luckymucklebackit

One of my greatest regrets in life was not keeping my detailed notes of trips and visits, the lists of numbers were tossed once the underlining process in the ABC had been completed. As a relative youngster (only 14 when the 1970s started I had limited 1960s shed visit experience, my Grandfather (a railway employee) took me to Eastfield, Fort WIlliam, Haymarket, Polmadie and Kipps between '66 and '68, just early enough to see a couple of remaining steam locos at Eastfield. What was impressed in my memory was the sheer number of locos that would be in the depot on a Sunday, Eastfield seems to have endless lines of diesel shunters. Jim

So that is the original inspiration for the class 141, (before the design team ditched the idea of having bogies and replaced with single axles as a cost saving exercise)!

Black 5 - before locos were covered in gaudy vinyls https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hCGJqjKD1XU

I remember as a lad that the class 20 allocations used to be very simple - if it had a tablet catcher recess it was a Scottish Engine, if it didn't it was an English Engine, and my Ian Allen reflected this with most of the D8028 - D8034 and D8070 - D8127 series underlined, then one day in 1968 a shiny blue D8316 ( not even in my book) whistled past Coatdyke which had me scratching my head! As the years went by the demarcation disappeared and even the class doyen D8000 made an appearance in Coatbridge. Jim

Little Bird - Annie Lennox

This practice was in place right to the end of ore workings to Ravenscraig, the loaded trains always ran via the R&C to avoid the Bellshill bank which was a heavy slog from Uddingston Junction to Bellshill for most trains. Being the most direct route the main line was used for the empties. Before the days of the triple headers the loaded train would pick up the banker at Rosehall Junction for the climb from Mossend to Holytown, they went over to triple headed after a coal train of HAAs spread itself all over the curve from Mossend North to Mossend East, the banker didn't respond quick enough to a brake application due to a signal check and kept pushing! As an aside, on the Bellshill Bank, the local villains were known to put oil or grease on the rails if they knew there was a freight with anything worth nicking due, the loco would slip to a standstill and the vans would get raided while stationary! Jim

New Scotrail Journey planner now available

How long before the pedants come on and start pointing out detail mistakes! Like no tail lamps, foot recesses etc

Punch and Judy - Marillion

There was at one time an aspiration to relocate the entire Scottish Steel Industry to Hunterston, they got as far as building two direct iron reduction plants but in the event these plants were a white elephant and were never used for iron production. There were many factors in play here, local opposition to what is an area of natural beauty being scarred by what is unavoidably a dirty, polluting industry and the influence of politicians wanting to keep employment in their patch (i.e. Lanarkshire). There were many incidences of this, resulting in some bizarre decisions. One of the worst was where I worked at the Tube Mill. A major part of our production was casing pipe destined for the North Sea and what should have happened was that once the tube had been heat treated it would roll down a sloped bench into the machine shop, where a thread would be cut on each end and a coupler (made out of larger diameter tube with a thread on the inside) torqued in place at one end. The tube would then be craned onto bogie bolsters, destination Aberdeen Waterloo Goods Yard. But thanks to a parochial old Labour MP called James Dempsey what actually happened was that after heat treating the pipes were loaded onto trains (or lorries) and sent to the Imperial Works in Airdrie, some 10 miles away. This works was so badly sited, being on high ground and with very poor road and rail access. Trains leaving Clydesdale ( see sketch map attached) had to reverse at Rosehall Junction in Coatbridge, be propelled up the old truncated Caledonian Railway Airdrie Line via Calder yard where the train had to be split down into 4 wagon trips due to the gradient, these trips were then propelled up the branch to a headshunt then hauled up into the works. The whole process had to be repeated once the thread and coupler had been applied. Anyone with half a brain could see it was madness, but the MP had to show that he was keepping jobs on his patch! Tubes waiting to be collected in the works yard, my office was just oposite where the trailer is parked on the road jim

The Scottish station that used to have pretty much a stranglehold on any "best garden" awards was Aberdour. The station now has a thriving visitor centre and has kept up the old traditions of well kept gardens. IIRC It won the National Rail Award for "Small Station of the Year" in 2018 Jim

It was one of the features of UK steelmaking that made it uncompetative with the modern Korean and Japanese markets. Their steelworks were fully integrated and built beside the sea, and bulk iron ore or coal was loaded straight from the ships to the stockyards and then to the steelmaking plant. The cast ingots went almost immediately to the rolling mills and finishing plants and then straight onto the waiting ship for export. OK that might be a bit of an over simplification but compared with say Ravenscraig where ore was unloaded from the ships at Hunterston, some would go up the conveyor to the loading hoppers, the rest to the stockpile, train then would take the ore to Ravanscraig where it would be unloaded to a secnd stockpile then into the plant. Semi-finished coil went initially over to Gartcosh by rail, later all the way down to Wales for finishing. Interesting times for the railway observers but all that transport was additional cost. Jim

Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life - Monty Python

Brilliant site, thanks for the link, on the Mission Impossible page there is a cracking still of a TGV crossing Ballochmyle viaduct, did they say that the camera never lies? Jim

Same view in the early 1960s And in 2005, the branch is now disconnected from the main line Jim

has to be Bohemian Rhapsody - Queen

The world record for pulling a train... using model trains. https://twitter.com/mrtimdunn/status/1252485673153712131?s=21

Sorry - that must have been photoshopped, I mean - a MAN having to do his ironing! Good God it was a man who invented the steam iron to make it easier for women to do the job!!! blue touchpaper lit, now retiring.........

Found this rather sad photo on Flickr while looking for something else, it is the short lived signalbox at Blackpool South Station, which found itself rather removed from the track that it controlled following the removal of the carraige sidings in 1970, just proves that the signal box does not need to be positioned right beside the track or station. https://www.flickr.com/photos/masonphenix19/15799513397 Jim

As posted on Friday in the Forum Jokes Thread, beginning to wonder if there should be rules for these threads, as in visual gags on here, written jokes on the other thread.....

latest Playstation VR releases....