have started to stable there.  He told me that DBS still have the contract for Immingham docs/refinery so Colas cannot stable there and have to run back to Barnetby light engine to wait for the return journey.  Now I do not know if that is the real reason but it is just seem crackers to me.

 

 

[PM47079]

Freightliner have a network of fuel points and the fuel points will do running repairs and servicing, with the bigger depots like midland road, Southampton and Crewe doing bigger repairs. There is also the option to use places like brush at Loughborough or emd at Longport for repairs also.

[black and decker boy]

Each FOC still has one or two bases for heavier maintenance. Toton, Crewe Electric, Doncaster Roberts Road, Kingmoor, Gresty Bridge, Washwood Heath, Leeds Midland Road.

 

Very heavy maintenance and out of course repairs are often undertaken by the manufacturer (GM wise anyway) at

Longport.

 

The design of the current heavy freight locos means the old BR network of small and medium size depots aren’t needed and the number of locos now we have a multiple unit passenger railway has reduced the number of locos massively. The frequency of heavier exams has also been extended so locos don’t need to return to depot as often and can be diagrammed to do so.

 

Run of the mill servicing can be done by a man in a van and even the heavier daily & weekly exams only need a concrete pad. Static fuel bowsers are common and freely available so have been adopted along with the concrete pad (often used for wagon maintenance as well).

 

Some locations do have a very basic weather shelter, DBS have these at Tees Yard, Bescot and Doncaster (and maybe others).

 

As for stabling & signing on points, many signing on points are now not physical offices, flexibility being key and stabling is down to who owns/leases what.

[woodenhead]

More reliability as well as extended periods between exams has also contributed to the leaner nature of locomotive requirements these days.

 

Changes in traffic flow has also impacted requirements for lots of locos and lots of places to keep them.  The transition away from wagon load to specialist flows meant the end of trip working, re-marshalling and small uneconomic trains all of which required locomotives to perform those tasks in some quite far flung places.

 

Now the trains flow from port to distribution or between manufacturing points the natural place to hold the locomotives are the hubs where the trains meet rather than a depot away from the action.

[Reorte]

In the case of Buxton is there much that was done at Buxton (in later years) that can't be done at Peak Forest now, especially considering the less frequent nature of such work? So here perhaps it's more akin to a movement to a more convenient location. All guesses, please feel free to rip apart

[Jim Martin]

Rail Express is running a series about active depots at the moment. Part 2 is in the current issue and covers London, Southern England and Wales. Last month was the North of England, I think.

 

Jim

[brushman47544]

The simple answer to the OP's question is:

• an unused siding,
• a fitter in a van, and
• a fuel tanker.

Edited November 24, 2017 by brushman47544

[Nearholmer]

Just think how often a modern car needs servicing, compared with one made in, say, 1963, and transfer that thinking between a 19060s built loco and a 2000s built loco.

[jonny777]

I see a fair few discussions/questions at the moment about TMD's and as I am in the process of doing a layout for home of Buxton I have been taking a fair bit of interest in them.  I can hear moans already of people saying "Oh not another TMD'! 

 

My knowledge is fairly limited to what I read on here really so I was wondering with so many TMD shut down and or demolished what happens to the locos for servicing and repairs now?  There seems to have been so many closed in recent years, Buxton obviously but Immingham and Froddingham in this area along with many others such as Thorganby and no doubt many more I do not know about.

 

I realise the various TOC will have their own facilities and that the flow of traffic is much reduced now but even then there is still a lot of traffic about and nowhere near as many places for routine maintenance as there used to be.  So what happens now?

 

In one of the threads Clive Mortimore wrote.

 

 

 

With that in mind how on earth did Immingham not need one? 

 

 

 

 

Immingham did need one, and had one for many years. 

 

Here are 37083 and 60056 standing outside the depot on 4th September 1992. 

 

 

[chriswright03]

Some interesting replies there thanks. 

 

I did wonder about a man with a van because a couple of months ago at Barnetby one turned up to service a DRS Special that had to come back from Cleethorpes to the sidings so it could be serviced.  Allegedly he was going to do it at Cleethorpes but  H & S said they couldn't.  Cannot verify that one way or the other.

 

The point about increased time in between services due to less maintenance required now didn't occur to me though.  I am assuming they are done on a time basis i.e. 21 days or something rather than mileage. 

 

Am I right in saying that Immingham was closed some years ago for maintenance but still kept open for signing on?  I know it is closed even for that now so how long before it is demolished?  I would also assume that a lot of staff are actually travelling a lot further to work now rather than being based somewhere near the TMD.

 

I recall my 'spotting' days as a kid in Lincoln and there would be locos all over the place at the weekend.  There would be some at the DMU depot and more down at Holmes yard.  In fact looking at pictures of Buxton from the 90's there was 30 - 40 plus locos stabled there at weekends.  Have most of them gone now or are they just parked up elsewhere? 

 

May have to have a look at the Rail Express mag and see what is says.

[John_Miles]

Is Canton a TMD for Colas?

[25901]

I remember that when Corus's Castleton Yard was open that DBs (EWS then) refueled their loco's there using a small road tanker and man with a van

 

As for Colas they list depots at Wimbledon, Rugby, Crewe, Bristol, Manchester and Plymouth in one of their service brochures I have but as one of the members on here works for them he might give us a better insight

Edited November 24, 2017 by 25901

[tamperman36]

Another point is that with modern technology modern locos are fitted with computer self diagnostic systems which show if there is any faults, just like modern cars, so when they are next in for an exam they will check the system and if a fault shows it will be sent for maintenance. Otherwise basic exams and fuel can be done on a concrete pad on a siding.

[JeffP]

 

 

....I recall my 'spotting' days as a kid in Lincoln and there would be locos all over the place at the weekend.  There would be some at the DMU depot and more down at Holmes yard.  In fact looking at pictures of Buxton from the 90's there was 30 - 40 plus locos stabled there at weekends.  Have most of them gone now or are they just parked up elsewhere?

 

Gone.

BR had thousands of locos. The modern freight scene far less than a thousand.

[br2975]

"What has replaced the TMD ?".......... a man with a van.

[Rugd1022]

The man in a van can do A-Exams almost anywhere so long as he can get to the loco carrying bags of sand etc safely - a couple of days ago I was sat on 66 414 in the north end neck at DIRFT and matey from oop the north arrived avec une white van, he trots over for a shuftie, planted his magnetic 'not to be moved' sign on the cabside and set to for half an hour or so. I mentioned to him that there was an oil leak under the engine bed which he quickly traced to the previous day's crankcase checks by a colleague of his who hadn't cleaned up properly, leaving the oil to slosh about until it found it's way out via a breather pipe between the two battery boxes. He went back to the van and produced some new-fangled 'sandbag sausage' type thingummies which are designed to soak up any overspill. Jop duly jobbed, matey disappears off up the M6 for his next repair based caper!

Edited November 24, 2017 by Rugd1022

[Dava]

"What has replaced the TMD ?".......... a man with a van.

Not forgetting the concrete pad, of course. Maybe there will be an inflatable 'app' produced for a portable/virtual version of this, activated by a mobile device?

 

The antecedents of the Class 66 and related GM locos are in North American locos designed to run for thousands of miles across the prairies and mountains between each service call. Very different from the failure-prone UK designs which needed constant attention [think of classes 21-29 for example].

 

Dava

[Davexoc]

Just wondering if oil samples are still taken periodically for testing?

I remember we had a basic test where three inclined glass tubes in a rack with ball bearings in, would be placed in a hot water bath and then tipped to see if the oil was within viscosity tolerance. Two tubes were control (one new oil, one oil with 5% fuel added) and the other for the test sample. Provided the test sample was between the other two it was deemed OK.

 

Had a foreign 47 failed with low oil pressure one day, so took samples, one for the lab the other for immediate evaluation which failed spectacularly. Removing rocker covers revealled several sparkling clean sets of valve gear where the high pressure fuel lines had fractured between pump and injector. New pipes and oil and all was OK. Later when the lab results came back we were told the oil was over 15% dilluted with fuel, anything over 5% is considered to be at a higher risk of crankcase explosion.

 

Dave

[stovepipe]

Gone.

BR had thousands of locos. The modern freight scene far less than a thousand.

Whilst that is true if you go back 50 years, I don't believe BR had vastly more freight locos in the period the OP is talking about. Looking at the last combined volume I bought in 1986, there are perhaps 1250 non-eth freight locos. If anything the amount of freight hauled these days is greater than in 1986, though probably in heavier trains over longer average distances.

[Hesperus]

If you are comparing numbers of locos at depots it is worth considering that BR had a lot of stored and withdrawn locos cluttering up the depots.  They owned all the track so it didn't cost them anything to have 15 dead 31's and an accident damaged 37 sat there providing spare parts.

 

The current operators rent the space so are theoretically more likely to strip and scrap old locos.  Not always the case though as EWS hung onto ex-BR locos for years to make sure that they weren't useful to anybody else.  Presumably there are about 70 dead class 60's parked up somewhere?

[toffee]

 

Back in the day lots of smaller powered locos running around in pairs or even triples, all now gone, replaced by one large loco. Loco goes with the work and gets seen to where it ends up, e.g. DIRFT as pointed out above. No longer any parcels trains running from major stations needing locos close by, end of EWS Mail meant end of Canton by them, although used now by Colas as a base in SWales. Modern EMD locos built on over 50 years experience of all weathers and temperatures in the US makes a more reliable loco.

Small loco depots do exist however, you just have to find them. So St Blazey still used by 1 and a half 66s a week. Canton, Colas. Leicester for UKrl, Derby station and over the road used by ROG, NR, and others. Washwood Heath closing as I speak to go where ? Crewe has DB, FLR, DRS, and the new steam/diesel based in the old loco shed. I'm sure others can name their local depots.

 

Looking at DMUs and EMUs, depots have sprung up everywhere, some small some large.

[Zomboid]

<p>

 

The simple answer to the OP's question is:

• an unused siding,
• a fitter in a van, and
• a fuel tanker.

I think the even simpler answer is that reliable traction (that doesn't need constant attention) has replaced the TMD.

[chriswright03]

So does that reliable traction include the 60's plus the odd 56, 37 and of course ancient 20 running round hard on the RHTT yet again this year?

 

I am a little surprised about the reliability issue though as coming from the bus world until I packed up two years ago I know the new buses are fragile in the extreme with computers seeming to make things worse rather than better.  I still have friends driving locally and the newest buses running round are still very capable of choosing their moments to pack up en route.

 

Thanks for the replies though.  Interesting to hear what happens these days.  Busy man with a van is what I reckon then.

[jonny777]

Not forgetting the concrete pad, of course. Maybe there will be an inflatable 'app' produced for a portable/virtual version of this, activated by a mobile device?

 

The antecedents of the Class 66 and related GM locos are in North American locos designed to run for thousands of miles across the prairies and mountains between each service call. Very different from the failure-prone UK designs which needed constant attention [think of classes 21-29 for example].

 

Dava

 

 

 

That is a little unfair as the class 21s were constructed by a company which was in dire financial straits at the time; and contained some relatively new technology, so financial corners were cut in order to keep losses to a minimum and hope for re-orders to keep the company afloat (and even that failed). 

 

The class 29 rebuilds were much more reliable but were non-standard and in the BR late 60s/early 70s climate, anything non-standard just had to go. 

[Mark Saunders]

Nothing has changed and everything has changed!

 

The passenger TOC's have their own depots even if they are ran by the builders!

 

The Freight companies likewise have their own facilities just not as many as before.

 

Light maintenance and fuelling can be done almost anywhere!

 

Mark Saunders