Lune River Trust

Footage of 46115 at Settle Junction and then at Hellifield Station.

[video=youtube;xJrRyy0zXx8]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJrRyy0zXx8[/video]

Hope you enjoy.

 

I would suggest that preventative maintenance is by thar the best route to take in the rail industry. In terms of cost it is probably going to be better for the business to know exactly what you are spending on organised planned maintenance than have the threat of a large bill for something out of the blue. West Coast Railways also has a resonably sized contract engineering business - though more secretive.

 

46115 does seem to be jinxed but I would wager that those best placed to discover the root of the problem and the cure are not those slinging mud on this thread.

 

PM replied to.

 

Any idea what happened to the train?

 

I just thought, I should add in case someone gets the wrong end of the stick regarding my earlier comment - I was explaining more why Riley's standards are so high than making a comment on Carnforths maintenence.

 

Set off from york on time 1824 (the on time revised schedule). Prince William now on front and 37 on back!

 

And that is how it's seen by the guys at Bury, prevention is far better than complete repair after breaking, hence why the loco's receive 5 year overhauls instead of 7 year ones. Much easier on parts, man hours and so on and things are done to a high standard and that's why they have such a good reputation and reliability record.

 

Well, we made it back. According to the driver Prince William returning LE to York tonight?!? Even though we didn't anticipate a heritage diesel tour, it actually ended up being an enjoyable trip, and with the extra speed, change in routing etc we still ended up having the original length of time at York/Scarborough, and we ended up back home on time, even after our 2 1/2hr layover at Hellifield this morning. So full marks to WCRC for their very good attempt at recovering from a bad situation.

 

Well said. There are members on here who are like vultures circling, waiting for and incident to happen and then" Ooo, quick, who can we blame". No waiting for facts, speculation in top gear, (What bit has caused the problem on this occasion, is it the same bit??") It's sickening to see supposedly mature men behaving like this. The engineering at NRM got ridiculed for incompetence and now somebody chirps that WCR could learn a lot from Mr. Rileys team, what a load of ball cocks. The Riley team are good, no question, but other loco engineering staff are far from being incompetent numpties.
And a diesel loco. on the back FOR INSURANCE, might have helped in this case.

 

Well said the pair of you. 46115 has had some real bad luck this last few weeks and it must be soul destroying for the guys at Carnforth who work so hard to keep the loco running.

 

I was also on the tour, and thought WCRC did well to recover a difficult and disappointing situation. 13 photos can be seen here:

Lune Rivers Trust charter, 2012 - andrewstransport's Photos

Cheers

Andrew N

 

Scots Guardsman is a bit of an enigma it would seem, although I count myself very lucky as I have had two sensational trips behind it. The first it set a record up Shap for a 4-6-0 with an 11 coach load and this year it took the heaviest load up the Highland mainline for a 4-6-0 and in some style. This also involved a light engine move from Carnforth to Edinburgh and back for the weekend too. It is clearly a very strong loco when it is on form and credit must go to the engineering team for this as it was in a very poor state when it went to Carnforth. What we must also remember it is also one of the oldest locos to be running on the mainline, it is 1920's technology, perhaps we can not expect it to turn in the same reliability as the Brits or Tornado with all their (relative!) mod-cons? The last two failures have been hot boxes; although annoying the cause should be simple to correct..once found!!

 

Agreed and nobody is implying that WCR engineering staff are "incompetent numpties" as seems to have been inferred rather unhelpfully. The only point being made is that if industry best practice would help improve reliability it should be embraced. It is plain for all to see that Rileys have a pretty much perfect availability record that all others are surely trying to emulate? For whatever reasons 46115 (and 44932 to some degree) has been more prone than most to mechanical problems and if it is to be provided for railtours this will have to improve because it is untenable while there continues to be a high likelihood of failure in traffic. There will be nobody more determined to improve matters than WCR either, we can be assured of that. Perhaps once 45699 and 45690 are available 46115 will be able to have an intermediate overhaul. A clear distinction should be made between boiler and mechanical by the way; WCR rightly has a very good reputation for the boilers it turns out, never any issues. As has been said WCR will go about their business discreetly and professionally as always; we wish them the best of luck because nobody is having a dig and there would probably not be steam on the mainline by now without their enormous contribution for which everyone on here is indebted.

 

The reference to incompetent numpties is quoted in other posts.