Gresley Junction

[thegreenhowards]

Next up is the 2050 Cambridge-KX headed by BR Standard 5, 73157.

 

 

This was a standard corridor 6 set which in 1958 consisted of Gresley BSK(3)s, Mk 1 TSOs and a Thompson FK.  You see this formation quite often in photos, particularly of baby Deltics in their early years. The Standard 5 was resident at KX from Nov 57 to Nov 58 so hopefully it would have hauled this sort of formation although I don’t have a photo to confirm it.

 

 

Here’s the video.

 

 

[thegreenhowards]

As the passenger traffic falls away in the evening more coals trains could run. It’s time in the sequence for another loaded up coal train headed by Wd 90428.

 

 

This one’s sound fitted so needed a video to do it justice.

 

 

[thegreenhowards]

No update yesterday because I was busy playing with my new toy from eBay! More on Coulsdon Works shortly. Here we have N2, 69541 arriving with the last evening terminating stopper from KX.

 

 

I get bored with from 3/4 shots, so here is a rear 3/4 shot showing the coaching stock - a standard five car mk 1 formation.

 

 

...and finally a video. I tried panning this and I’m afraid the angles went a bit wrong as I panned round so you'll have to bear with the ‘uphill’ look.

 

 

 

[thegreenhowards]

Today’s train is a down terminating local trip goods headed by J52, 68761.

 

 

It heads round to the sidings on the country side if the station

 

 

...and deposits its wagons ready to be sorted in the morning. Sorry about the focussing in this one. It’s never evident until I get it on a larger screen by which time it’s too late to do anything about it.

 

 

I don’t have a WTT for the local goods workings, so this is guessed at. I do know that such workings happened and that they were headed by J52s and later J50s as well as larger engines. But what time they ran and where they terminated is pure guesswork. Any guidance appreciated.

 

Andy

 

 

[thegreenhowards]

This evening’s train is a Class D Q path 1645 Long Sutton-KX. I’ve had to guess what traffic this train carried and here is my take on it headed by 60800, Green Arrow.

 

 

 

Here is the video.

 

 

[31A]

2 hours ago, thegreenhowards said:

I’ve had to guess what traffic this train carried

 

Fruit?

[thegreenhowards]

9 hours ago, 31A said:

 

Fruit?

Sounds plausible. Is that based on Long Sutton as an origin or just the Q path suggesting it was seasonal traffic? Cattle vans were used for fruit traffic weren’t they, so at least the front of my train would fit the bill.

[TheSignalEngineer]

11 hours ago, thegreenhowards said:

guess what traffic this train carried

A lot of old cattle wagons carried beer traffic from Burton.

[great northern]

41 minutes ago, thegreenhowards said:

Sounds plausible. Is that based on Long Sutton as an origin or just the Q path suggesting it was seasonal traffic? Cattle vans were used for fruit traffic weren’t they, so at least the front of my train would fit the bill.

Definitely seasonal, I'd say, and could well have been fruit, but maybe potatoes for London? Not sugar beet I think, as I'm pretty sure that would have gone to the factory at Spalding for processing.

[31A]

43 minutes ago, thegreenhowards said:

Sounds plausible. Is that based on Long Sutton as an origin or just the Q path suggesting it was seasonal traffic? Cattle vans were used for fruit traffic weren’t they, so at least the front of my train would fit the bill.

 

A bit of both, really!

 

A lot of fruit and other agricultural traffic was sent out from the Fens; it kept the Wisbech & Upwell running until 1965 and a lot of fruit vans were labelled to be returned to Whitemoor.  Spalding-Sutton Bridge was kept open for freight after the M&GN closed until 1965; in John Rhodes' book on the M&GN (talking of 1959) he says "goods traffic continued at a healthy rate, particularly on the Spalding to Sutton Bridge spur.  Heavy consignments of potatoes, flowers and vegetables were still sent out, and seed potatoes and coal were still brought in, with trains of 30 or 40 wagons during busy periods".

 

Do you have any clues as to when your "Q" train ran, e.g. was it seasonal in accordance with agricultural harvests, for example?

 

 

[thegreenhowards]

2 hours ago, 31A said:

 

A bit of both, really!

 

A lot of fruit and other agricultural traffic was sent out from the Fens; it kept the Wisbech & Upwell running until 1965 and a lot of fruit vans were labelled to be returned to Whitemoor.  Spalding-Sutton Bridge was kept open for freight after the M&GN closed until 1965; in John Rhodes' book on the M&GN (talking of 1959) he says "goods traffic continued at a healthy rate, particularly on the Spalding to Sutton Bridge spur.  Heavy consignments of potatoes, flowers and vegetables were still sent out, and seed potatoes and coal were still brought in, with trains of 30 or 40 wagons during busy periods".

 

Do you have any clues as to when your "Q" train ran, e.g. was it seasonal in accordance with agricultural harvests, for example?

 

 

Hi Steve,

 

The train is from my 1953 Summer WTT. There are no dates listed but there is a footnote which says ‘runs regularly from New England’. The train number is 1299 if that means anything. It does rather look like a regular up Class D onto which some fruit was added in season. Hopefully that means I’ve got the formation pretty accurate but I’ll try to add some more fruit vans next time.

 

Thanks to all for your suggestions.

 

Andy

 

 

[great northern]

1 hour ago, thegreenhowards said:

Hi Steve,

 

The train is from my 1953 Summer WTT. There are no dates listed but there is a footnote which says ‘runs regularly from New England’. The train number is 1299 if that means anything. It does rather look like a regular up Class D onto which some fruit was added in season. Hopefully that means I’ve got the formation pretty accurate but I’ll try to add some more fruit vans next time.

 

Thanks to all for your suggestions.

 

Andy

 

 

My summer 1956 WTT shows it as starting from New England, but still runs as required. For some reason, I've managed to miss it off my sequence. It was through PN at 9.00pm, so there would have been enough light for photography. I don't have any WTTs covering the M&GN or the E.Lincs, but I would expect to see the original departure point listed if it had commenced from somewhere else.

[thegreenhowards]

1 hour ago, great northern said:

My summer 1956 WTT shows it as starting from New England, but still runs as required. For some reason, I've managed to miss it off my sequence. It was through PN at 9.00pm, so there would have been enough light for photography. I don't have any WTTs covering the M&GN or the E.Lincs, but I would expect to see the original departure point listed if it had commenced from somewhere else.

Thanks Gilbert, I thought I hadn’t seen it on PN. I think I’ll keep it as an early post nationalisation fruit train. That makes a purpose for it which is a bit different from my other goods services. And it might give me an excuse to buy some more wagons!

 

Andy

[Theakerr]

I have converted almost all my detailed split chassis B1s to the new chassis and have had to add weight to all of them to achieve the same performance as the old split chassis.  My notes say about 50gms but I have a feeling my notes may be wrong!!.  If anyone is interersted I still have an unconverted new chassis and can weight one of each.  Since I am not using DCC I take out all the gubbins associated with the decoder socket and hard wire the motor.  This gives a nice space for extra weight.   However this creates a forward weight bias that is nearly as bad as no extra weight.  It took me some time to figure out where to put the rear weight; it is possible to put a little right at the back of the motor and a real thin sheet on each side of the motor but the front rear bias was still there.  I ended up putting the extra weight into the cab roof.  From a helicopter view it is invisible and by painting it black as well as trimming the end and sides it is almost invisible from a track level view.   However, the crew do seem to suffer from concussion on a regular basis.

[thegreenhowards]

17 minutes ago, Theakerr said:

I have converted almost all my detailed split chassis B1s to the new chassis and have had to add weight to all of them to achieve the same performance as the old split chassis.  My notes say about 50gms but I have a feeling my notes may be wrong!!.  If anyone is interersted I still have an unconverted new chassis and can weight one of each.  Since I am not using DCC I take out all the gubbins associated with the decoder socket and hard wire the motor.  This gives a nice space for extra weight.   However this creates a forward weight bias that is nearly as bad as no extra weight.  It took me some time to figure out where to put the rear weight; it is possible to put a little right at the back of the motor and a real thin sheet on each side of the motor but the front rear bias was still there.  I ended up putting the extra weight into the cab roof.  From a helicopter view it is invisible and by painting it black as well as trimming the end and sides it is almost invisible from a track level view.   However, the crew do seem to suffer from concussion on a regular basis.

Thanks for that, it confirms my suspicions. As I use DCC I have limited space in the loco for extra weighting. If there were no alternative, I’d probably put the DCC gubbins in the tender and weight the body. But it’s simpler to dedicate my sole new chassis B1 to lighter duties (it will handle a standard suburban rake easily) and use Hornby or split chassis locos for the heavier duties.

[thegreenhowards]

This evening it’s the turn of the 2221 KX- Royston headed this evening by BRCW type 2, D5312 which dates us to between Jan 59, when released to traffic at Hornsey and June 60 when it was transferred to Haymarket.
 

 

This was a standard outer suburban six car corridor set. I thought this was a nice line up of power at Gresley Jn.

 

 

This loco has one of my favourite sound chips. It’s a Legomanbiffo project with a speaker let into the fuel tank and really sounds the part. So I’ve done a panning video following her round the exit from the Gresley Jn station area.

 

 

[thegreenhowards]

Today I’m featuring a new addition to the Gresley Jn fleet, WD 2-8-0, 90559.

 

 

This train is running 20 minutes late this evening awaiting loco. This is because I had to finish weathering it before it could run - I allow some unweathered locos, but a WD without a layer of grot is effectively naked!

 

It is the 2125 Finsbury Park - New England class H coal empties.I have reduced the load slightly as this loco is not fully run in yet but it seemed to handle it with no trouble,

 

 

 

Here is the video.

 

 

 

 

 

[thegreenhowards]

I’m having a gentle day as I had my jab yesterday and I’m feeling a bit washed out. The same is true for this K3, 61870 which has charge of a 2 coach parcels from Grimsby.

 

 

 

Those of you who follow Peterborough North will have seen Gilbert querying the purpose of this train and I’m equally bemused. It’s shown in the CWN as three vehicles from Grimsby with a fourth added at Spalding. Two BGs were supposedly detached at Peterborough leaving just two ‘B’s to go forward to KX. I’m not sure what the power would have been but Gilbert uses it as an excuse for a K3, so I have done the same!

 

 

[John Tomlinson]

We know of several people who've had the Oxford jab and felt quite grotty for a day or two, if indeed that's what you had. Pains in the arms and around the upper body also seem to happen but will pass.

 

I had the Oxford one, my wife the Pfizer, and both OK, although I did have a bit of neck pain for a day or two. However that might have been unrelated and due to sitting at the computer for several hours scanning old pictures! We're both really pleased to have had them, now around a month ago.

 

John.

[Clive Mortimore]

The only side effect I suffered from was the young lady who took my medical details, well I kept thinking of her lovely blue eyes and her Spanish accent.

[great northern]

45 minutes ago, thegreenhowards said:

I’m having a gentle day as I had my jab yesterday and I’m feeling a bit washed out. The same is true for this K3, 61870 which has charge of a 2 coach parcels from Grimsby.

 

 

 

Those of you who follow Peterborough North will have seen Gilbert querying the purpose of this train and I’m equally bemused. It’s shown in the CWN as three vehicles from Grimsby with a fourth added at Spalding. Two BGs were supposedly detached at Peterborough leaving just two ‘B’s to go forward to KX. I’m not sure what the power would have been but Gilbert uses it as an excuse for a K3, so I have done the same!

 

 

I assumed it would be an Immingham duty, so B1 or K3 probably. Not knowing what the return leg of the diagram was, I err on the side of caution, as it was presumably something rather more demanding than this.

[thegreenhowards]

19 minutes ago, Clive Mortimore said:

The only side effect I suffered from was the young lady who took my medical details, well I kept thinking of her lovely blue eyes and her Spanish accent.

Was that more of a front effect?!

[thegreenhowards]

35 minutes ago, John Tomlinson said:

We know of several people who've had the Oxford jab and felt quite grotty for a day or two, if indeed that's what you had. Pains in the arms and around the upper body also seem to happen but will pass.

 

I had the Oxford one, my wife the Pfizer, and both OK, although I did have a bit of neck pain for a day or two. However that might have been unrelated and due to sitting at the computer for several hours scanning old pictures! We're both really pleased to have had them, now around a month ago.

 

John.

Yes it was the Oxford jab. No complaints, I'm just feeling a bit washed out. But I've just received a new toy from the postman which has perked me up for the last hour or so! More later on Coulsdon Works.

[thegreenhowards]

20 minutes ago, great northern said:

I assumed it would be an Immingham duty, so B1 or K3 probably. Not knowing what the return leg of the diagram was, I err on the side of caution, as it was presumably something rather more demanding than this.

Sounds plausible, although at this time of night it could be a returning 34A loco? I suspect a B1 is the most likely but I like an excuse to run my K3s. Stupidly I put my Colwick one on the front instead of one of my Immingham ones. You'll just have to pretend you didn't know where 61870 was allocated.

 

[Sandhole]

On 23/03/2021 at 11:45, thegreenhowards said:

Today I’m featuring a new addition to the Gresley Jn fleet, WD 2-8-0, 90559.

 

 

This train is running 20 minutes late this evening awaiting loco. This is because I had to finish weathering it before it could run - I allow some unweathered locos, but a WD without a layer of grot is effectively naked!

 

It is the 2125 Finsbury Park - New England class H coal empties.I have reduced the load slightly as this loco is not fully run in yet but it seemed to handle it with no trouble,

 

 

 

Here is the video.

 

 

 

 

 

Proper Engine.
I love everything about this layout.
You are a guy after my own heart.
Regards,
Chris.