Eggesford box

A few shots between Aberdeen and Inverness on 10/04/1987 0825 Inverness - Aberdeen passing Kennethmont 47 655 at Inverurie 47 655 again getting away from Dyce

It fllooded previously some years before and the water was even higher as they closed some flood gates to stop Oxford flooding which backed the water up. A canal boat got caught under a bridge and swamped. I was working the South box that night and told control that a load of track circuits had gone down but there was no point in calling anyone out as it was because everything was under water. Yes, they got the S&T to come all the way from Marylebone! I just shrugged when they turned up and said I had told control what the situation was. When the water got even higher me and my mate at the North bailed and went up the station. I managed to keep my feet dry, my mate was not so lucky having to wade knee deep from the North box. There was some grumbling and criticism from our esteemed leadership at Birmingham about our actions. Well there was until they saw the film footage on the news!

Not a problem with those signals since they are electrically lit but on the odd occasion I have lamped a signal with a safety cage up the ladder I found that you where likely to crack your elbow/humerus as you climbed up with the lamp in one hand. Health and safety I suppose but I think they are ugly to look at and just make lamping more awkward. Fortunately I no longer do that job.

Hi. took a few quick shots of the backs of the new semaphores as I presume you have plenty from the front. Off on annual leave after tonight for a week, yipee! Day trips out with the kids Dohh! PS, worked Banbury South earlier in the week when said 6X65 left a track circuit down behind it at Somerton, enjoying the box was not a word that sprung to mind!

Manufacturers putting liquid glues such as liquid poly in tall thin bottles rather than the short squat ones they used to supply them in so you are more likely to knock them over. Giving you the joys of wasting glue/dissolving part of the work you have just spent the last hour on and suffering from inhaling the fumes. Yes, I do know you can cut a hole out of a block of wood to make them more stable. Oh yes, and not being able to make up my mind what prototype to model!

2015 is the last date/rumour we have heard for the Banbury boxes closing

Hi, do not know if these will be much use to you. All taken on 31/05/1985 when I went down there to take photos of 46443 running a series of shuttles between Bristol Temple Meads and Whapping Wharf.

Hi Ian, nice to see your photos, never knew about your Appledore layout, only just seeing this thread. I was somewhat bemused about you saying you where going to Appledore to take photos for a backscene but now all is clear. Makes me a bit nostalgic for the coast living as far away from the sea as you can get nowadays. Bit of variety here at Banbury today with a DRS 37 propelling a green inspection saloon, a 70 in the up loop with a freightliner and a red 60 heading through on the down with a train of tanks .

Moving to the West end of the station, all the following photos being taken on Tuesday 5th November 1985 The West box The West box diagram, unfortunately, somewhat obscured by the reflection of the lights West box interior The detonator placers for the Down Lines. It was fairly common practise on the Western to put the detonators on a seperate small frame but I would imagine triple as opposed to double lever frames where a relative rarity (someone will now produce a list of triple frames as long as your arm!) Aview from around the back of the box nearing sunset both literally and figuratively A view of the gantry at night. note that it has lost a few more arms since Mike's photo. Indeed it seemed, at times, that their was some alteration (removal) of signalling equipment at Newton Abbot appearing in the notices almost monthly on the long run up to complete resignalling.

HI, a nice set of photos, takes me back to learning passenger shunting there in 1979. I thought a few more photos may be of interest though most where taken on a couple of fairly dismal days. first the large structure of the East box. There was a plan of this in the Model Railway Constructor once, it would certainly make an impressive model in any scale The East box diagram The cavernous interior, note the large proportion of spare levers by this date, June 1985 Looking towards the station from the gantry at the Exeter end of the station Final shots at the East end taken in 1986 of the view from the box looking either way.

Fascinating thread on a line of which I know very little. In Respnse to Debs comments, some photographs of Mouldsworth Junction in happier times, 21/6/86.

Hi Ian, it was a train of tanks.

60 071 departed Banbury Up Goods 2130 with 6V70 today

Hi, the Signalling Record Society list 5 photographs of Warminster signalbox, obtainable through their link with the Kidderminster railway museum. One of the leading lights in the SRS was John Morris, now sadly dead, who had been a signalman at Warminster at one point. Whether he left anything to the SRS which may be of any use to you I do not know but it may be worth enquiring. Somewhere, in the back of my garage, piled under mountains of junk valuable artefacts is the signalling diagram from the box towards the end of its life. When I can next round up my trusty native bearers I will mount an expedition to the darkest regions of the garage, photograph said elusive creature and post the results.

Hi Ian, On my past couple of layouts I built control panels with mimic diagrams. Using Tortoise motors I used the second set of auxiliary switches to feed a set of route lights on the control panel so as the points where moved a set of routes came up like a faux NX panel. I expect you are probably comitted to a computer based route but just a thought to use your existing auxiliary switches now you are using a Hex Juicer for frog polarity. Just before anyone picks me up on it, I do realise that route lights would not come up on a real NX panel until you called a route from a signal. Great videos!

For me, nostalgia for a simpler time free of mortgages and family commitments. Lets not forget that much of what we like to model remained owing to a lack of investment and the railways where in decline. But even so, looking through the carriage window passing a forest of semaphores, past yards full of archaic looking wagons and obscure branchlines curving away tantalisingly out of sight into cuttings. More personally for me, growing up and starting work on a branchline where nearly everyone had worked together for years. The end of a summer Saturday with the station gone quiet apart from the cooing of wood pigeons in the rock cutting and strange reflections on the canopy from the hosed down platform. Being given the flag by the guard, a youngster of my age, with instructions to see the train away whilst I check the tickets. Waving the train away from a sun drenched Umberleigh. Settling down in the guards chair, feet up on the desk and the inward swinging door wide open. A dragon fly buzzing into the compartment for a minute before heading out again as we rattled down the beautiful Taw valley, nearly home. Bliss!

And just to add to their woes a down freightliner failed at Little Bourton just north of Banbury early afternoon, same day. I think it was 66 566 I know it was only one digit away from 666 which I thought was appropriate.

Just thought of another one, think it was a sketch on the Dick Emery show where he got out of the cab of a DMU, walked along the track and inserted a large clockwork key into a convenient aperture and began winding it up

Know what you mean Paul, A couple of years ago I went to an interview at Walsall in offices, upstairs at one end, of what I think was an old goods shed berefit of track. I inadvertantly went into the shed portion looking for the entrance. Stood on disused old dock I half expected to hear the squeal of tyres and see Reagan and Carter piling out of a Granada to knick a couple of villans!

Hi Ian, certainly coming along now. I much envy your workrate. Nice to see even the blue shipping container there. In case you are wondering what it is doing there, it is used as a storeroom for things like de-icer and Autumn stores. David.

A few more:- Callan the movie where the bad guys car gets clipped at a level crossing by a 33 and a rake of MKis Carlton Brown of the FO with Terry Thomas and Peter Sellars with what may be a Stroudley Terrier decked up with cowcatchers emerging from a tunnel High Heels and Low Lifes (or was it the other way round) with Minnie Driver where the bad guys throw a suitcase supposedly containing money, but in reality a bomb, out of a train window as it passes over a viaduct. I think the train was again a 33 and Mk1s but am not certain. The viaduct was a different location to where the train itself was filmed, being Souldern No.1 or 2 viaducts between Bicester and Aynho Junction. The film crew could mount a camera on the bridge as it was before the double line was reinstated. I had nothing to do with it but still managed to avail myself of the outside location crews catering facilities!

Hi, Bhowani Junction with Stewart Granger and Ava Gardner. Was there a childrens series called Gods Wonderful Railway in the seventies or is my memory playing tricks? Also the Hi De Hi mob did a sitcom on the Severn Valley. An episode of 'Tales of the totally expected' where Keith Barron just missed a train at Crediton station 1981/83 I know cos I was the signalman and they dropped me a tenner for dropping and raising the barriers with no trains about, lot of money in those days!

You should make a model of the North, that leans backwards anyway!

Hi Ian, CD-R in post with interior views of Banbury station. If there are any specific areas you are missing details of let me know. David

Hi Ian, bit late in the day but the measurements of the South box above the plinth are:- Length 42' 1" Widrth 12' 1" Where the plinth is seven bricks the height is 23" and the splay bricks are 3" Measured by tape measure single handed so there is a bit of room for error with tape sagging slightly no matter how hard you pull it and eyeballing the length at corners with bullnose bricks but should still be within two or three inches and more accurate than brick counting. Thinking about it I should have measured the window frames to see if the error was in the dimensions of the etches. Do you still need photos of the buffet? David