46233 King's X - York 14/08/16

Today's scheduled timings for the Duchess are a lot slower than yesterday's scheduled times for Tornado over the same stretches (Kings Cross to Peterborough in the morning and Grantham to Kings Cross in the evening).

Although the Duchess has a heavier load (presuming the diesel to be a dead weight) it is still comfortably within the capacity of a Class 8P.

If four hours each way would have been too tight, what about four and a half? Five hours one way and more than six the other do seem excessive.

 

DO go there!!!

 

If Steam Dreams used the Starship Enterprise it would probably be destroyed by Aliens in the first 20 minutes of the journey and then the passengers would have to wait for the Klingon Thunder-warbird diesel to rescue them

Sent from my D6603 using Tapatalk

 

Andy

Don was refering to these runs like this : -

http://www.uksteam.info/tours/t08/t0705a.htm
http://www.uksteam.info/tours/t08/t0706a.htm
http://www.uksteam.info/tours/t09/t0516a.htm
http://www.uksteam.info/tours/t09/t0926b.htm

Some of which do have less pickups, and would have greater input than a standard trip to get better timings.

Paul

 

Video of the St Neots stops today. If anyone recognises the driver and fireman in the evening footage, please let me know and I will add to the Youtube description.



John

 

She seemed to either stall or stop just outside of Sandy earlier this evening. Anyone know what this was down too? She accelerated through the station with the diesel just ticking over with no push!

 

Driver was Mick Rawling, with Jim Clarke acting as TI. Wasn't sure about the fireman.

 

Cruising nicely through Tallington on the return trip about 30 late. Cylinder drain cock stuck open again.

 

I was on those and others with similar timings, and, of course, the exceptional Top Gear run with Tornado http://www.uksteam.info/tours/t09/t0425c.htm.
I accept that it is more difficult now but I think the real reason for the slower schedules is a change of attitude.

 

His name is Andy not Adrian and he has as much right as anyone else on here to have his say and tell the real facts as it is, as Andy said it was vacuum stock and if there was a steam failure where are you going to get a vacuum braked diesel from if you haven't got it with you and and if the train had sat down on the ECML because of a steam failure with no back up plan then that would be the end of steam on the ECML for sure regardless of the TOC or the steam loco. As for the timings and length of the trip it is NR that issues the timings and not Andy.

 

WTF is Adrian?

 

Is 46233 air braked and the Duchy stock air braked also?

 

Ha ha!! Oooops. Slip of the fingers on the keyboard Andy. You, Mr. T are man of great integrity and provider of valuable information on this great website.

 

'The Cathedrals Express', filmed at Lindsells (Biggs.), Peterborough crossing the River Nene, and Sandy.

 

I wonder whether the number of through platforms at Carlisle and York has a factor in this. Carlisle only has three, so the signallers will be pretty keen to get the train out of the way, whereas York has five and seems to give movements to/from Holgate the lowest of priorities.

 

It will not be long before runs on the ECML will be air only in my view.

Depending on a 40 odd year old loco to be the rescue, seems to eventually ask for trouble.

Either that, or the TOC of choice for ECML work has to move away from the main player, as they have access to many loco's that can act as thunderbird locos, in the event of failure.

Just a thought....

 

Tornado did do it. 19.09.10 and 26.09. 10 times were 4 hrs 2 mins up and 4 hrs 8 mins back. I was on one of these and time was kept. Also quite a few times in 4 hrs 40ish both ways.. Plus 60019 13.11. 10 was given 4 hrs 24 up and 4 hrs 27 back. Where there's a will there's a way. Its a question of decent intermediate times and a couple of brief water stops. Whilst I agree we must be thankful for what we have got there is no need for complacency.