I'll open with the British Rail APT-E (1972-76), a test bed for the tilting advanced passenger train. Unfortunately the whole project (£46m) came to nothing in the end. This thing looks like the 10:22 to the Thunderdome and sounded mental with its four screaming gas turbines.
"Mine's more pointy that yours"
Over ten years ago since the French did this
P=mv
I travelled from Glasgow to London on the Advanced Passenger Train 🙂
Love those APT's - I remember seeing one very early in my life - perhaps 1982 or so? Amazing thing - but they only lasted a couple of months didn't they?
Anyway, my earliest childhood memory was on this train and carraige - and my sister will be on it with her family today as they return home.
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Russia had the idea MOAR power = quicker trains
scuttler - that is traction in the real sense!
meerak - I'm am so jealous. What was it like?
but they only lasted a couple of months didn’t they
Yup, the train the accountants killed
37425. Concrete Bob. My favourite loco
@ wwaswas: Streamline Moderne never looked better.
They all look they're from the film Robots don't they 🙂
Nice one Binners
The Jawn Henry, a coal-powered steam turbine beast arguably the most powerful steam locomotive ever built.
Southern Pacific AC-12 Cab Forward, a wonderfully elegant solution to the problems of drivers suffocating in the long snow sheds over Donner Pass in the Sierra Nevada.
All scrapped except one single non-working example at the California State Railway Museum in Sacramento, which I recommend.
the problems of drivers suffocating in the long snow sheds
You wonder how many they lost before they decided to do anything about it.
You wonder how many they lost before they decided to do anything about it.
Not many I don't believe, to be fair, but visibility was obviously pretty dire too with a normal steam loco through a long tunnel.
They obviously had to be oil fired because there was no way to get the coal from the tender with the footplate up front. They were only in service for just over a decade, with less than 15 years between the first one being rolled out and the last one being withdrawn. Crying shame.
On modern stuff I'm a big fan of class 92s, even if they're a bit of a pain by all accounts:
There's a small train museum just outside Crewe station, Rail Heritage Centre . There's an APT parked up there as one of the main attractions, you pass it as you approach from the north. Open at weekends and Bank Holidays through the summer.
The sole surviving bits of APT, that's the APT-P (prototype) rather than the APT-E (experimental) as above.
A bit of a sorry state of affairs really, it had all the potential to be a roaring success, but instead was a total flop!
I didn't realise that the APT project basically removed the tilt and became the 225 in the end, nice bit of rebranding.
And I think the tilt has now made it into the class 390....
Sort of, it's quite roundabout.
We sold the technology to the Italians who developed it further in parallel with their own design. It's very similar to that in the 221 Super Voyagers, and the system in the 390 Pendolinos certainly has its origins in the APT, but far more distantly.
The 225 (comprising a Class 91, mk4 coaches and a DVT) likewise isn't really derived from the APT - not least the APT was designed for the curving WCML (hence the tilt) whilst the class 91s were never designed to tilt as it's less beneficial on the far-straighter East Coast Main Line. 91s were designed before the APT had been withdrawn; the Intercity 250 was the more obvious spiritual successor to the APT, but that too was canned before production ever began. Confusingly the mk4 coaches were designed with tilting in mind (there's a taper on the body ends to avoid them hitting lineside structures) but it never came close to fruition.
Once the APT faltered we continued with the class 86 and 87 electrics with mk2 and mk3 coaches which preceded the APT. Class 90s came along in the late 80s, still hauling the older stock, and ultimately nothing changed until the Pendolinos appeared in the early 2000s.
I worked on commissioning the Class 90s and 91s at BREL in Crewe in the late 80s. I was working for GEC Traction at the time who supplied to propulsion control equipment and motors.
The main hand-me-down from APT was the reduction in unslung weight achieved by moving the traction motors into the body. The bogies were powered through motor/cardan shaft/gearbox arrangements.
What it sez on the label!
I had a little cab ride on one of these when I was in Canadia, staying with a conductor in Med Hat...
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Some trains he was on could be 1.5 miles long.
Shay Engine - for when you really need to climb something steep:
Must go to the Romney Hythe & Dymchurch!
Me in the 70's on my trainset. South West Gas Shunter at Seabank Avonmouth.
Donated to Bristol Harbourside.
Its the wrong colour now ;(
On the APT, I’ve got the Honrby trainset of it.
Me at the controls of APT-P 370003 at Crewe Heritage Centre.
Bigger wheels are nicer ...
The Garratt type steam locos, a boiler at each end, still running on the Port madoc line to Caernarfon. and one preserved in the Mosi at Manchester.
Then add in the leader class steam loco,cab at each end and fireman in the middle in a semi enclosed cab.
[url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/mhampshire/ ]Matthew Hampshire[/url], on Flickr
Does this train go to Transcentral[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/mhampshire/ ]Matthew Hampshire[/url], on Flickr
https://flic.kr/p/bNEGAMmy claim to fame made cast iron brake block patterns for this model, had RollsRoyce engines, built by the yorkshire engine company and called Janus, we had 2 and 3 or 4 half ones with only one engine
always been fond of the BR steam grunt of the evening star class
They're called 9Fs, Evening Star just happened to be the last one 😉
In fact it was the last steam loco made by BR, and last year when GBRF received the last class 66 (out of 400 odd) they painted it in BR lined green and called it Evening Star as an homage:
Ah, the Evening Star class, Swindon’s finest locomotives!
Most were built at Crewe 😉
We went to the railway museum in York yesterday, it's been probably 20 years since I'd been but now have four kids in tow. Think the eight year old may be snared in big mechanical things as he was expecting scale models, his face when he walked in and saw it was the real thing will stay with me for years to come.
"Ah, the Evening Star class, Swindon’s finest locomotives!"
I beg to differ, the 6000 'King' (8P) class were probably the Swindon Works finest locomotives?
A wee diesel-electric shunter (BR class 11, according to google)
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Wee it may be, but I got a shot to go collect some wood, so it was instantly elevated to 'bestest train ever' status.
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This is an old engine block from one - massive, at least for someone used to messing about with cars, not trains!
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Shunters, you say? Heres another illustration. A Class 14 shunter that runs along the East Lancs Railway.
We went and had a pint at the Trackside in Bury yesterday where these are in the sidings, and watched a bloody big Deltic come in. 🙂
[url= https://farm1.staticflickr.com/557/19595907302_482e6b0e84_b.jp g" target="_blank">https://farm1.staticflickr.com/557/19595907302_482e6b0e84_b.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/vRC9wJ ]Print[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/14162682@N00/ ]bin lid[/url], on Flickr
Nothing on the 142s I drive!
I beg to differ, the 6000 ‘King’ (8P) class were probably the Swindon Works finest locomotives?
That’s a good point, well made! Still, Evening Star is a stunning loco, and living on the main GWR line from London to Bristol used to see King, Castle and Hall-class locos all the time, as well as 9Fs.
I have very fond memories of these little locos, 0-6-0 pannier tank 57XX series. Used to see them all the time, hauling light freight and local passenger trains, and Chippenham had one on shunter duties when there were proper goods yards at the station. The dad of one of my classmates, Steve Light, was the driver, and we use to get to ride on the footplate when it was running around the yard. Later got replaced by a diesel shunter, which was no fun at all! 😕
I had a little cab ride on one of these when I was in Canadia, staying with a conductor in Med Hat…
I filmed this just outside Medicine Hat when I was living in Canadia:
The steam trams of Rossendale:
https://peterfisher.smugmug.com/History/Rawtenstall-Corportation/i-78XCdTM/A
Took this earlier this year on a ride.
Steam is all well and good, but I do like a big ol' diesel.
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Shitty, rusty, train on the way in to Blaby Leicestershire. It's a bloody eyesore!!!
