Northants & Beds early 70s photos...

[46444]

Hi Rangers,

 

Thanks for the reply and adding some more information to Geoff's photographs.

 

So basically, when I get around to building my layout based around Raunds/Kimbolton I can run the BP!

 

I knew about the running of a DMU on the line from one of my resources and will be getting a new Bachmann Cravens unit to represent this.

 

Also thanks for the info re: the 8F, I thought that might be the case.

 

Mark

[Pennine MC]

Thanks all for the extra info, railborne minerals of all sorts interest me. It would make sense for tipplers to be used at that stage, with their natural traffic ebbing away.

 

31245 btw was a longtime Immingham resident - it's not too obvious in those oblique shots but it's one of the 'High Dyke' catcher-fitted machines

[Fat Controller]

Thanks all for the extra info, railborne minerals of all sorts interest me. It would make sense for tipplers to be used at that stage, with their natural traffic ebbing away.

 

31245 btw was a longtime Immingham resident - it's not too obvious in those oblique shots but it's one of the 'High Dyke' catcher-fitted machines

Tipplers would have been the ideal vehicles for this traffic- they didn't have doors for the fine-grained material to dribble out of (though, judging by the tell-tale heaps around the track, other mineral wagons had been used...), and they had a decent capacity for a relatively dense commodity.

I wonder if the 31 had worked into Corby on another working, and been used in its downtime for the trip? They certainly worked to Corby, as one was involved in a spectacular run-away on a coke train, round about the time in question.

[Pennine MC]

 

I wonder if the 31 had worked into Corby on another working, and been used in its downtime for the trip? They certainly worked to Corby, as one was involved in a spectacular run-away on a coke train, round about the time in question.

 

Funnily enough, that just came to my mind as was shaving (not that you need to know that) 31150 IIRC.

[RANGERS]

Funnily enough, that just came to my mind as was shaving (not that you need to know that) 31150 IIRC.

 

The Corby accident was on 11 Sept 1975, a lengthy slack train into Lloyds had to be split to shunt it in two sections from the reception roads into the yard, from where the Lloyds 08 would trip it to the BSC exchange sidings. I can't remember the exact detail but one half ran away, the route from the up main to the yard was still set at Lloyds North (IIRC the rear of the train was still fouling the points when the train came to a stand) allowing it to run on to the down main line and down the grade back through Corby Tunnel.

 

It had just emerged from the North end of the tunnel and was within sight of the catch points which would have derailed it when it hit the 31. The driver died and three BR staff faced criminal charges as a result of the incident.

 

31s were nonetheless pretty rare in this part of the world, except for their appearances on the Wellingborough - Kettering/ Corby trip. This was a Wellingborough turn and generally the preserve of Toton or Cricklewood 25s (27s in earlier days) which would have been working off Wellingborough. My best guess is there was a working from Leicester to Wellingborough which left the loco spare at Wellingborough during the morning shift. 25s or 31s could have been rostered for this and hence been prime candidates for Wellingborough to use them on local turns.

 

The Leicester Bell Lane trip (9T06) sometimes threw up a 31 (or two) but the only other time I saw a 31 at Corby before the early 80s was on an inspectors saloon which turned up and laid up at Lloyds for a couple of hours one day in 1978 or 79.

[15B]

Great shots of the last days of the Twywell line.

 

As a kid in the mid 1970s, I have vivid memories of looking down from the A6 overbridge, and almost every time there would be a train, locos (25s) or mineral wagons on the line.

 

I can't believe I was lucky enough to catch passing traffic, so following the end of the iron traffic fron Twywll, was this end of the line used for storage - maybe for Cohens yard just up the line?

[signalbox2001]

hi guys names simon from northampton.in the early 70s and 80s i tresspassed in all the signalboxes round northampton,the trains you are talking about with the westerns on did indeed come via the bletchley oxford line.they were wroking the quedgley(gloucester to northampton concrete sleeper trains which went down to brigde street central materials depot.i only saw two westerns on these trains and they were pretty infrequent wroking too!!!!!!

[Guest Phil]

hi guys names simon from northampton.in the early 70s and 80s i tresspassed in all the signalboxes round northampton,the trains you are talking about with the westerns on did indeed come via the bletchley oxford line.they were wroking the quedgley(gloucester to northampton concrete sleeper trains which went down to brigde street central materials depot.i only saw two westerns on these trains and they were pretty infrequent wroking too!!!!!!

 

 

Thanks for the posting Simon.

 

Sometime later the Quedgeley - Northampton was routed via Worcester, Stourbridge and the Dudley line into Bescot, possibly for a loco change. In my hazy memory it was 7M65 on a Friday and the empties returned on a different day. From memory the traffic was BR Tops type STVs - tubes.

La

[cobbler]

Hi Phil

 

The Quedgley working did indeed run on a Friday, I saw a class 46 on this in 1982 i think, working down the Bridge Street line on a train of ex tube wagons loaded with concrete sleepers, they were tripped from the CMD ( central amterials depot ) to the PAD ( prefab assembly depot ) by the class 08 pilot and used to make 60ft track panels and shipped out on Salmon flat wagons.

 

Richard

[Fat Controller]

This one's interesting; obviously early TOPS period. Is the ore tippler in local use or (possibly more likely), at the tail end of a roadstone train returning to the WR? Apologies for any geographical impossibilities, I know Hardingstone is near Northampton and something to do with the SMJ, but little else

David Ratcliffe just came up with the Pool details for this photo. I quote:-

my list has Pool 7683 in June 1975 as 'Foster Yeoman

Merehead-Northampton Roadstone 38 MSV'.