GWSR General Discussion and Operations

Yes well, maybe not all at the same time, not unless we get some double track to run them on first! It's going to take a little while just to get to the point we were at last time we ran a freight, there's been quite a lot of deterioration. All of the GWR vans that used to run need completely replanking for instance. But the first of those, a Mink A, is waiting outside and should be shunted in soon in the new year. I will personally take great delight in banishing the comic sans transfers and properly sign-writing it.

 

Alex,
Look familiar?

Southampton Eastern Docks. Not sure of the exact date, but between 15/9/1998 and 16/12/1998. I did once get some details from Bob Wallace, back when he wrote the wagon column in RAIL. He sent me a copy of his article (sadly now lost) so if anyone has an archive of RAIL (or was it Rail Enthusiast then?) ask them to get digging.
Pat

 

It does indeed:


Stored at Cheltenham, we don't use it. I believe it was made out of a SR coach underframe and I've idly wondered whether it would be of any use as one again. If it was, such decisions are well above my paygrade I should add!

 

I don't suppose anyone knows whether or not the Cotswold Festival of Steam is going ahead next year or not...? With the 2021 Wartime in the Cotswolds event having been cancelled and the lack of news regarding said festival (as well as events for next year overall), I would not be surprised if this event has been dropped as well. Even if it does go ahead, I'd assume they'd have to limit numbers as the Mid Hants did with their (fairly) recent gala. Then of course hire and transport costs for visiting locos come into it as well, so I wouldn't exactly bank on the GWSR bringing in 3/4 guests as they have done in previous years (If they were to hire any). Of course this is just speculation, but if anyone can shed some light on this it would be appreciated.
Cheers!

 

It was a carriage frame, one of Lancing's. I believe it became a Carflat (still VB on Maunsell bogies), then acquired by MAT who stretched it and mounted it on Y27 bogies with AB. You can still see the places where the new metal was spliced into the solebars and trusses. It passed to STVA when they bought MAT. It was a frequent visitor on (I think) Land Rover traffic from Bordesley and then, there it was - gone!
Pat

 

The start of a new build coach project Does anyone know what the original coach was?

Maybe a new build Tavern Car to run with 35006

 

Thank you, Noel! I remember squeezing the 9T dumper along the trackbed while the scaffolding was still up to erect the canopy....

 

You are quite right, things certainly won't be like our usual gala in 2021, sadly...

However in the last week or so a discussion with the board has been started to see what we can do. There is a desire to do something, whether that be an enhanced weekend with the home fleet, maybe a guest, who knows, all up for discussion at present . As I'm sure you can appreciate it's difficult to plan with any certainty because things are ever changing, until people can get on and off trains as they wish and with less social distancing restrictions, it's difficult to make the pounds stack up for any kind of 'big gala'

Hopefully things be a little clearer towards the end of the winter.

Regards,

Mike

A small cog in the gearbox of GWSR galas.

 

I thought you had taste ...

Tom

 

Everyone is allowed one bad taste guilty pleasure.

I would have loved to have been at the meeting where the Tavern Car was proposed.

I almost think it was a joke idea that someone accidentally took seriously.

 

Unlikely.
The donor vehicle was stretched (current length is 68ft LOB). I have a note in my TOPS record that it dates from 1927 or thereabouts. Just a common or garden Maunsell corridor carriage (and how we would love to have the original, eh?). It would also need replacement bogies, as Y25 are for freight. (As an aside the 'Y' is some French designation. Passenger bogies have even numbers, freight have odd. Every day a school day!)
Pat
(Edit to get the bogie type right!)

 

I think if I got into a railway carriage that looked like this inside, I'd be wondering of someone had spiked my drink ...





Tom

 

Exeter Central, before the broad-gauge mob butchered it?
Always thought that the tavern car was from the same line of though that streamlined radiograms, but that's just my prejudice having an airing.
Pat

 

Well, this is from the same people who designed the Leader...

Did Bulleid have a taste for Absinthe?

 

After the orange formica horrors of a 4-BEP buffet car, that would seem almost normal...

Did southern railway/region hire dipsomanics who knew nothing other tham dubious bars to design their buffet cars?

 

That’s not what I said.

Tom

 

They do say it makes the heart grow fonder
In which case, am I the only one who thinks the Art Deco Buffet cars were the mutt's nuts? I remember having a look inside the last surviving one at a Brighton Station open day in the 70s.
The Tavern Cars really were the hight of kitsch, though.
And I've only just realized I'm on the GWSR thread, rather than the Bluebell!

 

I see absolutely nothing wrong with those interiors; they are, as stated above, 'of their time'. Just as orange Formica is pure 1970s.

I wonder how long it will be before a heritage railway goes full 1971 and has a blue and grey set hauled by a Rail Blue diesel (with reporting number blinds fitted)??