Tornado

Fair enough.

I find both statements to be rather poor. The implication of WCR's is that Tornado is not fit for purpose. The A1 Trust's statement seems to be a direct retort to the latter. Neither does either of the two groups any good. I am curious as to what exactly about the reboring was felt inadequate, as JS's statement suggests.

I am not entirely sure it is "publicly criticizing" but it is definitely questioning their decision -whatever it entailed - to "fail" Tornado...!

RE the important company - yes, significantly important. But like the trust, and the rest of us, not impervious to criticism when it warrants it. In this case, I'm flabbergasted at both of the groups.

---
​

I'm still trying to get my head around both statements. Are the Trust saying that all the groups involved, including West Coast Railways, agree that the standard of reboring is satisfactory - and are West Coast Railway saying it's not the work, but who did it, that is the problem?

 

I read it that West Coast have not satisfied with the competency of the company employed. Maybe they have experienced problems in the past with work carried out by this company?

West Coast do not currently operate 71000 after works were carried out on it, but have done in the past. It could possibly be a similar situation?

 

Its industry practice that an OEM will only work with accredited business partners.
If you use someone who isnt accredited, the OEM is not obliged to support it, it's at their discretion.

It could be BT and BT approved phone equipment or British Gas and approved boilers, your desktop pc and the shop or the car on your drive and the maintenace garage.. or just about any other industry you care to mention.

Its just unfortunate in our industry that there's only 2 game players, so if you dont meet the criteria of , or have a disagreement with one, you are at mercy of the only other.

However James's post does say the door is still open, who knows maybe a way through this is to get the repair specialist who did the work recognised by WCRC, as it would appear to be recognised by DBS ?

 

Absolutely Ralph, I take your point. I'll say nowt more on the matter.

 

DBS do significantly fewer Steam Charters than West Coast and therefore have fewer crews . Therefore availability of crews will be the problem. Mike Notley wrote in the Jan 2011 issue of Steam Railway of 4 retirements of DBS crew, includling Eastleigh's Brian Butcher - & Didcot's Bob Cottrell.

 

C'mon Neil, you should know by now that that is totally unacceptable to a lot of Nat.Pres. members. Some of these lads DEMAND to know what is going on. :behindsofa: :whistle:

 

It seems to me that the Trust is perfectly entitled to decide who will carry out work on its locomotive. It is entitled to decide, also, if that work has been carried out properly. It is nobody else's business.

Regards

 

Who will fire 35028 on those epic enthusiast runs now? Wayne and Butch made a fine crew.

 

But equally WCRC are within their rights to ensure that any locomotive's they are responsible for operating are maintained to standards that they accept. I assume that there is a great degree of risk involved as the TOC and WCRC need to protect themselves against any failure by having their own standards that locomotive owners have to comply with.

This is hardly new. BR insisted on locomotives being up to a certain standard (MT276 ring a bell?) that was different from simply overhauling a locomotive suitable for working on a preseved railway.

One continuing trend of the modern railway is that each individual company has to create their own standards and maintain them without there being one overall body that enforces a standard on each company (which is what we're seeing here) despite the approval of the VAB.

 

No argument there Neil - but if you read the trust's statement, it states that WCR agreed that the work on reboring the cylinders was satisfactory. So that being the case - Tornado mechanically is not the issue. The issue is who was contracted out to do the work, as I read it (and it seems, several other posters read it that way too).

So my question is - does it really matter who carried out the work, if all sides are satisfied the work done is satisfactory, and the locomotive is not mechanically unsound?

 

Indeed - just as West Coast is perfectly entitled to decide they are not prepared to operate a locomotive on the mainline if work has been carried out on it which they are not happy with (for what ever reason).

Ultimately it will be West Coast's employees who are working on it, and it will be under West Coast's safety case and licenses that it will be running. On that basis it's nobody elses business how they run their business.

It would seem from the West Coast statement that the A1 Trust were specifically advised not to use 'unacceptable contractors', so the fact they carried on anyway means it shouldn't be too much of a surprise to find West Coast subsequently had issues with it.


Whilst DBS are still prepared to operate steam there isn't too much of a problem, but it might perhaps be a little short sighted of the A1 Trust to totally burn their bridges with West Coast, seeing as their proportion of the steam charter market has grown substatially in recent years to the cost of DBS.

If at some point DBS decide to pull out of running steam then the A1 Trust will be left with having to conform to West Coast's requirements. ...or else just move their toy around with a lowloader between preserved railways.

 

I'm not sure anyone agrees that the work was done to a level that would satisfy both parties. WCRC state that they did not approve the use of the contractor as James said in his statement:

Surely the Trust would have known before the work was completed that WCRC weren't going to accept the locomotive as according to their own standards?

 

In fairness, the A1 Trust press release did say:

So it would seem the actual work carried out is acceptable to West Coast, just it was performed by an unapproved contractor that West Coast warned the A1 Trust not to use.

...So I agree, the A1 Trust should have known there were likely to be a problems ahead if they carried on with their chosen (unapproved) contractor.

 

I cant understand the thinking of the A1 trust about this, West Coast who i would assume would have put a lot of work their way tell them, who their prefered contractors are so i would have assumed that someone from the trust would have asked West coast can we use this firm ? now what is the problem, is it the standard of work or a paperwork issue? if its a paperwork issue then as long as there are no past issues with the firm who did the work then i cant see why they cant be accepted by West coast, after all they do more mainline work than DBS who i feel will one day pull out of operating steam
But if there have been issues in the past with work done by this contractor, then you have to ask were the A1 trust aware of this and the problems it could , and has caused

 

The statement from James doesn't say that though.

 

I wonder how long it will be before Jeremy Hosking sets up his own TOC (or perhaps reaches a deal with someone like DRS to amend their safety case to include steam)? . If DBS were to pull out of steam that would leave the market at the mercy of a monopoly operator and that isn't likely to be good for anyone.

 

It does rather beg the question of whether West Coast have actually inspected the work done and what are their conclusions from that inspection.