Bluebell Railway General Discussion

I think it has a private owner. Presumably an agreement has been reached with the owner to have it overhauled and operated on the Wealden Rambler dining set. Interestingly, it is one of only a couple of the 70-odd coaches on the Bluebell not to have a Bluebell webpage. I understand that the trimming team in carriage & wagon at Horsted Keynes have been working on the seats for 3068 and I must say the moquete is lovely from what I've seen of it.

Hoping to get a chance to ride this coach before too long. It is likely to appear on standard services at least once per year, Giants of Steam, but may well appear more than that. It varies for galas when making up a 4 car crimson lake set whether they use the four from the Rambler, or two from the rambler and then 4957 (absolute dump) and 16012. No disrespect to C&W - basically every coach on the railway except 4957 and 35207 are absolutely gorgeous. Last year, the entire Wealden set formed the 'A set' for a month or so in the summer. I think that turned out badly with no accessible access / buffet / too much first class, so isn't being repeated this year.

I don't know the timescale for the completetion of 3068, but I'm certainly looking forward to it - maybe not as much as I was for the Hastings Brake!!

Maybe @RichardSalmon who is from C&W might know more?

 

Is there any further changes in regards to this weekends MRW roster or is it now unchanged since last time? Please and thank you/

 

It hasn’t been updated that I can see, so it’s still:
73082 - A
2999 - B
32424 & 72 - C

 

Camelot has been in use this week.
Lady of Legend was reported (I think on here) to be in light steam in the past few days
Beachy Head was on test yesterday as mentioned above
Fenchurch was in use on Wednesday

As far as I can predict these locomotives should be in use for MRW.

Stock (All S-N, I must clarify- some odd orders here)
A: 25728-16210-21246-4941-1818-4754
B: 387-412-368-394-3188-661-3360-114 (forgive me if 3360 and 3188 are the other way round - last weekend the set turned up not how I expected it to)
C: 1503-3687-7598-1098

A couple of things to note:
The brake (21246) of set A will now and ongoingly be marshalled in the middle of the set. This, I believe, is to make dispatch easier on curved platforms. Set A is soon to lose 25728 to become a five coach set, with the addition of the OBO or 25728 (or 43909) as required. For July the set will be S-N 16210-21246-4941-1818-4754 (not sure how I feel about that order.....)
At Horsted Keynes, when trains pass, it seems it is now protocol for up trains to use plat 2 and down trains plat 3. When only one train is using the station in either direction this will continue to use plat 3. I don't know why this is, and how long it will be for.

Here is the latest public timetable. Unfortunately, there are a couple of inaccuracies, which have not been possible to update.
https://www.bluebell-railway.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/Model-Railway-Weekend_PTT_2026-1.pdf
73082 will work the trains marked 34059
Sets A and B are re-ordered as above
Up trains will use plat 2 at HK with the exception of the 0937. All down trains will use platform 3.
Beachy Head will depart SP LE at 0940 (plat 2)
Beachy Head will depart HK LE at 1630.
The 1645 departure from SP has been re-timed to run at 1650 and run 5 mins later as far as EG.

 

Here is the updated timetable, to the best of my knowledge. PLEASE NOTE THAT THIS INFORMATION IS PROVIDED IN GOOD FAITH, MAY NOT BE ACCURATE, AND THAT I CAN TAKE NO RESPONSIBILITY FOR ANY ISSUES CAUSE BY ANYONE DEPENDING ON THIS TIMETABLE.
If travelling on the 1650 ex-SP, please ensure you are on board at least 5 mins before departure, as this is the advertised time. Ditto the 1710 ex-HK.
Where multiple platforms are given, the first is the Saturday platform, and the second is the Sunday platform.

 

@SECR 65 @WorkingPressure225 Thank you both of you

 

I've been hearing odd whistles in my back garden near Kingscote, that's for that timetable as it explains a lot!

 

Just to note that the expected re-timings at the end of the day have not occured, so the final train will be 1645 ex-SP, and the penultimate down will leave HK at 1705.

It's been a good day today - quite busy - trains well loaded, especially the shuttle. I've spent more than enough money......
More layouts are at SP than HK, but there are lots of traders at both. Layouts at SP in the Birch Grove Suite, Steamworks / Running shed, Loco works, and maintenance (washout) shed.
Atlantic house is also open.

 

Yes, a very enjoyable day with only a bit of timetable slippage. The long TSR between West Hoathly and Kingscote wasn’t helping in that regard although crews seemed to be trying to minimise it’s effect with some very spirited runs between HK and West Hoathly. The last one with the Saint was a cracker!
Nice to see the progress on the B4 first hand as well.

 

The TSR all the way to Kingscote was weather related - it will be removed when the weather cools down. (The notice says it should be gone today).

Tom

 

To be honest, I was incredibly impressed that the timetable remained intact. When I saw about the TSR a couple of days ago I thought it would completely destroy the service. But time was kept impaccably. With these kind of things, as station staff, you just have to let the train go on time, as the next one is not too far behind. I suspect the relay just north of SP will have helped a fair bit. The section used to be timed for 13 mins on the down.

Possibly the greater challenge today for me, however, will be not to buy anything else, having made a number of purchases yesterday!

 

Another good day today. Equally busy compared to yesterday I would reckon. Guard of the shuttle reported good loadings almost all day, and from what I saw, I would agree. Some lovely shows from Beachy Head today.

Time was again well kept for the morning. Slipped up to 15 mins in the latter part of the day due to a couple of very slight issues (one being a problem with the access lift on 4941 which cause a few delay minutes).

Thankfully I managed to stop myself spending too much money!!!!!

The atmosphere around the railway was great and everyone seemed really happy. It's been a really nice day in a customer-facing volunteer role.

80151 has been in light steam this weekend. I'm told both 80151 and 2999 have recently recieved annual exams.



As an additional point, 2999 is now the engine for this week's mid-week trains. I understand that Archie will not now be lit up until it has a long run of use as it is cold anyway.

 

I can second that on today. Very busy and good to see. Excellent showing from both 73082 & 2999 on full line duties. My attention was more focused on 72 on the shuttles. A great way to enable the masses to travel behind her. Another excellent day out at the railway. Thanks to all the volunteers.

 

Yes, 3068 is privately owned. It doesn't (yet) have a Bluebell web page, since it is not (yet) actually on the Bluebell.
The problem with the Rambler set is that CLC is a terrible livery for maintenance; hard to keep clean, and needs much more frequent attention in the paintshop than other liveries. The set lives outside, and since it sees such limited use (one or two trains a week) it visits Horsted very infrequently for maintenance, compared to the other carriage sets that need maintenance after every 6-12 weeks of use. The rambler set really is a bit of an unnecessary luxury, acting as a second catering train between the Pullman and those catering services which make use of an ordinary service set.

4957 was supposed to be sold when the ex-Bicester TSO entered service, but the railway's management has yet to be convinced that we could make more use of Bulleid opens rather than needing a second Mk.1 TSO, for only occasional use. So it keeps on being patched up.

The problem with the Mk.1s is that those that have yet to receive complete Bluebell rebuilds are approaching the end of their residual working life left from BR days. There's little volunteer interest in spending years working on Mk.1s when there are much more interesting and rare vehicles to be worked on, which have also attracted donations and specific bequest funding, and because Mk.1s require a lot of welding work, which therefore also require scarce full-time staff input. Commonwealth bogies, with their roller bearings, require little operational maintenance, but again they are reaching the end of their residual BR lives, and now are receiving very complex major overhauls. Overhauling an SR bogie again is something which volunteers can undertake, whereas a compete strip down, and making and fitting new pedestal liners requires skilled creation of the composite rubber and manganese steel fabrication, and then welding. They are really far too complex (and heavy) for the requirements of a heritage line. They are designed for 100mph running, and are not great when only trundling around at 25mph.

3068 will not, I suspect, be moved to the Bluebell until all the seats for it are finished, and it's a big and time-consuming job undertaking the re-trim (far harder than most coaches for a variety of reasons), which is the Bluebell's contribution to its overhaul.
Yes, it will effectively replace 3064 which is need of an overhaul.

 

That's an interesting observation. The GWSR's service fleet of carriages is almost all Mk. 1's (list here); they have a large C+W group which has been doing some fairly heavy restorations on them. That includes welding in patches for sections of the sheet metal bodies which have corrosion holes - and also sections of the internal vertical U-section beams (e.g. on the ends) when needed. (Their work on bogies seems to make heavy use of swapping, although some parts get worked on, so I'm not sure what they'll do when they can't get bogies to swap.) So I'm wondering if they will some day 'hit the wall' on being able to restore their carriages.

Thanks for the lengthy notes about 3068.

Noel

 

I was on 2999 for the afternoon (third and fourth trips). We were I think 15 minutes late leaving on our last trip, but had got back to about 7 late by time we got back in the evening. I suspect some of the delay earlier was probably us because we had stopped to put out a small sleeper fire at Kingscote on our first down trip, so were running a bit late after that. My hunch is that adding in the shuttles on that timetable reduce the ability to get things back on track if there is anything untoward. With just the two main service trains, even if you are late on one "cycle", you can get it all back by the next one.

Tom

 

Thanks you for taking the time to expain about coaches - very interesting!!!!

Interesting about 3068; I shall patiently await its webpage!

I wonder, once 7864 (Maunsell Restaurant) is complete, could a train of Maunsells perform current Wealden Rambler duties? But, I suppose that wouldn't really solve the issue of being outside, as you would have to store two seperate vintage sets at SP, both the Maunsells for the WR, and for set B of service trains. Possibly in SP shed B road, if some of the things in there were relocated???

I'm glad C&W are keen to see more Bulleids running. The SRCG look to be doing an amazing job and I'm really excited to one day have a 'full' set of both Maunsells and Bulleids. I had a lovely trip in 1482 the other week, which looked stunning internally and externally, and has lovely big quaterlights. A ride in 3687 on Saturday was equally enjoyable. 4754 is a nice coach and C&W have done a fabulous job of it, but, unfortunately, as you say, some of the Mk1s are showing their age - 25728 might be next after the aformentioned 4957.

 

I haven't checked the available vehicles in detail, but I wonder if it would be possible to create a five coach Bulleid set that had the same seating combination (1st, 3rd, disabled, buffet) as the core Mark 1 set. That might satisfy the commercial people that they could guarantee equivalent seating for advance sales / coach parties regardless of which set happened to be in use, and mean that the core set could alternate between Mark 1 and Bulleid; and the second set alternate between Maunsells / pre-group SR carriages and Mets / 4 wheelers; with shorted vintage sets at off-peak weekends. (Just the Mets; or just the 4 wheelers would be within the load limit of Fenchurch; the combined set is within the load limit for the O1 or H).

Tom

 

One or two coaches would need significant modifications, as we don’t have a Bulleid buffet car or wheelchair accessible coach (yet). I think there was an idea at one point to put a buffet counter and wheelchair accommodation in one of the Semi-Open Brakes, but I don’t know if that will actually happen or not.

 

There are nine Bulleids owned by / based at the Bluebell Railway:
Four Open 3rds: 1456*, 1464, 1481, 1482
Four Semi-opn brake 3rds: 2515, 2526, 4227, 4279
One Corridor composite: 5768

Bold denotes currently operational vehicles
Underlined denotes have operated on the Bluebell in preservation
1456 is currently operational on loan to the Watercress Line

If we take the current MK1 A set (I'll use its old order):
21246-16210-4941-1818-4754-25728 so that's in a simplest sense BRAKE-1STCLASS-ACCESSIBLE-BUFFET-ALL3RD-ALL3RD

Looking at the Bulleids:
Brake is easily covered - at present this would be 2526
The only Bulleid with 1st class is 5768
Two open 3rds can be used - at present this would be 1482, and most likely 1464

This provides four vehicles out of the six which are easily covered by Bulleids. There are two possible options for finding an accessible vehicle, and a buffet car.
One would be to use the second Mk1 vehicle in each of these cases as there are two MPVs and two RMBs. Alternatively the Maunsell restaurant car could be used.
The second option would be to convert a Bulleid coach into these types of vehicles. I believe it has been suggested that 1464 could be converted to be a Tavern Car. Either a brake or an open 3rd could have one end gutted out in much the same way as the Mk1s 4941 and 5034 to have a wheelchair lift installed. This might attract grant funding???

Interestingly, the Bluebell's fleet of Maunsell vehicles is much more varied, so may prove a better option to form an A set.