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Looks wrong - but isn't!


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  • RMweb Gold

Id say an error too, surely it must have passed some manual boxes between sellafield and carlisle for someone to spot it

 

Some DRS 37s vary regards the lights, on some non refurb ones the rear light switches in the cab you are in switch the opposite end tail lights on the loco so you can turn on the head and tail lights on from one position (which is how i believe they were built?) and on refurb ones the lighting switches work for just that cab (and they have proving panels in the cabs too)

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  • RMweb Gold

Id say an error too, surely it must have passed some manual boxes between sellafield and carlisle for someone to spot it

The Sellafield - Kingmoor was just a guess.

 

Would this be a minor error or quite a major safety issue?

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A minor error rather than a safety issue.  If it passed a manual signal box then it would count as having no tail lamp and would be stopped at the next box.  The box that first noted the problem wouldn't be able to accept any more trains until the driver had confirmed his train was complete (in case there was some more of the train stopped in section or even derailed onto the other track).  As Jim points out it would have had to pass several such boxes on the way from Sellafield so I suspect this move probably hasn't come that far. 

 

Potentially much worse is if a loco tail lamp is left on when hauling a train, because if the coupling parts behind the loco then the next (manual) signal box might assume the train was complete. These days it's much less likely as all trains have continuous brakes, but of course if the pipes weren't connected then the brakes wouldn't apply if the train parted.  A few years ago I shouted across to the driver of a parcels train in the through roads at Derby that his loco tail light was on, his reply was that he'd driven all the way from London and nobody had pulled him up (no manual boxes of course).  Users and manufacturers of model diesels please note! 

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Bessacarr Junction, Doncaster, last weekend. The 153 has its tail lights on.

post-6971-0-48311700-1365540831.jpg

 

In fact it's heading away from the camera, on a Lincoln to Doncaster service. It approached the junction on the left-hand line, crossed to the right-hand line, and is now passing the coal train which had preceded it by about 5 minutes, and had stopped at the next signal. The single line to the right joins the up side of the ECML, and the two lines with trains on fly over it and join the down side (or else allow you to head off round the corner to Mexborough). The coal train may well be a diversion due to the Hatfield landslip blockage. 

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  • RMweb Premium

heres one from today, Derby Sinfin Jn, green with a flash to take you down the sinfin branch, wrong because the next signal you reach is a stop board!!

I have never heard it called that before (the 'feather' as I know it), which bit of the railway geographically does the term come from?

 

As for it being wrong to go from a green to a stop board (without a reflectorised distant board appearing in between*), although unusual it might not be quite as wrong as it first appears. In theory if the branch speed is low enough such that distant boards are not required (i.e. the Stop board is located such that you can easily bring a train to a halt after it is seen) then the situation you illustrate could well be allowed.

 

* In four aspect territory, when such a signal is cleared onto a line featuring three aspect signalling the double yellow indication is never given. When a four aspect signal is cleared onto a line featuring two aspects and there is a separate standalone distant signal between the four aspect and the next two aspect stop signal

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When Kings Cross was resignalled in about 1977, they installed RA indicators on the platforms.

 

Right Away was a "code" used by "the foreman"  to tell a driver to go home.

 

So, one day, the forman walked in the driver's room and one wag asked him what the RA meant on the platform. Foreman says "right away" so we all stood up, put our coats on and moved towards the door!! He never go caught on THAT again.

 

Daft signal plates, on the Underground they use fog repeaters. A Training School trick question used to be "where is the only fog repeater on the system that shows RED?"  

 

The answer was at Triangle Sidings on the eastbound road towards High Street. Fog repeaters were always labelled R (repeater) with the signal box code, in this case ED for High Street. Hence the fog repeater always showed RED....on the signal plate!

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