Expanding the RHDR fleet and other cool ideas

[BenExpress]

Ever since first travelled on the Romney, Hythe and Dymchurch railway, I fell in love with it and also started looking for ideas to make it more popular. 
 

For instance, I thought that the railway could use a dedicated daily express train working in push-pull fashion, reminiscent of the old BR Class 43 high speed train like this rough sketching of mine below.

 

Another idea would be to bring back freight services on the line because I think the roads of Kent are too narrow and windy for regular lorries. 
 

Do any of you have ideas of your own that could make the RH&DR become more popular and bring in more passengers and goods clients for years to come?

[Calimero]

Overhead electrification at 900v DC, narrow gauge electric locos!

[Mol_PMB]

You could even paint your 15" gauge diesel railcar set in Intercity colours!

(photo on Flickr by John Law)

 

Much as love overhead electrics, I suspect the wire height needed for the level crossings would be a challenge for such low and narrow gauge rolling stock. The current collector would have to be mounted on a very high tower on the roof of the train. I suspect it would have to be a trolley pole as the lateral sway of a pantograph or bow collector would be too large and you would suffer from frequent de-wirements.

 

 

[Mol_PMB]

The photo above was in an approximation of 'Swallow' livery, but the set stated life in 'Executive' with more yellow. Another Flickr photo:

 

[DCB]

They could revive the racing between two trains like Capt Howey etc did pre WW2,  or get the armored train going and charge people to dress up like WW2 conscripts and play soldiers.

 

[Jeremy Cumberland]

1 hour ago, Mol_PMB said:

The current collector would have to be mounted on a very high tower on the roof of the train.

Have you seen the bridges they've got?

 

 

1 hour ago, Mol_PMB said:

The photo above was in an approximation of 'Swallow' livery, but the set stated life in 'Executive' with more yellow. Another Flickr photo:

 

Originally it was silver:

 

 

[009 micro modeller]

2 hours ago, BenExpress said:

Ever since first travelled on the Romney, Hythe and Dymchurch railway, I fell in love with it and also started looking for ideas to make it more popular. 
 

For instance, I thought that the railway could use a dedicated daily express train working in push-pull fashion, reminiscent of the old BR Class 43 high speed train like this rough sketching of mine below.

 

Another idea would be to bring back freight services on the line because I think the roads of Kent are too narrow and windy for regular lorries. 
 

Do any of you have ideas of your own that could make the RH&DR become more popular and bring in more passengers and goods clients for years to come?

 

1 hour ago, Calimero said:

Overhead electrification at 900v DC, narrow gauge electric locos!

You might find this interesting: https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/mrw_forums/rh-dr-hythe-to-sandling-t3419.html

 

(And there is discussion of electric traction, but not especially seriously. It has been done on other public 15” gauge lines though, so not necessarily insurmountable, but perhaps prohibitively expensive over that sort of distance, and with the higher voltage necessary.)

[Wickham Green too]

Why not cart around half a trainload of batteries ? ...................... seems a very popular concept nowadays !

[BenExpress]

12 hours ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

Have you seen the bridges they've got?

 

 

Originally it was silver:

 

 

The Ravenglass and Eskdale railway were able to do it, we can do it again!

[009 micro modeller]

3 hours ago, Wickham Green too said:

Why not cart around half a trainload of batteries ? ...................... seems a very popular concept nowadays !

Indeed, though based on the narrow gauge and miniature railways that already make a lot of use of battery traction I don’t think you’d necessarily need ‘half a trainload’ (though it does rather depend on the operating speed and how frequently they can be charged, which I think is the issue with somewhere like the RHDR). Bure Valley (a comparable long 15” gauge line) has a new battery loco.

[GrumpyPenguin]

I don't think battery power will be feasible for general use on the RHDR, after all it's possible to do an almost 30 mile (IIRC) run without stopping (AFAIK they use two locomotives).

 

Even taking out the fact of low bridges & then high clearances required on the level crossings I don't think any OHLE within touching distance would pass muster for any regulating authority.

 

You also need to take into account the loadings on the RHDR - traims are often around 20 coaches and fully loaded.

[pete_mcfarlane]

I'm not sure I'd want a battery loco on the RHDR*. The steam locos are a big part of the draw. 

 

(*Unless they made a battery powered replica of their Rolls-Royce loco. That would have a certain appeal.)

 

15 hours ago, DCB said:

... or get the armored train going and charge people to dress up like WW2 conscripts and play soldiers.

For the full WW2 experience they have to sit out on the Marsh for several months in the rain waiting for the Germans to (not) show up, like my Grandfather did in late 1940.

 

[Wickham Green too]

9 minutes ago, pete_mcfarlane said:

... The steam locos are a big part of the draw.  ...

... but I doubt whether equivalent miniatures of main line diesels or electrics wouldn't bring in hoards of 'modern image' aficionados - the RHDR's existing diesel fleet serve a purpose, of course, but look nothing like the 'real thing' !

[DCB]

4 hours ago, pete_mcfarlane said:

For the full WW2 experience they have to sit out on the Marsh for several months in the rain waiting for the Germans to (not) show up, like my Grandfather did in late 1940.

The Germans heard about your Grandfather and his mates and decided to attack Russia instead.
My Dad and his mates protected Chedworth Tunnel on the MSWJR from attack by German Paratroopers with equal success.  

Edited July 26 by DCB

[009 micro modeller]

3 hours ago, pete_mcfarlane said:

I'm not sure I'd want a battery loco on the RHDR*. The steam locos are a big part of the draw. 

 

(*Unless they made a battery powered replica of their Rolls-Royce loco. That would have a certain appeal.)

And perhaps more reliable than one with an original engine? (Unless you’re thinking of the environmental reasons for battery power, which is an equally valid point.)

 

4 hours ago, GrumpyPenguin said:

I don't think battery power will be feasible for general use on the RHDR, after all it's possible to do an almost 30 mile (IIRC) run without stopping (AFAIK they use two locomotives).

 

Even taking out the fact of low bridges & then high clearances required on the level crossings I don't think any OHLE within touching distance would pass muster for any regulating authority.

 

You also need to take into account the loadings on the RHDR - traims are often around 20 coaches and fully loaded.

Agree on the subject of battery power - the NG/miniature lines that I can think of that exclusively use battery electrics (including one that I sometimes drive on) are short and quite low-speed (and not using massively heavy trains). It would be interesting to see how the BVR and others get on/have got on with theirs (the BVR one is a brand new Clayton loco - not sure it’s even in service yet) but I’m not sure what they envisage a working day looking like for that - if it’s capable of rescuing a full train plus dead loco and taking it on a full return trip up and down the line that’s still a bit different to actually being rostered as the train loco for the entire day.

 

On the subject of overhead wire I’m not so sure. The (currently inactive) 15” gauge tramway at the Conwy Valley Railway Museum (and I think the similar, working 18” gauge one at Heath Park in Cardiff, though I’ve only visited the Conwy one) have less clearance than full-size tramway electrification, though I think still well over most people’s head height. The Conwy line also runs parallel to a Network Rail line for almost its entire length, which probably has both pros and cons from a safety point of view. As far as I know they are both 110V lines though, you’d probably need a higher voltage for an RHDR-style operation which would lead to more stringent regulation. Getting very off-topic now but until around 2004 in Maldon, Essex there was a 10 1/4” gauge line with, rather bizarrely, 110V third rail electrification (though on that point, I notice some of the Dotto-type train rides seem to take their power from a third rail and I’m not sure how that works safely). I think my favourite 15” gauge overhead electric though is Minirail’s Amber Arrow, though that only ever ran in its original form on unelectrified lines, accompanied by a generator car. Not sure what voltage Claude Lane’s trams used originally (they were originally 15” gauge, before he moved up first to 2’ at Eastbourne and then 2’ 9” as still running today at Seaton).

[298]

6 hours ago, 009 micro modeller said:

Indeed, though based on the narrow gauge and miniature railways that already make a lot of use of battery traction I don’t think you’d necessarily need ‘half a trainload’ (though it does rather depend on the operating speed and how frequently they can be charged, which I think is the issue with somewhere like the RHDR). Bure Valley (a comparable long 15” gauge line) has a new battery loco.

 

Plus it was proven on the Bure Valley that the Mainline style miniature locos from New Romney and Ravenglass weren't quite bulky enough for Norfolk.

 

In terms of power, I'd like to see the pressure taken off the existing fleet with a few new 15" Romney outline looks styled like a Bullied West Country, both rebuilt and unrebuilt and with appropriate local names. And whilst I'm spending my lottery win, how's about restyling New Romney station back into a mainline through/terminus that doesn't look like it's borrowed it's roof from a farm...

[bécasse]

2 hours ago, 009 micro modeller said:

Not sure what voltage Claude Lane’s trams used originally (they were originally 15” gauge, before he moved up first to 2’ at Eastbourne and then 2’ 9” as still running today at Seaton).

My hazy recollection is that the voltage at Eastbourne was somewhere around 70 volts. There were plenty of places on the line where the overhead line was quite low and I remember conducting on the upper deck with the wire touching the top of my cap, giving rise to a mild tingling sensation. One "interesting" experience was on after-dark evening runs out to the Crumbles (then a desolate shingle beach quite different to today's housing estates). The tram was well lit but when one pulled down the trolley pole to turn it, one was plunged into darkness with the result that getting the trolley wheel back on the line at the other end of the tram was a distinctly hit and miss experience.

[GrumpyPenguin]

2 hours ago, 009 micro modeller said:

 I notice some of the Dotto-type train rides seem to take their power from a third rail and I’m not sure how that works safely.

I'm pretty sure that they are something like 50v DC but stand to be corrected.

[Wickham Green too]

Someone DID mention the third rail option, didn't they ......

 

29/3/24

[johnofwessex]

6 hours ago, DCB said:

The Germans heard about your Grandfather and his mates and decided to attack Russia instead.
My Dad and his mates protected Chedworth Tunnel on the MSWJR from attack by German Paratroopers with equal success.  

 

My Father was ready to surrender on Margate Beach but they never came

[009 micro modeller]

2 hours ago, GrumpyPenguin said:

I'm pretty sure that they are something like 50v DC but stand to be corrected.

So pretty low then, and not subject to the same sort of safety considerations. I was under the impression that even 110V stuff is a bit more regulated than that, but not as much as higher voltages obviously.

 

2 hours ago, bécasse said:

My hazy recollection is that the voltage at Eastbourne was somewhere around 70 volts.

A quick Google suggests that even now Seaton (with its slightly larger, heavier trams compared to Eastbourne) is only 120V. Not sure how that would translate to the power requirements of a ‘main line’ 15” gauge sort of line.

 

1 hour ago, Wickham Green too said:

Someone DID mention the third rail option, didn't they ......

Yes, though I’d be surprised if that was allowed now on a new line. It’s not just the normal third rail safety stuff but the fact that miniature and NG lines often have low or rail-level platforms, which in some cases would put the conductor rail above platform surface level. Isn’t Volk’s only 160V, possibly less? Frustratingly I can’t find any pictures of the Maldon line I mentioned but there’s a bit about it here, and there is a listing for it (with the loco described as a 4wRE (rail-electric)) in an Ian Allan book published when it was still in operation. Arguably the Maldon line was (or could have been) relatively safe though from a passenger point of view as it was (as I understand it) just a straight line, with the train running up to the end and then reversing back to the station (the diesel-powered Hall Leys line in Matlock is another miniature line with a similarly simple straight line layout, among other examples). So in that scenario there’s multiple opportunities to reduce the risk of people getting near the (already low-voltage) live rail, if you wanted to - e.g. third rail and collector shoe always on the same side, away from the passenger platform, third rail stops before the end of the track (as at the pier head station on Hythe Pier, where the loco is always at the shore end), sealed/non-existent doorways on the third rail side so people can’t alight onto it etc. A line like the RHDR with much more complex track and platform layouts would be a different matter.

 

Anyway, getting a bit more back on topic (unusually it wasn’t actually me that started the NG electric tangent, though I did contribute to it) and thinking about the RHDR. It’s already a lovely line so I’m not sure it needs a load of other stuff to make it more popular etc., but one idea I did have a few years ago relates to the fish railways at Dungeness, that fishermen used to haul their catch across the shingle. At least one of these is 15” gauge (I think others are 2’), either using an actual disused mineral/gravel branch off the RHDR or at least reusing its track on a different alignment. It’s disused these days I think, but what if it was restored and connected up to the RHDR balloon loop at Dungeness, to provide a branch line/feeder service and allow passengers to explore the unique landscape there? Edit: I think the one I’m thinking of is described as ‘Beach Fish Line’, diverging just after the level crossing over Dungeness Road: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romney,_Hythe_and_Dymchurch_Railway

 

On Google Maps I think it’s the still prominent line opposite Ness Cottage and Beach Cottage, though there do appear to be remains of others as well and I can’t work out how it connected to the RHDR main line.

Edited July 26 by 009 micro modeller

[kevinlms]

How about a nuclear flask train?

[Michael Hodgson]

On 25/07/2024 at 21:42, Mol_PMB said:

The photo above was in an approximation of 'Swallow' livery, but the set stated life in 'Executive' with more yellow. Another Flickr photo:

 

 

Looks more like Tyne & Wear Metro livery to me !

[pete_mcfarlane]

18 hours ago, DCB said:

My Dad and his mates protected Chedworth Tunnel on the MSWJR from attack by German Paratroopers with equal success.  

 

Luckily the Dutch shot down most of the German paratroop's transport aircraft in the battle of the Hague, so they were going to have to walk. 

 

 

[Jeremy Cumberland]

I think this thread deserves a picture of the Dudley Zoo APT:

15 inch gauge electric, with the generator being on a wagon at the back. Later, when the train was at Rhyl, the diesel generator moved into the leading carriage.

 

Now, does anyone have a photograph of Amber Arrow at Longleat?