Ken.W

ETH (posted that at same time lol)

Hi Erm, no, not really. There's two distinct subjects being talked of here; Single-manning - of the driving cab - without a secondman DOO -Driver Only Operation - train worked by only a driver with no guard either, which started very much later. The Secondmans' position didn't disappear, more like faded out. Single-manning started from at least the early '70s, probably late '60s. I believe it started with the same agreement that allowed the guard to travel in the rear cab of fully fitted non-passenger trains, where he would usually use the secondman's seat. All trains did still have a guard though at this time. There were certain restrictions though as to when a turn could be single manned, which applied to the full turn, not just part of it, so you could see what 'could' be a single-manned train being double-manned as another part of the diagram required it. First of all, a single-manned diagram had to have a fixed, booked working, no 'as ordered' or as required work, hence things like local goods or trip would be double manned. It also had to contain a booked, guarantied break (the 'PNB') within a certain time period, double-manned turns didn't required any break. All our DMU diagrams conformed to this and were single-manned. I think single-manning on units had been allowed even earlier. Any light engine movements had to be double-manned, as with no guard there still had to be two on board for carrying out protection if needed. Plus it was usually the secondman who would do coupling / uncoupling of the loco (though some areas did differ) One of the main reasons for continued double-manning though, was steam heated trains, a secondman was required to operated the boiler as it often needed to be attended to on the move, either for resetting a fault, or shutting it off 20 minutes before any loco change or shunting was due to take place - there was up to 60 psi of steam in those pipes! And I can vouch that the middle of a Deltic engine room at full pelt's not a very pleasant experience. So double manning naturally declined as steam heating was phased out. You could of course have situations such as an ETH fitted train double-manned as a steam heat one was worked the other way, or one turn which we had, a loco hauled train N'cle to York which required double manned then a DMU back to Darlington. DOO operation, ie without a Guard, first started for passenger in the early 80s with certain specially fitted units, the Bedford - St.Pancras already mentioned being the first. The more general DOO-NP (non-passenger trains) didn't start till several years later, and from around the same time light engines could also be single manned.

As has been noted above, various methods could be used depending on location and traffic levels. Most common seems to have been unloading onto trolleys to be wheeled off to the parcels office or wherever they were dealt with on the station. In later years this was largely replaced by unloading brutes which were then taking to the appropriate point. Mail however, as Stationmaster Mike has pointed out, could only be handled by Post Office staff, and they would generally wheel them out direct to their vans. At some larger stations with large amounts of mail traffic special facilities were provided, at Newcastle the goods lifts at the east end of the main platforms connected to a subway out the station, under Forth Street, and direct in the P.O. sorting office across the road. Waverley had a mail compound between Platform 1 (the present Pl.2) and the Operations Depot', which had an overhead conveyance system from which the mail bags were hung and carried over the tracks, out the station, and into the adjacent sorting office building on Calton Road. Ah yes, I remember those two, i was one of those who, at that time, would be providing the heating on them (or in later years, driving). Time of the essence? Not always, unfortunately. Reminds me of one occasion with 1A40, the London Mail, by Durham we were on our third loco! The first,which we'd have brought the stock up from Heaton with was declared a failure at Newcastle due to, IIRC, a boiler fault. Cue the second sent over from Gateshead in place. At, or by Durham though (it's a long time since) this one had expired so we were then onto the third, which I think was a Peak which must have been a 46 as Kings X men didnt know the 45's (think I've got that the right way round, it was one or the other and as we had 46s a Gateshead but there were no 45s on the Eastern think that was it). BTW, I notice your avatar's of a Deltic nameplate . No 8, always brings back a couple of memories for me, one involving another failure. Way back in school days, it was my last one for spotting the the full class when, on what was maybe my first trip to York, with my Mum, it had hauled our train there. A few years later, in '81and doing the MP12 (Driver's basic training course), which at Gateshead was done on the 47. So, on the practical handling part, for air brake train handling we used the Newcastle - Liverpools, generally a 47 with 8 Mk2s then. We'd go in a group of six, half the class, to Leeds and back taking turns driving with the others in train. After setting off from Newcastle the lad driving unfortunately spotted a body by the line in the Birtley area so stopped at Ouston Jn. to report it. The 47 then died in sympathy. Nothing could be done with it but call for assistance. A short wait, then rolling out along the Slow Line from Gateshead to our aid comes.... Deltic 8 We then continue on to Darlington where, whose turn was it to take it on to York? The only occasion I got to drive one .... officially

On the ECML, the non-stop workings by a single loco between London and Edinburgh are of course well known. What doesn't seem to be so appreciated though is that this was very much a one-off through working and pretty much on the limit. It was also, incidentally, the only working which actual used the crew-change facility of the corridor tenders, and one of very few on which an Edinburgh loco would be seen south of Newcastle. So, what were the issues? Clearly not water, the ECML, like most other main lines used water troughs to refill at speed, and the non-stops obviously relied entirely on these. For other services in steam days, when infrastructure was there for steam working, main stations would all have water cranes enabling water to be topped up during station stops too. Remember, these wern't the firemans hose pumped from a road tanker hour-long job of todays steam specials! The water cranes had a massive diameter 'bag', and were fed from a large capacity tank, constantly topped up, up on a high tower to give a high pressure, so they could top up a tender in minutes. Also, station stops weren't the minute or two 'whistlestop' of today's railway, most passenger trains also had significant amounts of parcels and mail traffic to handle so stops were longer. What can't of course is be refueled en-route is the coal. With the non-stops, even with a fast timing, limited load, and no station stops to restart from, there's reports of occasions of running short of coal at the end of the journey, and I've seen several photos at Belle Isle of locos coming off Top Shed prep'd for the non-stop that, the heap of coal on the tender, the signaler must surely have had to bell it through to KGX as an 'out of gauge load'! So, on regular expresses, with generally heavier loads, several stops to restart from, and hence slower timings and more time on the road, such through workings were out of the question. Even shorter runs could apparently still present problems coal wise. When I was at Gateshead from '78 onwards, one of the Running Foremen had the nickname (though strictly not when anywhere near within ear-range!) of 'floorboards' as he'd reputedly once, on an A4 on a KGX - N'cle working, used them to fire the loco on the last leg in from Durham! Many workings, as the OP noted, were much shorter still, this now brings us onto working practices. Depots were, it would seem, loath to allow their locos, particularly 'top link' one's to be taken on by 'foreign' depots or crews, and workings were generally arranged to return locos back to their home depot. Perhaps a factor here, their would of course have been no centralised maintenance records, so keeping it returning home would help keep track of what was done. Also, the practice of regular manning of top link link engines, mentioned earlier regards pre-group times, hadn't entirely gone away, the idea being, i believe, that drivers would take greater pride in looking after their 'own' engine, and this seems to have continued on / off at various times virtually till the end of mainline express steam. For example, there's numerous references to in the 50s No.7 being Bill Hoole's 'regular' engine, or the well know books of 'Toram Beg' with his regular, No.100. So, when the home depot crew were due to come off, so, often, did the loco. Although I don't think they would necessarily be worked back by the same crew after the time needed for servicing, it could still likely be by another crew from it's home depot. Grantham was one change point mentioned by the OP which appears strange now, it was AIUI, the furthest a Tyneside crew could work out and back. Although they did work through to London these were of course lodging turns which would seem were a minority, most turns being been out and back in a shift. It wasn't until the HST that London and back in a shift became possible.

Was very slow for me yesterday evening too, then unavailable just getting timed out errors. Very slow again and some timed out errors this afternoon as well.

Well, in the erm, present climate, the other day I was walking the dog around 5pm in fields by the A1, and virtually all I could hear was birds singing! This was no 'country' section of the road either, it was directly opposite the Gateshead Metrocentre

With the Edinburgh - Glasgow 27s, coaches were through wired and piped so the locos were working in multiple with each other. Top & Tail working in the modern sense, with the leading loco working the train and the trailing loco hauled dead would not have been possible with vacuum braked stock, as the trailing loco would be unbraked.

Anyone know what 'Cheltenham' was doing at Darlington? Some sort of special I presume

A2/1 were originally unlined black with 'NE' on the tender, tho all had LNER on by May 47. 60509 (Aug. '48) and 60508 (Sept '48) were repainted in lined LNER green but with "BRITISH RAILWAYS" on the tender. 60507 (10/48) and 60510 (4/48) had "BRITISH RAILWAYS" applied to the tender but remained black. To BR green with early crest, 60508* 6/49, 60510* 8/49, 60507 10/49, and 60509 6/50. * Note, for 60508/10 this co-insides with receiving 8-wheel tenders, the other pair had done so under LNER. A2/2 60501 LNER Green, BR number and "BRITISH RAILWAYS" on tender May '48. BR Green Feb.50 60502 LNER Green, BR number still with LNER on tender July 48. BR Green Mar.51 60503 LNER Green, BR number and "BRITISH RAILWAYS" on tender Sept.48. BR Green Aug.50 60504 LNER Black. To LNER Green Mar.48, BR number with "BRITISH RAILWAYS" on tender. BR Green May'50 60505 LNER Black to LNER Green with "BRITISH RAILWAYS" on tender Jun.48. BR Green Jun.50 60606 LNER Green, BR number Dec.48, LNER retained on tender. BR Green July 50 A2/3 All LNER Green, with BR number by Oct.49, and all received "BRITISH RAILWAYS" on the tender except for 60523 which was the first to BR Green, July 49 but with blank tender sides for a while, receiving the BR emblem later. The others received the emblem on re-painting, the last being 60524 Apr.51. Of the 4 Hornby are releasing, to BR Green with early emblem were 60500 10/49, 60512 4/50, and 60514 11/50. 60523, as above. Ref; RCTS 'green books' Pt.2A

I believe, as posted earlier, though the point seemed to be lost in discussion of wheel sizes and whether 7P qualified, it was simply that the 6'2" wheeled A2s, of all varieties, were classed as Mixed Traffic locos. In The RCTS 'green book' (Pt.1), table of power classes, it lists A2, A2/2 and A2/3 as 7MT, and A2/1 as 6MT. So which 'P' classes qualified's irrelevant as they weren't in any.

All of the Peppercorn A1s also received BR express blue, the last Doncaster builds, 60127-9/53-62 from new. Also, all of the A4s and all but 2 of the A3/A10 At that stage A1 would have been the Peppercorn class Erm, not quite. The A2/1s were actually built new as such. Although they were originally ordered as V2s, the alteration was made prior to construction.

A quick check of the RCTS book and yes, thats correct, last LNER 4-40 D11 62685, 1/62 Just beating last ex-NB D34 62496, 11/61. Last D49 62712, 7/61

Maybe not, but am sure it still had the red stripe finishing above the headlights like this one

Agreed, I do like the livery on them, but think it would have been been better with a Garter Blue stripe. LNER just looks SO wrong on red for some reason Bit different when East Coast took over from National Excuse, as most of the fleet (ie all the 225 stock except 91111) was then still in re-branded GNER livery and due overhaul. Also, the grey was described as being a neutral base colour for whoever came next

Virgin's design, but modified, particularly the red band around the cab side / coach ends; Darlington 01/11/16 (I believe the Japanese was for the promotional livery only) Also, the same senior management were retained

From pages 222-3, May 1st These were the sets we were using for training at the time, and this was just the week after Easter week

They were certainly doing training runs well before Easter

Hi Mike, Sorry if it wasn't clear, but in saying there's been no bi-directional signaling brought into use on that section, I was meaning any bi-directional, including SIMBIDS. The remaining signal at Holme has as I said never been in use, and in fact, I don't recall any other bi-direction signals ever actually being installed in that section. I signed the route, btw, from 1990 until leaving last October

Hi, That's definately the original signal still in use, with the "new" 4-aspect LED type replacement behind which was installed many years ago but has never been brought into use. Erm no, there's been no bi-directional signaling brought into use on the main line between Peterborough and Huntingdon. There is an Up direction signal on the Down at Holme which has never been in use. The only bi-direction working's wrong direction moves from Peterborough Station to Fletton to access the Nene Valley line There's actually a section, not yet mentioned, at the subject of this thread. Peterborough Station over the Up Slow to Werrington Jn. It allows a train having arrived from Lincoln in the Up platforms to return wrong direction avoiding crossing the main lines twice. At Werrington it only gives access to the 'Joint Line', down main line trains have to cross back proper line at New England North. Now that section, actually Cockburnspath bank, is definately an odd one. Both lines are signaled bi-directionally, however; the Down direction over the Up Line (downhill) is SIMBIDS only, while the Up direction over the Down Line (uphill) is fully bi-directional. It used to be quite common, with the 21.00 off Edinburgh (the Aberdeen -Leeds) to pass a freight up the bank that was running the same direction wrong line. That section also seems unusual in that the Up direction bi-di signals are normally green, and you see then changing down as a down train approaches. Yes the full section of the ECML under Tyneside IECC is bi-directional, also Morpeth, Alnmouth, and Tweedmouth signaling areas. So that gives bi-directional operation from Northallerton Station Jn (ie not through Northallerton Station in the down direction, or from the end of the Down Slow at Longlands Jn. about two miles south) right though to Berwick station. Again, although Tweedmouth has got bi-directional signals north of Berwick, there's none over the border so no bi-directionals possible north of the station, other than into the Up Goods Loop. Although it is mostly SIMBIDS, there are also sections of full bi-directional, including Darlington station, the Down Slow from Birtley Jn and then all lines from Low Fell Jn, through Newcastle as far as Benton Jn, also Wooden Gates to (but not through) Alnmouth station for terminating trains, and between Tweedmouth and Berwick station.

Doesn't surprise me I'm afraid to say. After 42 years on the railway, I'm convinced there's those that would still expect service as normal the day after WW3

Following satnav? Then when he found it unsuitable, tried reversing to turn round?

You still don't get it! The other half of the post is still part of your assertion, and you're still insisting that a period out of use is adequate rather than deep cleaning, which was based on your false premise that 20 minutes would do. As has already been stated, the virus can survive for three days on certain surfaces. There's already been complaints about some trains still being too crowed due to the service reductions. So, just what level of service do you think would be operating with trains quarantined for THREE DAYS after use??? I'll do the maths for you, that gives you a quarter of trains serviceable. Please, either 'get it' now, or go away before you get this thread locked

Sunderland's another granted City status in recent times, 1992 to mark the 40th anniversary of The Queen's accession. It's also another one to be without a cathedral, being part of the Diocese of Durham

For the A3s and A4s the tables are the pair of fold out sheets inside the rear cover, but yes for St.Frusquin it only had the GN type (technically still a Gresley one, the 8-wheel GN type only ran with the A1/A3s)

The RCTS 'green books' (part 2A) is much more useful for this as it includes a table that lists the actual tender types, and dates of change