Johann Marsbar

I think so. There was a report about them in the local Transport Society magazine at the time, which will be somewhere on the GERS produced CD of the things which I have here at home. I believe they were built at Ashford and were sent north (Hull?) for shipping abroad on accommodation bogies. Think that was somewhere around the 1975-76 period without having a search though the CDs in question. Another wagon type for overseas use went the other way through Ipswich around the same time and I managed to get a (pocket instamatic) photo of those, which I think were destined for Jordan......

I just dug out my copy of Tourret and all he had to say about it was.... "WD 7195 left works in September 1943 experimentally fitted with armour plate over the top of the boiler, probably as a prototype in case it was found necessary for these engines to be armour-plated for the invasion of the Continent. In the event the Allied air superiority made such armour plating unnecessary and it was removed from this single locomotive before it was shipped to France"

For those who want to have something "different" on their layout, how about a rake of Bangladesh Railways bogie vans, as seen emerging from Ipswich tunnel sometime in the 1970's (?)....... Another gem from the camera of H.N.James, as found in the Ipswich Transport Museum archives this morning!

I think he may have spent some time on the Melbourne Military Railway as well in his WW2 service. I remember him recounting that he was on his way via Canada/USA to the Far East when they dropped the atomic bombs, so he decided to "get lost" in North America for a while, which enabled him to cover a number of eastern railroad operations in the US, some of which he photographed in colour. Unfortunately I'm not sure whether we actually got all of his photo collection, as some of the US colour images I remember from 1980's slide shows seem to be absent from our archive. His collection passed through a third party after his death and it took a lot of work getting them in our archive. The same happened with Dr I.C. Allens photo collection.....not that we have that though!

As we've drifted off topic for the S160's in recent posts - this might be a good place to post this image that I found in our Museum photo archive this morning, whilst actually looking for something else...... It is a 2-8-0, but one of the WD variety rather that a USA one and shows the sole example that was fitted with armour plating on the boiler and something I'd never seen a photo of before. It's not excactly a brilliant shot, but was taken by H.N.James, a resident of Ipswich since the early 1950's until his death in the 1990's and one of the photo collections we hold in our archive. He certainly took a number of photos at Longmoor during the war when he was based there, but where this image was taken I'm not sure. We may have details somewhere on our computer system, but he was someone who didn't make good records of where/when he took photos!

Next port of call was Olomouc, home of an interesting but compact tram system. A few views at the station first..... ...before venturing outside and buing a DPMO day ticket ..... Most of the fleet appeared to be Tatra T3's, but a few Skoda low floor cars had been purchased....... The tram depot was mainly an open-air parking area situated in the centre of Town...... More livery variety back at the station....... The plan was to return to Brno via various secondary lines, which started off well until I reached Prostejov, as shown below...... .....where what seemed to be the statutory bus replacement of the trip meant that I missed out on one section of line I wanted to do!

The next day mainly involved railcar travel over a variety of secondary and branch lines in order to visit a couple of interesting local transport operations, although it was rather damp for the first part of the day. This 754 in yet another livery variation was at Brno in the morning...... As is usual, anything resembling an "interesting" passenger working, such as this loco hauled set of trailers at Viseli nad Moravu..... ....always involved a service other than the one I was travelling on, which in this case was the usual "Bouncy, Bouncy" 810..... First port of call was the Zlin-Otrokovice interurban trolleybus operation where I managed to locate the depot without much of a problem..... One of the fairly recently delivered CD railcars is seen at Otrokovice.... At Prerov this 0-6-0T in rather nice condition was plinthed at the station..... More mundane traction at Prerov......

As I've put some images in the bus & car threads, some for the lorry thread as well!

A few of the 700 entries (not all cars!) in todays Ipswich-Felixstowe run......

Some entries in todays Ipswich-Felixstowe run.....

I like the Police Hillman Imp in J3849. Hope theirs was more reliable than the one my Father owned!

This railcar in another livery variation was also parked in the station...... It was a very quick visit to Chomutov on this occasion - the intention being to get some photos of the trolleybus operation there, though this wasn't helped by the distance from the station to the nearest set of wires! They turned at the end of a very long station approach road, so I had even less time to get photos than expected..... I returned to Brno via Prague, though the Chomutov to Prague section was in another 854 railcar via a very secondary main line that eventually arrived at Praha Hl.N.... There was time to get some more tram photos there...... ...including this vintage tram & trailer which were located on a short length of track in Wenceslas Square and were in use as a cafe..... Trams had been removed from that area in the late 1960's/early 70's, but it is planned to reintroduce trams there again in the near future.

You'll have to buy a Kriegslok instead......

The next day consisted of another rather longish trip from Brno to Usti nad Labem and Chomutov, made somewhat longer by taking a fairly indirect route to get there on the outward trip. A 362 electric took me to Kolin with an EMU to Nymburk, after which I ventured into unelectrified territory for the portion of the trip to Decin. One of the 810 railbuses took me Mlada Boleslav where this selection of photos were taken..... An 853 railcar then took me on to Decin for another EMU to Usti nad Labem for a look at their trolleybus operation...... This 163 was stabled at the station........... ....and as my train was leaving, this rather unexpected sight rolled in on another passenger service....... .....a full CSD liveried late 1950's Skoda electric, complete with CSD running number and a large red star on the front end! It turned out to be a semi-preserved "depot pet" which was still used occasionally on service trains and we will come across it later on another trip in this thread, as will the whole of the North-Western part of the Czech Republic in more detail, albeit accessed from Dresden. My train from Usti is seen here after arrival at Chomutov..... ..whilst another of the many liveries is seen on another service there......

The B1 seemed to have an aversion to The Fine City in the early 2000's as I travelled on a run from Liverpool St on 10th November 2001 which was supposed to carry on to Lowestoft and then return via the East Suffolk Line. However the B1 aquired a hot box on the outward run to Norwich and we ended up with this..... The 67 wasn't passed to run via the East Suffolk, so we had to return via Norwich (Wensum Curve), though whoever was in Control that day added interest to the return trip by routeing us through lots of little used loops and other lines on the way back!

Standing in the platforms at Brno that morning was yet another 754 livery variation..... .....though my train that day was hauled by a 363 electric to Hradec Kralove where this loco was photographed in the yard...... Before catching a railcar on to Liberec I had a bit of time to investigate outside the station........ This appeared to be a vehicle on demonstration there...... LIberec is the home of an interurban tramway which was in the process of changing gauge and which did, at that time, still have some elderly (1950's) trams in the fleet - but needless to say none were about in the time I was there so I had to stick to the usual Tatras..... The leading car in the second photo had been converted to have a low floor section - as seen by the change in window line. Back at the station was this modern shunter..... ...along with the lesser known TTTE character "Adolf the Tank Engine" . One can imagine what the smokebox face would look like.......... I'm asuming that might actually be an example of Czech humour! This CSD liveried diesel was passed en-route back to Brno.........

A couple of Skoda products seen passing the factory.... As befits the status of the City, the station building at Plzen is rather impressive...... The sheer variety of stock and the different liveries seen in 2006 made Czech Railways a very colourful place...... I don't think there was a "standard livery" for the 754's (or the 749's either..) The 742 hauling a couple of railcar trailers is of note...... Back at Brno the following morning, this Tatra articulated car with a rebuilt front end put in an appearance.... ...the originals front end looking like this....

I did have a scan of a couple of 12 hour segments on there the other day and found a solitary train in that time - and that was headed by NS power. Doesn't exactly appear to be a "Hotspot" !

The following day consisted of a long trip by rail to Plzen, the outward journey being made via various secondary routes in the southern part of the Country through Jihlava and Ceske Budejovice. At Brno that morning this 754 was positioned nicely in the sun....... My train was also 754 hauled to Jihlava, though 754 046 was in an all-over red paint scheme. From Jihlava, one of the glass-fibre bodied "Laminatka" 240 electrics took me on to Ceske Budejovice, with this narrow gauge train being seen en route on the 760mm line at Jindrichuv Hradec...... A view of the station building a couple of stops further on....... The plan was to have enough time at the original home of Budweiser to see the trolleybus operation there but my train was late, so all I saw were some overhead wires on streets we passed over on the train! On the run up to Plzen behind a 242, another couple of members of the class were passed in top/tail mode on a train........ Plzen is home to a tram & trolleybus network, as well as being the home of Skoda, whose products feature largely in the vehicle fleet, including these low floor cars..... On finding the tram depot, a Skoda demonstrator was parked up there as well....... Portland and Tacoma get a mention in the list of customers on the bodyside. The rest of the tram fleet was composed of Tatra products....... There were still some older Czech motorbuses in evidence there as well.....

111 001 was acting as station pilot at Masarykovo.... With Prague being a major tourist destination (to put it mildly..) there are several different ways to tour the city and one that I discovered in 2006 was a selection of pre-war vintage Czech built cars which were gathered in one of the squares and available for tourists to hire. Most were right-hand drive, as Czechoslovakia drove on the left (along with Austria) in those days. Prices didn't seem too bad either, but I didn't really have time to indulge in such things. A Praga and a Tatra...... (not quite Warrington & Wigan registration marks though!) A closer view of the Tatra again, with a Skoda........ Not sure of the make of this one, possibly another Praga, but it did cause me some amusement by its colour scheme....... Just needs "Mulleys Motorways" painted along the side doors........ After a wander round looking for model shops and purchasing some Czech made aircraft kits, I found a location by the river where rail and tramway shots could be taken...... ...before heading back into the centre...... ...and on to Holesovice station for my 350 hauled train back to Brno......

I will confess to owning a plate featuring 4472 which seems to date from 1988 and which was part of the "Great Steam Trains" collection produced by Davenport Pottery, so seemingly not one of the dreaded Bradford Exchange products! It was bought for me at around that time by one of my Grandfathers, so I didn't have a hand in buying it...... To be honest, it's not a bad rendition either and certainly pre-dates the current hype/tat surrounding the loco.

The SPV went together OK, though mine's in "showroom" condition rather than weathered. The rubber tracks went on OK, but after about 5 years of making the thing the rubber forming them had perished beyond redemption so they all ended up in the bin and I've never managed to find suitable size rubber bands to take their place. The only kit I saw at that time which I didn't bother with was the Angel Interceptor, as I have an original Airfix one of those. Those kits all seem to be available today, as I had a browse on the "Scalemates" site last year to see what was still about, though a few if them appear to have been upgraded (as has the price...) in the past 30 years....

The transfers have faded a bit on the Cloudbase and Spectrum passenger jet models as they received direct sunlight where they were displayed in my previous house. The Spectrum jet has working missiles as well as Cloudbase and I used to "entertain" a couple of cats I owned at the time by firing those! The grey painted missile heads on Sky 1 fire on springs as well....... Apart from those I've got a Shado Mobile, Spectrum Persuit Vehicle, Spectrum Patrol Car and a selection of much smaller Thunderbirds models of TB2/TB4/Mole, plus figures of the Tracy Brothers with smaller scale TB1-5 models attached on the display bases. All seem to be able to fire missiles or have other working functions which obviously appealed to their market at the time. The Sky 1 is a bit odd in that it has a fold-down rear panel which contains minature versions of a Shado Mobile, Sky 1 and Ed Strakers car! At least all of those kits compliment some of the Dinky and other models of Anderson equipment that I've got here at home as well.

In the 1990's, when I started going to Airshows again after a bit of a gap, one of the traders at the annual Waddington Airshow seemed to have an awful lot of the Japanese Gerry Anderson kits to dispose of at fairly low prices. I bought examples of most of the ones on sale and actually made the things up fairly quickly at the time, unlike the kit "stockpile" (now mainly 1/35 military, but loads of OO carriage kits in there as well...) that seems to have built up since then! Three of the 1990's efforts as they are on display at home now.....

The second day of the 7-day first class rover ticket (which I can confirm cost all of £32, having found the haulage/tour notes yesterday) was used to take a day trip to Prague, this photo being taken just after 06.00 outside Brno station before catching my train.... The service to Prague (and back again in the evening) was hauled by a ZSSK class 350 electric which indicates the service must have started from somewhere like Bratislava. On arrival at Prague Holesovice I bought a day ticket for the Public Transport network and headed off to a tram stop. The City at that time was "T3 heaven", as can be seen from the shot below... ...though I was more interested in even older vehices, so the main destination that morning was the Transport Museum, housed in one of the tram depots. There was an awful lot of equipment on display in there, but photography was a bit restricted by the sheer number of items on display and the presence of closely spaced wooden roof supports in parts of the depot...... However, they did have a very substantial (232 pages...) hard-backed book about the museum and all of the exhibits - mostly illustrated in colour - which cost the equivalent of something like £4, so one was duly purchased to make up for the difficulties in taking my own shots of some of the exhibits! The rest of the day was spent travelling around on the extensive tram system..... ....and visits to the likes of Masarykovo station, where one of the fairly new "City Elefant" double deck units was seen...... ...along with an older diesel railcar.......