Nene Valley Railway

Another cracking day with the Wagon Group on one of their charters, this time with Britannia. Always a pleasure and it's good fun getting some of the unusual visitors on the freight rake.

 

Britannia running along the NVR today, looked and sounded excellent in the sunshine:

 

Couple of thoughts after watching @TheModster's video:

1. Is a chime whistle peculiar to 70000 or did all the "Brits" have them? - I thought it was only the A4s that had them and
   
2. Milepost 43 (at 4:22 in the video) - is that measured from Northampton, Rugby or somewhere else?

 

Not sure where "Milepost 43" is located. According to Bradshaw:

From Northampton Castle: 37 miles to Wansford; 43½ miles to Peterboroough (GE).

From Rugby (via Market Harborough): 44¼ miles to Wansford; 50¾ miles to Peterborough (GE).

 

Fairly certain that all the Brits had chime whistles, as did some of the Standard 5’s. No doubt @std tank can give the full picture.

 

The Brits, Clans and 71000 were all fitted with chime whistles. The Standard 5s 73000 to 73099 were fitted with chime whistles which were mounted on the smokebox directly behind the chimney. Standard 5s 73100 to 73171 had normal small whistles mounted on the front of the manifold. Some of the chime whistles on the Standard 5s, 73000-73099, were exchanged for smaller whistles, but were still positioned behind the chimney. From memory, I think one or two of the Clans had smaller whistles fitted at some time during their short working life.

 

Question 2 - Blisworth, the junction with the WCML.

 

Brilliant - thank you!

 

in addition to other replies, the Gresley P2 class also had chime whistles. The chimes were replaced by standard whistles during wartime to avoid confusion with air raid sirens

 

Did that replacement happen for A4s as well?

 

Yes. Should have made my post clearer.

 

4469 Sir Ralph Wedgewood was still fitted with a chime whistle in May 1942 when it was hit by a German bomb whilst at York MPD.
The chime whistle was transferred to the York shed pilot Y8 0-4-0 tank 560 (later 8091). The whistle had been removed from the Y8 by 1946.

 

Coverage of some of the special services on the 15th/16th March hauled by 70000 Britannia - and four sequences capturing 'The Jolly Fisherman' fish and chip specials after dark - hopefully good for sound and atmosphere bearing in mind it was very dark!

 

GWR Large Prairie no.4144 arrived at Wansford on Tuesday afternoon on loan from Didcot Railway Centre
Until September, and will enter traffic this weekend

 

An alternative look back at the Flying Scotsman photo charters with footage from a different run pasts to my first video

 

I thought it was supposed to be a recreation of the Kings Cross - Niddrie Class C, known as the 266 Down or Scotch Goods. Those modern hopper wagons are out of period and would never have run in a Class C freight.

 

Sometimes you have to make do with what you've got, and they were removed from the rake later in the day (used to provide the illusion of a second departing freight train in the background).

 

The NVR evidently do freight charters very well. The Boston docks-themed one with the 'J94's the other year looked fantastic and I wish more railways would do similar!

 

Thanks - we (NVR Wagon Group) try very hard to put on quality events with a variety of locos and themes. We're pretty chuffed that our recent efforts have resulted in a lot of social media visibility, cover shots from Scotch Goods on both Heritage Railway & Steam Railway Magazines, and feature articles on Scotch Goods and Rule Britannia charters in consecutive issues of HRM. We're not perfect, but we try to take feedback on board and make every event better than those that preceded it.

We're taking a break from photo charters for a bit - April sees a freight driving day with Thomas (sold out), then again in May with GWR Prairie 4144 (morning slots still available, afternoon sold out), and there are more events to follow - it's going to be a busy year!

https://nvr.org.uk/product.php/232/western-goods-driving-experience

 

That’s very commendable, it’s a shame some railways are getting a bit anti railway enthusiast.