Gwiwer

Thanks for your comments Michael. I'm sorry I am not at all familiar with the time period you are asking about but if I turn up any sort of references I'll be sure to let you know. One thing you can be sure of however is that the railways in Cornwall had already got around 70 years of experience in handling china clay by that time. The Cardaon Railway started it all and was one of Britain's earliest conventional railways along with its near neighbour the Hayle Railway.

... and now the up Postal as well B)

Agreed. A broken cab window would really be icing the already delicious cake.

It's not just about the trains ..... I managed to find two large vehicles passing in a tight spot today without a train in sight!

Thanks Doug. Amongst other things it also shows the scale of the whole thing and how much is still on the "to do" list, plus give an idea of why - being long and thin - it is quite hard to obtain a shot of any of the individual scenes without including something else such as walls, fences, workbench or incomplete scenery. At long last we have a sunny day and it has been a joy to get outside this morning and run a few trains around while tidying up and repairing the inevitable wear and tear to the greenery. With a couple of hours spare after lunch I'll have another go at the new 5-arch viaduct scene as well.

The Kernow MRC "flat tarp" china clay wagons have arrived. These represent the well-known "hoods" in the years before the hoods were fitted in the mid 1970's. A rake of the wagons awaits departure from Ponsangwyn yard with a class 42 "Warship" on shed. The Warship seems to be resting for the day as a rather oily Western has backed onto the train. This gives an overview of the yard area, complete with redundant crane, derelict wagons and a sense of having seen better and busier days. Finally the Western brings the train up to the main line where it is held in the down loop to allow something to come through on the main first. Another Warship is seen passing through on an up milk train.

Regards the TGS coaches the above is correct - they were built later than the original sets and added to them rather than being converted TS coaches though a few have subsequently been converted to TS vehicles. Goes to show what a minefield the subject of HST formations is.

Nigel If it was a "London" set of that era it would usually be formed DMB+TF+TF+TRUB+TS+TS+TS+TS+TGS+DMB. Some sets had only a single TF, some had one less TS, the classification of the catering car varied and in the early days the guard rode in a DMB as the TGS coaches were not then built so the sets were 7 cars. For a "Cross-Country" set a typical formation would be DMB+TF+TRSB+TS+TS+TS+TS+TGS+DMB. As introduced some of the "London" sets had two catering vehicles for a couple of years and were formed DMB+TF+TRUK+TF+TS+TRUB+TS+TS+TS+DMB or DMB+TF+TF+TRUK+TRSB+TS+TS+TS+TS+DMB but this was found to be excessive provision and the TRUK was quickly replaced by an additional TS. My set listing dated 1984 shows that by then the "London" sets were operating as per my first line but with some having a TRSB instead of TRUB. HST formations have been anything but "fixed" for most of their years of service despite appearances to the contrary. It is common to see a set missing one of its vehicles and on rare occasions two have been omitted leaving just 6 passenger coaches in the set. In particular the catering vehicles have changed classification, configuration and numbers many times. In placing the catering vehicle the right way round in the set the TRUB which has first class seating should have those seats next to the TF and the buffet counter towards the TS. A set with a TRSB will have the coach the other way around so that its standard class seats are adjacent to the TS and the buffet nearer the TF. TRUK (kitchen) cars were marshalled with the kitchen nearer the DMB than the middle of the set IIRC in order to provide a meal service to the adjacent TF coach(es) "London" sets should have the First Class at the London end but some diagrams reversed them and so did some last-minute diversions. "Cross Country" sets would have the TF at the "London" end in Cornwall but again were often reversed in service, with many trains timetabled to reverse once or more en route.

I'm told she's known as "The Manageress" Though who ever deals with your order they are always equally as efficient. Most of my parcels come with a cheerful "Thanks again - Greg" note on the receipt.

Not an outstanding shot by any means but one taken in response to some requests for an illustration of the actual size of the layout. This is taken with my back to the cliff section and leaning as far back as I can without damaging the scenery! To put this into context the freight just about visible on the right is a Hymek with 8 milk tankers and 5 other vans in tow, beyond the road bridge in the middle-distance that side lies Treheligan station which accommodates a full-length train (loco+8 or HST) and the return at the far end which is the duck-under entry will also hold around seven coaches across the width of the span. The shopping cart is used to hold the scenics and take the entire selection to where they are needed; that saves a lot of walking!

The 8Vab was in effect a 5-car and a 3-car unit semi-permanently coupled. All the cab ends carried the unit number including the intermediate ones which also retained yellow panels and later full yellow ends. It was in theory possible to split the unit and there is at least one recorded occasion (noted in the SEG journal "Live Rail") of 5Vab+4Vep on an up Bournemouth - Waterloo semi-fast. The 3-car portion was reportedly out of service at Bournemouth depot. There is no record I know of where the 3-car portion ran without its big brother but the possibility of seeing the same unit in two places at once did exist. Anyone who spotted 8001+77?? working up to Waterloo and then wandered down to Bournemouth West only to find 8001 also there might have had to check their NHS specs! In addition to powering the train 8001 was required to supply some additional power to the buffet car which, as an SR wired vehicle, would probably have had electric cooking. I believe all motor coaches were powered when running as 8Vab+4Vep so as not to under-power the train and buffet car combined. In later years 8001 was recycled as a 4TC unit number. None of the same vehicles was involved. the 4TC's became TOPS class 438 and in the 4-digit scheme still universally used at the time for SR emu stock 438 001 was identified as 8001 on the unit.

Standard operating instructions (not just at Bournemouth, not just on that route but SR-wide) was that a train arriving to be split must come to a stand, passengers be allowed to detrain and board and the rear portion be then split and shunt back from the front. For attachments the rear portion must enter the partially-occupied platform under approach-controlled or calling-on signals and able to stop short of the stationary portion. Once again after passenger duties were completed the rear was shunted onto the front. In the case of Bournemouth each train both detached and attached a portion. The Rep should have been split from the rear of a down train before the 33 was allowed to run onto and couple to the front. The 33 should have propelled the TC onto the Rep after station duties were complete on the up before itself being detached and run back. That is not to say this always happened. But the sometimes-seen method of running the rear portion straight onto the front and coupling before stopping, or of the leading portion being driven away from the rear after a a split were both strictly forbidden. I have seen both happen many times at locations as far apart as Bournemouth and Faversham. It would be anticipated that passengers on an arriving rear portion might be ready to alight and (with slam-door stock) potentially have the doors opened as the train draws to a stop. If it then makes heavy contact with the leading unit there is a risk of throwing passengers to the floor or out of the train. A leading portion drawing ahead from a split may cause a SPAD. Authorised operating methods are always safety-first. With SR / BR units fitted with buckeye couplers and 27-way control a split or join could indeed be very slick and often took well under a minute including the opening or locking of gangway doors. Would that this could happen now. Where a Littlehampton / Eastbourne - Victoria train used to be allowed just 2 minutes to attach and three to divide at Haywards Heath (and either move could be done in a single minute when required) the requirements of 377 stock dictate that around six minutes is now required. And this on a line stretched to the limit for capacity already!

Only the electric was powering; the surrogate was only on tickover for hotel power if I recall rightly. Otherwise too much power : weight.

For large-logo fans here's a 50 with the Old Oak FK set in the late afternoon sun at Pryce Moor. The patch of moorland has been so named as an Anglicised version of the Cornish "prys" meaning "worth". The name then becomes a pun on "worth more" B)

Good old Southern innovation. Where else in recent times could you find rostered mixed-mode traction with diesel and electric on the same train*, both powering and both controlled by the one driver which ever unit (or loco) was leading? The headcode 62 indicates that the train - or in this case the leading portion of it - is a semi-fast Waterloo - Salisbury (or any point to Exeter) working. When split the Vep(s) behind will show 92 from Basingstoke for semi-fast Waterloo - Eastleigh (or any point to Weymouth); if timetabled to stop all stations from Basingstoke then 93 (stopping service) might be used instead. If the electric portion was leading it would show 92 from Waterloo, not 62, because that is the headcode applicable to its journey. The usual formation was 33/1+TC+Vep(s) but the SR 27-way control cable and unit / loco compatibility meant that it could equally be formed with the Vep leading / loco pushing or even with the loco amidships such as TC+33/1+Vep. Gone are the days of such flexibility and interest. * : OK I know there was a 66+92 powered freight a couple of years ago; I even got some shots of it coming through Willesden Junction. But the locos couldn't be put just anywhere in the train neither was it a passenger service!

Just caught up with your latest work Peter and there's plenty in here to your usual high standards. Thanks for keeping us in touch with developments.

"Unusual" workings reported by those not "in the know" would be innocent mistakes but have probably been quite common. Around 1967 I encountered a Reading - Paddington Sunday stopper (must have been Sunday as the weekday crawlers only ran to and from Slough) formed of a 123. That would be the only time I have ever boarded or alighted from an "Inter City" train at West Drayton! Having come up to Reading from the SR on a 3H and then sat in a compartment (!!) on what was a local train it seemed the height of luxury. But whether that 123 was rostered or rare I know not; though the normal fare was 117's.

* Sic; quoted as typed. I assume " plain blue" is meant. Railcar also notes, apparently from the same person as the post quoted: "Tim Hall reports "I have a clear memory of one vehicle, a TS, painted in blue, in an 8-car formation of otherwise mixed green and blue/grey stock, in about 1970. I only remember seeing this vehicle once, so I assume it got repainted in blue/grey soon after." I my self do not recall any class 123 being all-blue. They went straight from green to blue-grey but with the uncommon variation of being all-blue around the cab doors; the grey did not start at the leading ends of the driving coaches. I do recall, as I mentioned in an earlier post, that these units were at times formed with what ever Reading had to hand in order to provide sufficient capacity usually after the buffet cars had been withdrawn on peak workings to minimise overcrowding aboard an otherwise reduced formation. While I also don't recall any all-blue vehicles being coupled within a 123 unit they were most certainly attached to them. This makes possible a sighting of 4-car 123+ spare trailer 101+ 3 car 123 as suggested. My own sightings were of 123+117 sometimes with a 122 bubblecar or driving trailer added also. The suburban stock would have been plain blue at the time.

P indicated "Plymouth Division" rather than Plymouth Laira I believe (in the same way as L was London Division not just Southall) so giving P-numbered sets a "normal" range of operations from Axminster to Penzance. They would also have been seen quite frequently outside this area just as B-series sets would have wandered west at times. P480 was a Gunnislake set but appeared frequently in other parts of Cornwall. It spent quite a while as the regular St. Ives unit as well.

The "Southern Region" also operated numerous WR units. Not only did they work the Reading - Redhill - Tonbridge / Gatwick trains for a number of years after the 3R Tadpole units had gone (and the occasional turn during the "Tadpole era") but they also featured on the Exeter - Ilfracombe and Okehampton services with duties in 1966 / 7 as far afield as Wadebridge, Padstow and Bude. The final North Cornwall trains were ridiculously overcrowded dmus. Classes to appear on those routes were 119 and 120 with 121 bubblecars on the North Cornwall lines. Class 116 /7/8 "suburbans" made occasional trips to Tonbridge and Ilfracombe also, and to Barnstaple in later years when the lines beyond had closed.

2xx for the class 121/2 driving trailers and 9xx for the parcel cars. Much later as unfamiliar types arrived on the WR 7xx was re-used for class 104, 8xx for class 101 and 9xx was recycled for class 108. Class 123 was also first numbered as 511 - 520 following the Cross Country series, soon renumbered into the L701 series.

I'm quite happy to bow to actual records against memory but there certainly were green WR dmu cars running into the 1970's. I encountered a pair of class 120 sets at Salisbury on a Bristol working with one in green and the other blue. The notebook in use at the time would suggest that was 1972. The subjective use of terms such as "early", "mid" and "late" is always open to a degree of interpretation.

Late 60's / early 70's. There were no 104, 108 or 110 on the WR. The latter class has never been allocated there so far as I am aware. The mainstay was the classes already discussed. Class 117 was responsible for the suburban services out of Paddington and most to Oxford as well. Class 121 including their driving trailers (the W5628x batch) appeared on some lightly-used duties including the Thames valley branches. Power twins were less common in those times. The class 101 trailers appeared in class 117 triples making the quads (and slightly underpowered as a result) or in place of a 117 trailer in a triple. You could tell they were coming from a distance because of the different coach profiles. Bristol, Cardiff and Plymouth division services were in the hands of 116 and a few 117 cars, which could be seen as far afield as Milford Haven, Birmingham, Portsmouth and Penzance though the Pompey turns were most often class 120 or 123 until returned to loco haulage. Class 118 was seen in Bristol and the south west. Longer distance workings would have been the class 119 / 120 Cross-Country types which could be found almost anywhere on the WR except in London and worked to Portsmouth, Weymouth and Birmingham; they also worked the WR turns on the Central Wales line to Shrewsbury for which purpose Landore had a couple of 2-car sets. Don't forget the other dmu types of those days. The parcels cars operated timetabled trips from Paddington and other key destinations either singly or attached to a passenger train. The Blue Pullmans were just as much a part of the WR dmu fleet in the day as well. When we look at liveries by no means everything was rail blue. The WR was famously tardy in eliminating green and you could find green dmu units or odd cars running until the mid 70's. The variations are too numerous to discuss in a single post. Suffice to say you could see green syp, blue syp, blue fye, blue syp white cab roof and more. The CC and IC units were early candidates for the bg treatment though not all ever received it while on the WR. Just to add a bit of variety there were turns with Cross Country sets in the late 60's where the buffet was open though that made no difference to their appearance as those buffet cars never had red lines on the cantrail; most would have been in green at the time anyway though the word BUFFET in gold upper case lettering (on green livery - Buffet in lower case white lettering on a blue livery) appeared on the side panels. Then remember that the 116/7/8 classes were delivered without through gangways and only had these retro-fitted after some years in service in a long drawn-out fitting program over many years. I believe some 116 / 8 never ever got them. A very complex subject area and worthy of close study for those interested.

True. I overlooked in my post above the fact that the train ran via the long-closed Cudworth route . This route took the left turn near Swinton station at what I think was called Wath Road Junction, crossed the Hull & Barnsley route into Wath and ambled cautiously past seemingly endless mining ruins and vast scrap yards, closed stations at Cudworth, Royston and others and finally crept with wheels squealing around the sharp curves into and out of Wakefield Kirkgate (without calling) to reach Westgate station. Dreary and slow.