Why so few 'Preserved' Diesel Tours?

I've been looking at both the WCRC Suspended thread and the one on the 25mph limit on Preserved lines.

Now I realise that there are quite a lot of railtours that feature 'heritage' diesel traction - although these are locos still in regular mainline service - class 20, 37 & 47, but given both that I assume its not as difficult to run a preserved diesel on the main line - and of course in order to make the larger locos work a bit they need to be running heavy trains at speed, why are there so few tours with preserved diesels.

Some years ago I had a lovely trip to Dunster by Candlelight with 45112, and quite reasonably priced to boot, so where are those 25/33/40/45/46/50/52/55/whatever hauled trips? Perhaps a 'Torbay Express' with a Peak, Western or Hoover might have some support.

 

Still require TPWS/OTMR etc.
Tours advertised this year with 37025 and 55009.55022 been on Royal Scotsman last fortnight.
25278 works to Battersby on NYMR safety case.
37057 MAY do likewise shortly
33012 under repair,40145(WCRC safety case only),45112 OOS,46035OOS,50007 and 50017 ML certified, but DBS have no crews current on 50s,50044,50049 under repair,55002 under repair,1015 under repair.47773,47580 in service(773 WCRC only?)

 

One of the main reasons is cost. WCRC charged a premium for using a heritage diesel which usually equated to needing at least 2 extra coaches on a tour. Generally this is also about as most as you can get as extra income from extra passengers attracted to your tour when a heritage diesel is added as an attraction so most tour suppliers seemed to have stopped bothering. It is a source of great frustration for most diesel fans and especially the societies who have paid out for the mainline kit and certification (circa £60k) and cannot find the work to justify the cost, and that was before the disaster that has been the WCRC suspension that has decimated the tour market.

 

Basically only Deltics are available outside the stuff DRS and a couple of others have in regular use, everything else is either knackered or out via paperwork technicalities, not cleared for DBS, drivers signing them has lasped, need regauging for many routres, delete as appropriate, especially annoying in the case of class 50's IMO as it would stop the usual 47/66 bore fest, 1015 would almost certainly have some outings if not sidelined, and the 40 is hampered by WCRC.

 

So we need a Diesel Jeremy Hoskin by the sound of it then, unless he can be persuaded to take them under his wing

 

55022 is on long term hire in Scotland to GBRf. I think I'm right in saying the owner wasn't getting much work for it and along came GBRf with an offer. It helps to pay the bills. Two of the other Deltics have a summers work on the SVR.
I know if somebody were to run a main line railtour with a Deltic I'd be at the front of the queue for tickets.

 

What actually happened with him and 46035, did he just lose interest or something ?, semed like it went for repairs and just got abandoned at some stage.

 

Preservationists buy diesels, or anything else, in order to preserve them. Diesel locos, like any other mechanical objects, are subject to wear and tear, accidental damage etc. and, because they are relatively complex and sophisticated machines (compared with steam locos) such issues can be very expensive or impossible to resolve, which may well be fatal to the loco. Clearly, wear and tear and the risk of accidental damage is greater when working on the main line, or even when working intensively on the larger HRs. Whilst it's true that an occaisional run at full power is good for the loco, regular intense running risks damage that would be the death knell of the loco.

 

So which other Deltic besides RHF is at SVR for the summer?No9 is only there for a couple of weeks.
Take it you're booked on No9s trip a week on Saturday, Paignton and the tour with Tornado?