The Linear Scrapyard: Which locos/coaches/wagons in it would you most like to see get restored ?

This deserves to be highlighted. The prospect of working in a decent indoor environment with power, lighting, etc on hand will surely attract more volunteers than the prospect of working out of doors in all weathers with improvised facilities.

 

Indeed, many railways seem short of folk to work on carriages, especially lines with just Mk1s, but with 4 carriages under cover at once to play with, 2 in heated buildings, excellent woodworking, metalworking, engineering, upholstery and painting facilities, a large messroom with tea and cakes on tap and a friendly bunch it's no wonder our C+W department now numbers over 100 members.

 

Been there, done that,... Two DMU vehicles, three Mk1's and a Van B, provide my own funds, power and tools, provide driver cover at a moments notice, work in a swamp, brave vandalism and theft (both yobs and railway staff!) and the elements, repair the railways stock, and still get told I'm not wanted (probably because I knew more than them....).

 

I think enthusiasts should not be so dismissive of Mk1's. Its interesting to note on the SVR that parents (in their late 20's or 30's) see the SK's and CK's and cry "Just like Harry Potter" - the coaches are probably twice as old as said parents. The accompanying Grandparents cry "I remember travelling in these to school" etc

 

People don't need a lottery win to work on stuff, The majority of volunteers don't necessarily spend anything other than the membership fee. I worked for example for a short time on carriages at the East Lancs and later GWSR and never spent anything other than petrol to get there (tools and materials were provided by the railway). Only since I started my own project do I now pay for my own materials
so you can spend as much or as little as you want depending on how involved you want to be.

To be honest the money is only part of it. For example with a wooden bodied carriage, the reason many are linear scrapyard wrecks is that good ones were often scrapped in the 1950s to 60s so many of the ones that survived long enough to get preserved were either camping coaches or departmental vehicles and in both cases that meant the original interiors were generally ripped out, so to get it running again you need to remanufacture a lot. With my own coach for example much of the interior was missing so we have had to make it from scratch not restore.

This is then the issue, when you go to the wood yard and buy a load of of 1", 2" or 3" thick planks of hardwood, at this point you have paid for it but you still need to turn those planks into a finished window frame or repaired door and then is when you need people with the skills. So skills are as important as the money.

 

Maybe it was felt that someone with such apparently crippling shyness and modesty would be too afraid to come out of their shell and tell everyone else how it should be done?

I seem to be alone in being an 'enthusiast' who doesn't mind Mk1s. While I enjoy the experience of proper 'vintage' carriages, nowadays the experience of riding in a Mk1 has enough 'vintageness' for me not to seek sitting over the wheelset of a four wheeler, only to emerge with my spine sticking through the top of my skull and needing a back brace!

 

I love variety in coaching stock but a well turned out Mk 1 is comfy, has big windows and brings back happy childhood memories.

 

No, you're not alone - many others do not mind, myself included, although my preference would be for much older coaches given the opportunity, as well as variety (which is also available within the mk 1 family - on some railways).

The irony is that the older, and generally thoroughly restored, pre-nationalisation carriage, is often in better condition than those mark 1s that I have experienced on many heritage lines. When you come across a lovingly restored (both outside and inside - not just a paint job) mark 1 it is a joy to behold. A restored, un-refurbished example belongs very much to the steam era, and is like taking a step back into history - I love it! I suspect that, as I've already mentioned, as the mark 1's in service wear out and get rebuilt we'll see them fully restored to their "glory".

And what took me by surprise was how much I was impressed by the restored mark 1's AND 2's in blue and grey livery, and the Thumper in NSE livery at the Epping Ongar railway. It also suited the refurbished interiors. I never liked the blue/grey when it was first introduced, yet to see it fresh and clean at the EOR made me reconsider!

It didn't go with the Prairie though!

Steve B

 

I would second that variety vote. My railway has two main (i.e. day to day) rakes of Mark 1 coaches. If I had a magic wand, I'd keep one set exactly as it is, but would swap the other for a rake of either LMS or LNER 1930's/1940's era stock. Why? Not because they'd be better, but because they'd be different!

I'm not making any Mark 1 vs pre Nat stock arguments or anything like that, just saying that I think the public do respond well if there are two trains in services and the carriages (not just the logos) are a different type/colour/era etc

Sent from my HTC Desire 620 using Tapatalk

 

IMHO they are rather too "undismissive"!

PH

 

Harry Potter- the Mk.1's friend!

 

We owe the humble Mk1 a huge amount of recognition for the favour they have done railway preservation. The challenge is for railways with the opportunity to run pre-nationalisation designs to wean themselves off the addiction to Mk1s and see the opportunity that other stock represents

The question then needs to become one of what degree of modernisation - retention tanks? decent locks on GW stock? - may be acceptable to support modern circumstances and user unfamiliarity*.

* - A friend told me last weekend that her student son had been overcarried from Stevenage to London because he couldn't find the controls on an HST door. She seemed surprised to hear that there are still slam door trains in day to day service

 

Ha ha made me laugh, couldn't he have asked an adult ? There was an article about a young women who had bought a hot water bottle and then taken it back to complain that the water in it didn't heat up and they were like. Did you heat the water before you put it in ?

Getting back to coaches, The Marks 1s are okay if well maintained but many of them too are gradually falling apart and will need more and more work if they are to be kept running. A lot of railways for example have done things like just replace doors on them when they are rotten with replacement spare doors, but now there are hardly any spares so they will have to learn how to rebuild a rotten door.
There seems to be a shortage of people who even want to do serious work on coaches.

Pre Mark 1 Vintage coaches, to be honest I prefer them as they are more unusual and I feel they are very much a missing link. Many railways have the restored GWR/LMS/LNER/SR locomotives, stations, signal boxes, goods sheds etc but there are no (or few) big 4 or older carriages to complete the picture and go with them. Any they do have are neglected and rotting in a siding. That is why I decided to do one myself.

We have all seen plenty of WW2 movies with Mark 1s used in them (Dunkirk for example recently with 1980s era interiors) when they weren't even built until the 1950/60s

 

I remember seeing Spike Milligan's "Adolf Hitler- my part in his Downfall" the scene with the troop train was shot on the old open platform at Horsted, using birdcage stock and the 100-seaters, done on a shoestring no doubt, and it looked infinitely more convincing than the Swanage scene for Dunkirk.
What is it with filmmakers and railway scenes? They will spend a fortune on production values and lighting. Hair, fashions, cars, interiors, accessories, etc researched to the n'th degree, and yet when it comes to railway scenes and correct period music, so often it's "any old stuff will do". Don't' get it.

 

I think the film-makers think that certain details can be fudged - or that no-one will spot such continuity / set dressing errors.
I must admit that such an attitude is annoying, especially when a little bit of extra research would soon put them right. (Even worse when they have obviously done a lot of research already !).
Perhaps they think there aren't experts in the target audience ?

Quite often I find myself deliberately looking to see if there are such howlers ... instead of watching the plot !

A case in point, was watching one of the Suchet Poirot TV productions - usually very good at the period appearance - when a modern electronic lift call button was pressed and the lift interior was far too modern ...

 

Thee and me both! I'll just about forgive Ealing Sudios for "Oh! Mr Porter" ..... but only because they're the best shots of a K&ESR 2-4-0T in action, but surely the SL&NCR could've slotted filming into their hectic timetable? ..... and don't even get me started on the lack of RT's and trams on period London sets (plenty of RT's and what's this CGI malarkey good for if you can't see an E1 or Feltham trundling around, eh?).

 

It's far easier and more rewarding with television and films to merely suspend one's disbelief than get all hot under the collar about the perceived slight because of getting railway details wrong.

Back when I lived with my parents, every time a steam locomotive was on the telly, my Dad used to do his pieces about the sound of said locomotive not being synchronised with the movement of the valve gear and/or that the sound was 'obviously the wrong locomotive'. No amount of telling him at the time that he really should get out a bit more (or simply switch it off) had any effect.

As it happened I went on to a career in professional sound and I spent a lot of time wrestling with the practicalities of such scenarios. Again, no amount of telling him - from sheer bloody experience - about the huge challenges of recording pristine location sound of railway locomotives or that, massive as sound effects libraries are, it may simply not be possible to locate a sample of a Schools class travelling at precisely 37.6mph would convince him that it wasn't easily possible to synchronise the exhaust with the valve gear in both sound and picture!

It's telly/film and it isn't real. Don't worry about it!

 

Your Gold Mark 1s are so good that it's be a shame to lose any. That said, it did cross my mind that it might be interesting to restore the mainline heritage coach fund set as an 'everydayer'(BTK 295 excepted) and have it painted rather than varnished teak and allow the JHCF to amass a full train of GER and a full train of M&GN 6/4 wheelers. I'm not doing the work or the paymaster so I am just very grateful for what we get (which is excellent), before anyone thinks I am criticising. would I be right in thinking that the wooden coaches are lighter and therefore the Y14 may be suitable for 5 rather than 4 mk1s? I promise coaches before engines when I win the Euromillions

 

Very possibly because, however big a budget a production may appear to have, it's probably smaller than you think and, in most cases, railway scenes form such a tiny part of the overall narrative that it would be disproportionately expensive to hire the perfect location with the perfect rake of stock, rather than for it to be an area where cost compromises can be made. Priorities have to be made and, I suggest, it's probably worth enduring the ire of a few gricers on their wee railway forum for those couple of minutes of footage, as 99.9% of viewers will never notice the difference.

 

They could have shot the scene at Horsted Keynes for the same budget, and had an authentic train and atmosphere.
The Bluebell even has its own facilitator to enable filming projects to run as seamlessly as possible. Goodness knows, the pictures of battered and bloody Tommies leaning out of Southern Railway compartments are as much a part of the Dunkirk image as the beaches themselves. If any railway or setting was ideal for use on Dunkirk, surely Bluebell was the one?
(Apologies for thread drift!)