I had a muse today *wears bemused expression* about maps and trains. Well you do from time to time don't you, you know how it is. Anyhow it sorta goes like this.

When you have a map on the wall, traditionally North points up towards the ceiling, and South points down to the floor. So, taking the UK as an example, I would travel down to London from Birmingham, and travel up from London to Birminhgam. Similarly I would travel down from London to Brighton, and travel up from Brighton to London. Hence the phrases going up or down to London for the day. In the case of East to West or vice versa we would say going across, e.g. from Edinburgh to Glasgow or vice versa. OK got that bit?

But then come along the railways and confuse things a bit further *furrowed frown*. You see in their world, they have major stations and terminals and minor stations and terminals. They say the the Down train travels away from the major station to the minor station, and the Up train travels away from the minor station to the major station. With me so far? Ooops you were lulled into a false sense of security because read on.

Looking at our previous examples, we would now go down to Brighton on the down train, and up to London on the up train. Fine. But we would now be going up to Birmingham on the down train, and down to London on the up train. Edinburgh and Glasgow are equal so lord knows what train we would take to go across there.

I'm going for a lay down with a cold beer on my forehead ......

Sigh. That is not what you are supposed do with a beer.

---

BOINC WIKI

Sigh. That is not what you are supposed do with a beer.

I do intend to imbibe said beer after it's furrowed brow medicinal properties have been efficacious.

I would use a pack of frozen veggies for the first bit and then put them back in the refrigerator. If it is really that mind boggling of a problem, you might want to have 2 or 3 of the aforementioned beers...

---

BOINC WIKI

Recently in another thread there was mention of the "leaf cleaning trains" that run around this time of year.

Today I was walking in my local park, which is right next to the main London-Brighton line when I heard the distinctive sound of the steam cleaning train.

Unfortunately I was not in a very good spot but managed to get these couple of shots.



73207 on the front, painted in the old British Rail "Large Blue Logo"



And 73136 bringing up the rear, imaginatively painted in the operators colours!!

I have been trying to get some pictures of the Class 73 as they are unique. Whilst looking like a fairly standard late 60's diesel freight loco, these are unique as they can also operate off the 650V third rail, the earlier 74 class was similar but all have been scrapped, whereas there are still 39 of the 73 class still in existence. At one time they use to operate the Gatwick express with a Class 498 on the other end.

Pity these two were both so dirty

---

74 class is earlier than 73 class?

---

David
Sitting on my butt while others boldly go,
Waiting for a message from a small furry creature from Alpha Centauri.

74 class is earlier than 73 class?

Well they were actually rebuilt 71 class so they were "originally" built before the 73's as 71's then 10 were converted to 74's with limited sucess.

So were all scrapped while the more reliable 73's continue in operation today.

That's the short story, the longer on is here.

Class 74

---

Bernie, I have never heard of a steam cleaning train. Is it used to clean ballast and or the tracks? Nice looking loco by the way.

And has anyone heard any news about the rebuilding of Bigboy?

---

[/quote]

Old James

Bernie, I have never heard of a steam cleaning train. Is it used to clean ballast and or the tracks? Nice looking loco by the way.

Here in the UK we have a problem with "leaves on the track" causing wheel slip across the network, and here in the south where it is predominately third rail, loss of electrical contact.

Back in the day of steam the cuttings and track side were kept clear of vegetation to lower the risk of sparks from the steam locos causing a fire.

After the end of steam the vegetation was mostly left and so the current problem got worse. The cleaning trains run in the autumn and because they require locos often the older working heritage locos are used, as seen here.

Of course Network Rail now have started to keep embankments and cutting clear however not all the trees are on railway property and so the cleaning trains are needed.

As to the Bigboy, I read the restoration is expected to take three to five years so I suppose it is a bit early yet.

---

This sounds interesting...

---

David
Sitting on my butt while others boldly go,
Waiting for a message from a small furry creature from Alpha Centauri.

Speaking about steam. S/S Blidösund

Built 1910 and still cruising.
S/S Blidösund is one of the few steamers in Sweden and the only one in the Stockholm archipelago, where the boiler is still fired with coal, and that goes into commercial operation. The machine is a 413 hp compound machine. At cruising speed (about 10 knots) the ship needs 250 kg of coal per hour. The noise level from the engine and vibrations is almost nonexistent. Even the ship's electric generator is steam driven.

The monthly steam luncheon train came through again today, this time I went to East Croydon station to take a few pics (well a video actually)

As usual hauled by 35028 Merchant Navy Class Clan Line



What was a surprise was what was bringing up the rear, normally Clan Line runs with no backup, this time however.



Class 67 015 was there. Don't see many of the 67's down south as they are mostly use on passenger services up north, a few freight services and of course the royal train, 67005 Queen's Messenger and 67006 Royal Sovereign. Plus only 30 were made, as opposed to over 400 of the 66's

So it was unusual to see one at East Croydon.

---

What was a surprise was what was bringing up the rear, normally Clan Line runs with no backup, this time however.

Does it provide hotel power to the train?

---

David
Sitting on my butt while others boldly go,
Waiting for a message from a small furry creature from Alpha Centauri.

What was a surprise was what was bringing up the rear, normally Clan Line runs with no backup, this time however.

Does it provide hotel power to the train?

Well that did occur to me, however I must have seen 35028 eight or nine times in the last 12 months and it never had a diesel on the end before.

In fact I believe there is a power car in the consist, either the 2nd car or the last in the video.

http://youtu.be/dWASfJnVb00

Perhaps that wasn't working. The guy on the platform (another spotter) was also surprised as he hadn't seen that before.

---

What was a surprise was what was bringing up the rear, normally Clan Line runs with no backup, this time however.

Does it provide hotel power to the train?

Well that did occur to me, however I must have seen 35028 eight or nine times in the last 12 months and it never had a diesel on the end before.

In fact I believe there is a power car in the consist, either the 2nd car or the last in the video.

http://youtu.be/dWASfJnVb00

Perhaps that wasn't working. The guy on the platform (another spotter) was also surprised as he hadn't seen that before.

It doesn't sound like either of those cars is making noise, but it does sound like the diesel is running at faster than idle.

---

David
Sitting on my butt while others boldly go,
Waiting for a message from a small furry creature from Alpha Centauri.

What was a surprise was what was bringing up the rear, normally Clan Line runs with no backup, this time however.

Does it provide hotel power to the train?

Well that did occur to me, however I must have seen 35028 eight or nine times in the last 12 months and it never had a diesel on the end before.

In fact I believe there is a power car in the consist, either the 2nd car or the last in the video.

http://youtu.be/dWASfJnVb00

Perhaps that wasn't working. The guy on the platform (another spotter) was also surprised as he hadn't seen that before.

It doesn't sound like either of those cars is making noise, but it does sound like the diesel is running at faster than idle.

I was rather hoping it was something I had seen once. The steam engine towing the diesel off to the shop (the rail line in question had 2 locomotives...)

---

BOINC WIKI

The Southern ran three Pullman trains with the suffix Belle. The others were the Brighton Belle (originally the Southern Belle) and the Devon Belle. British Railways introduced the Thanet Belle (later renamed the Kentish Belle) in 1948.

Then of course the famous Golden Arrow boat train and Silver Arrow rail/air to Paris. There was even going to be an attempted resurrection of British–Continental sleeper services under the Nightstar (a play on Eurostar) brand after the opening of the Channel Tunnel in 1994. But it was abandoned after many of the coaches (night coaches, sleepers, and food service cars) for it had been built. Competition from cheap airlines in the 1990s meant the service could never be profitable, and as the journey time was little more than 2 hours it just didn't make sense. The coaches were never used in Europe; they were sold to Canada's Via Rail.

There even used to be a sleeper train from London to Penzance that took your car along with you, but that folded. Although we still do have the Cornish Riviera and the Caledonian


The golden age of the railways, we shall never see their like again ......

Part of the problem is that the UK rail network was never designed for long-distance interconnecting services: most routes start and stop in London. A couple of weeks ago in this thread, you and Bernie were commenting on "The Battersea Railway Bridge - properly called the Cremorne Bridge" - an obscure, largely freight route through west London.

I've crossed that bridge on a couple of memorable occasions. The first was on one of those sleeper/motorail trains you mention, from Stirling (central Scotland) to Newhaven (ferry port on England's south coast, with sailings to Dieppe in France). The second trip was from Doncaster (Yorkshire) to Waterloo station in south London, again to make a connection to France via the original Channel Tunnel/Eurostar terminal.

Both routes involved absurd contortions to navigate London. It gets a bit parochial here (apologies to readers who don't know the geography of London), but...

The first train was, at one point, heading westwards away from Paddington on the Great Western line towards Bristol. Then it looped northwards to Greenford, before heading back towards Paddington on the Birmingham line - all to reach Kensington Olympia and that single available bridge. The second train turned westwards at Finsbury Park for the North London line, and then reversed in Willesden goods sidings. It was so surreal that the buffet staff gave us a running commentary on where we were and where we were going (also partly because there were so few passengers on a very slow service that there wasn't any buffet work for them to do) - at one point, approaching Battersea Bridge, we could see the gym where Princess Diana worked out on the left. Or so they solemnly told us.

That link from "the rest of the UK" to continental Europe only lasted a couple of years, probably because of the cost and complexity of navigating such a difficult route (the Eurostar link train actually stopped at Finsbury Park to pick up an extra driver with local knowledge, or 'pilot' as it would be in shipping terms). Wasn't there at some point talk of building a London orbital route - but it ended up being the M25 instead?

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/11/10/network_rail_new_measurement_train_ride/ A fairly long read four pages on the high speed network rail measuring train also a video hope you train buffs like this.

---

Old enough to know better(but)still young enough not to care

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/11/10/network_rail_new_measurement_train_ride/ A fairly long read four pages on the high speed network rail measuring train also a video hope you train buffs like this.

Nice article and video.
I wonder if the US has anthing thing like that?

---

[/quote]

Old James

Yes that is a very rare train to see over here!!

Just about saw it once when travelling from London to Carlisle by train.

The article also mentions

There are other track inspection trains but they are not high speed sets. These other measurement trains run at a more sedate pace – typically 30mph – and do jobs which cannot be done at high speed, such as measuring the voltage on overhead lines and using ground penetrating ultrasound, which inspects the condition below the line.

Here is one I saw last year on the line near me, just two of those very distinctive yellow Network Rail coaches pulled by a couple of the old 37's

---

The "flying banana" is a shy beast, it spends most of its days hiding in sidings to venture out after dark....

---

Bob Smith
Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society)
Somewhere in the (un)known Universe?

I see Freightliner is for sale.

---

David
Sitting on my butt while others boldly go,
Waiting for a message from a small furry creature from Alpha Centauri.