locoholic

Yes please! Particularly The Great Marquess in LNER green as preserved and run on the mainline in the 1960s, so I have an excuse for an LNER liveried engine next to my BR steam and diesels.

Well, let's see what you think... It runs very nicely, but is my K1 the only one with a bit of a wavey running plate? Apart from that it looks great to my untutored eye. The top headlamp is especially fine and will almost certainly get broken off at some point, and will be absolutely impossible to find again.

Some great stories! This is 47521 on a Merrymaker Mystery trip calling at a soggy Rayleigh, on 11th April 1981. I think one of the station staff was making the most of a Class 47 calling at his station. The most memorable Merrymaker I went on was on 24th October 1981, from Rayleigh to Blackpool for the illuminations. I think the loco was 47115, and the outward route was via the North London line, the ECML to Hare Park Junction, then to Wakefield Kirkgate where, to my delight, we swapped the 47 for 40083. We proceeded via Standedge, Manchester Vic and Bolton to Blackpool where we arrived at 14.55 in the teeth of a gale and torrential rain. The return departed at 23.46 and all went sedately until Euxton Junction, where we stopped for around 30 minutes, before gently reversing all the way back to Preston. I think the train in front had failed, but I'm not sure. We set out from Preston again, this time taking the line through Blackburn. Then came the climb to Copy Pit. I don't think that line was used very much at that time, so rail-head conditions were not ideal, and in the heavy rain the Class 40 kept slipping every time the driver applied power. Somehow we kept moving in the inky blackness, finally rolling over the summit at walking pace. We swapped back to 47115 at Wakefield, but by then the engineers were in possession of our outward route, so we trundled back via Knottingley and Lincoln Central, regaining the ECML at Peterborough. We finally arrived at Shenfield at 7.06am, where I believe we had to use a bus to get back to Rayleigh, due to more engineering works. I was exhausted, but very pleased with the traction and route. Here is the hero of that dark and stormy night on the Copy Pit line, ten hours earlier at Blackpool North. The negative has self-destructed, and the quality wasn't great to start with, but the photo still brings it all back.

Does anyone know why there were Class 31s in green with the double-arrow logo (and classes 15 and 23, if Heljan are to be believed) but no class 37s or 47s, or any other Eastern Region diesels?

Lovely photos. What was the 56 doing on the post train? Here's a couple of earlier ones. 56003 on a railtour (The Grid Iron Grice) at Walsall on 7th Aug 1982. I recall it did a number of freight lines I wanted. And a more mundane duty: 56056 at Saltley on 13th Oct 1982, presumably heading for Didcot Power Station.

I found some old leaflets for excursion trips recently - I think they have a certain period charm, and they bring back happy memories of long days spent in Mark 1 open stock, journeying economically to far off places. The first Merrymaker I went on was in 1974 from Leigh-on-Sea to Chester. Whoever planned the trip obviously took his LT&SR allegiance to the Midland Railway seriously, because we used ex-MR lines to get as near to Chester as we could, via the Midland main line and the Castle Donington freight-only line (where I saw my only working industrial steam loco at the power station), then through Uttoxeter and Crewe. The train included a Gresley buffet car, but I can't remeber which loco hauled the train - I expect it was a Class 47. Here is a later Merrymaker, which had taken Stratford silver-roofed 47169 "Great Eastern" from Essex to Taunton on 15th April 1979. The trains to the Western region always seemed to take the Badminton route, never the Berks & Hants. On the way back I was very excited to see the three old diesel hydraulics at Swindon. The photo I got shows how fast 47169 was going at that point. Another memorable trip was my introduction to the Settle & Carlisle, on 11th October 1980. This was a Mystery trip which took us north up the S&C, to spend a couple of hours in Carlisle (the first of many such visits) before a return via Newcastle and the ECML. Happy days...

Have Hornby or Bachmann made a RTR version of 08604 in that livery? It looks very smart.

Scanned a couple more Class 31 photos: 31268 leaving Old Oak Common with vans on 16th Sept 1986. Unidentified 31 at St Albans on a "Network South East" Day in 1986. The loco and BG arrived and then reversed into the siding by the old signal box. After a passenger train had gone past the 31 departed northwards. Not sure if there was a loading platform in the siding, or whether it was just to get the 31 out of the way of the passenger train. It did seem an old-fashioned sort of thing to do, especially when there are slow lines all the way from St Pancras to Bedford. Those Network South East Days were good value, I seem to remember.

I also lived a few miles from the Southminster branch, when I was young, and your photos are tons better than mine. I got one terrible shot of the Class 37 hauling the sand train, then went back to get a better picture, only to be told by the signalman at Fambridge that it didn't run any more. I have been told that I went to some kind of open day to mark the closure of the signal box at South Woodham Ferrers and removal of the passing loop, but I must have been very young, as I don't remember at all. Of all rural Essex stations, though, my favourite was Cressing. I don't suppose you have a photo of that, pre-wires?

Sorry if this is a silly question, but where is the exhaust on a Class 05? I can't see anything suitable on the photos of the Heljan one, apart from the obvious chimney thing on Cider Queen.

The sun does shine sometimes on the Blyth and Tyne. Here's a grid northbound across the viaduct over the River Blyth. What's the official name of this structure? And here's another view of the chimneys visible in the previous shot. You get to visit some real beauty spots chasing trains. This location has changed a lot since this photo - I think the power station has gone, and the sidings are all derelict, and the staithes that were beyond the sidings have gone too. And at Winning Junction this lovely junction signal has been replaced by two ordinary semaphores.

A couple of shots from 30 years ago: 20002 and 20114 at Carstairs.This was on 14th Jan 1984, when I was travelling on an Adex from Birmingham to Edinburgh. The wires had come down between Crawford and Carstairs so, after a lengthy delay, our Class 86 was dragged by (I think) a pair of 20s. As I recall, this meant that we had less than an hour in Edinburgh before our departure back south. I had a friend with me who was not interested in trains, and he was not impressed, having been looking forward to sampling the cultural delights of Edinburgh. 20168 at Bescot, 15th Feb 1984. I had cycled through freezing fog from Northfield, and my hands were so cold I could barely operate the camera.

Thanks to everyone for identifying my shot at Portsmouth Harbour. The prize is... a couple more old shots of 47s. This is 47 790, I believe, on 23 July 1998, at Cattybrook, heading west, down towards the Severn Tunnel. Sorry this one's not very good quality, but it was at Harlington (Beds), and the headboard says "The Orcadian". Any ideas what this was? The loco and coaches almost match. This one just reminds me of the hours spent on New Street in the 1980s.

Couple more I've found from a gloomy day by the North Sea: 56108 propelling CovHops into the alumina loader at North Blyth, not sure when, sadly. 56104 at Cambois Depot on the same date.

Found the first photo in amongst my slides - it dates back to around 2002, I think, and the location is Haresfield, south of Gloucester, as far as I remember. I guess the army kit has come from Ashchurch, heading for Ludgershall, perhaps? The second was from 08/11/14 and is at Angerstein Wharf - haven't seen many pictures of this interesting location.

Thanks for posting the excellent photos. I grew up in south Essex, but hardly ever bothered to take photos of the EMUs, which I now regret greatly.

Moving on... several decades previously, here is one of my ancestors at Poplar in the summer of 1923. My great grandfather, Herbert Humphreys, was a driver on the North London Railway, and I seem to remember my grandmother saying that her father drove trains to Potters Bar, presumably from Broad Street. I blame him for my life-long interest in railways.

A couple from the archive: 47847 gets its revenge on a failed Voyager at Gloucester. 47052 rumbles through a soggy Stratford. Help! I have no recollection of taking this photo - can anyone recognise the location, with tank wagons parked in a bay platform, and why would a 47 be hauling such a short train?

A couple from 1985 today - oh goodness, that's nearly 30 years ago. 56043 & 56036 at Stratford heading what I presume is a stone train to Purfleet. And a few days later, 56078 at New Street, heading a drag to Nuneaton with a diverted Euston train, attracting a reasonable crowd in the process.

Latest teaser is on the Kernow Models Facebook page - accompanied by a photo of the class 151 dmu (which I had no idea existed). What possible connection could there be between that and their Beattie Well Tank model?

Here are a few more Grids from days gone by: 56091 at York on 4th June 1981. Sorry about the quality - the negative is in a pretty awful state. Can't find the info on these. The slides are stamped 1991. This was two years later - potash empties to Boulby at Hunts Cliff. Surely this location deserves to be as famous as the Dawlish Sea Wall?

Not sure if this has been noted elsewhere on this thread, but Gaugemaster say on their website that they are to distribute the Oxford Rail Adams Radial, so that might be somewhere to watch for news. Has it been confirmed that the Adams radial is the prototype that another couple of manufacturers were also working on? It will be very interesting to see what compromises are necessary to keep the tooling costs manageable and yet still produce the livery variations. I knew about the different boilers, as the domes look different on the three locos that survived at Lyme Regis and were photographed from every angle, but different diameter trailing wheels and slidebar arrangements had passed me by, and to be honest, don't really bother me (and I suspect about 99% of the potential customers) as long as it looks "right" - but I know that's a subjective judgement. I wonder how they will get enough weight over the driving wheels to give the model reasonable adhesion - perhaps their die-cast expertise will be useful? Were any of the three survivors ever used on railtours in BR days? That might be the excuse I need to buy one.

I hope these shots are of interest to Cl56 fans - I can't find my notes, so I don't know the dates at the moment: This was near Avonmouth - 56086 had hauled the wagons out of the sidings and then run round - anyone know what these wagons were used for - they don't look like the normal coal wagons? This was at Resolven, I think, on the old Vale of Neath line. Loco is 56069, looking very shiny. 56069 a few minutes later at the loading facility at Cwmgwrach. This in 56088 at Onllwyn, later the same day. Having arrived with the empties and run round using the weed-infested line in the foreground, it was propelling the train into the sidings. Happy days! Glad there are still a few Grids on the network, although I haven't seen one for ages - the only trains through Ross-on-Wye are on the back of low loaders on the M50!

A couple of Class 31s around Sheffield: 31116 and 31227 at Rotherwood Sidings, with lovely rusty coke hoppers, presumably from Orgreave, on 16th April 1981? And an unidentified one at Tinsley, on the same day.

I used to live in Dursley, and managed to get a few shots of Class 31s on the Berkeley nuclear flask trains. This would have been around 1997, when the brake van was still used. Seen at Standish Junction. The Sharpness branch is mostly in a cutting hemmed in by trees... This looks like a different pair, in the siding at Berkeley. I can't find my notes of the loco numbers, sadly.