Blue Pullman Revival

Fit it with a pantograph like the Swiss dining cars, plenty of juice!

 

But thats no good on the third rail or non electrified lines...

 

In my opinion, that Midland Pullman livery is equal 2nd best, with the large logo executive livery. It was a stunning livery on the Met-Cam units, and will give the trains real eye appeal, and setting them quite apart.
I still put the original '76 livery as the best, but obviously the rivet nazi's won't allow any preserved HST power cars to wear it, unless restored to original condition, dull lights, and deafening, child scaring Valenta engines.

 

Whenever we get back to normal, the market for a fully escorted land trip for Chinese, Japanese and American tourists could be enough to sustain it.

Remove some coaches, and add some sleepers, and you have a fully contained hotel for the duration, could be a decent success.

Good Luck to them, it certainly looks the part.

 

You mean like the Royal Scotsman?

 

Suppose so, but one that could do 125mph, and cover more ground???

 

Does that kind of trip need to cover ground in that way though? Royal Scotsman seems to do pretty well at lower speeds, allowing passengers to enjoy the views, rather than rushing.

 

It does if it wants to start and finish in London but the main part of the trip is somewhere more distant.

 

I'd guess the acceleration of a 125 helps no end on fitting it onto today's railway, ditto the double-ended nature of it.

I do like the idea of a 125 sleeper set (albeit IIRC there is a blanket limit on night-time trains anyway).

Another vote here for the reversed grey/blue colours.

 

I hope that the in train heating works if there is going to be a blanket limit.

 

There is no simple or cheap way to make a MkIII Sleeper work within an HST set. MkIII loco-hauled coaches and HST Trailers may look similar but are quite different things. Here's a few to begin with:
- Different couplers - HST have solid-shank Alliance couplers, MkIII have drophead Buckeye.
- Different control systems - HST uses a 36 way through jumper for control of the rear power car but also PA, lighting control etc. MkIII use RCH jumpers (and didn't need to worry about a back PC)
- Very different electrics, with the toilet shaver socket being maybe the only common component. HST uses a system based on 415v 3-phase, MkIII uses the "traditional ETS" system of 800-1000v AC or DC.

Conversions (of day coaches) have been done in the past, but very deep pockets are needed.

 

Groan!!

I'll get your coat...

 

That's a b*gger. How does the Flying banana manage with Mk2 coaches in it's consist (or are they the deep-pocketers)?

 

The NMT these days uses solely HST trailers in the consist. In the early days, it had at least one Mk2 - based vehicle in the formation, which was the legendary High Speed Track Recording Coach (number eludes me). HSTRC was developed to be interchangable between loco hauled and HST sets, and was equipped accordingly. Excitingly, it was fitted with B4/B5 bogies which aren't really designed for 125mph.

Conversions LHCS to HST were done for Cross Country and for Grand Central because there weren't enough trailers to go around, for a variety of reasons. The deepest of deep pockets were needed.

 

Do you need sleepers though, as any high end market would expect to include hotel accommodation the 125mph capability is good if say starting from London, and your touring the highlands, or Cornish Rivera as it enables the passengers to reach a destination for an overnight stay, , and of course for the train set to be cleaned and re stocked overnight, to continue onward next morning, with the guests suitably refreshed, and on the more scenic stretches, the HST SET can be replaced by Mk 1's and one of LSL' Steam fleet, with the HST being used for the longer distance runs.

 

The Royal Scotsman mentioned earlier is a pure hotel on wheels, where there is no need for the tiresome business of transferring between train and hotel.


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A pair of HSTs were wired up with a 91 this week so this isn't as farfetched as it seems off the bat and would be handy over electrified sections.

 

The HST's were powered up but the 2 x 91 set was not, Pantographs up though for testing purposes.
Detail from another forum.

 

Proper diesels HAVE to be loud enough to scare the children, otherwise how are we going to to get new railway enthusiasts? I myself was alarmed by a steam engine at about 4 years old, and I'm still hooked 60 years later.