TOPs number etc ex British India Line thread.

Open to correction but I suspect it depends on whether all the latest requirements are provided or whether derogation are necessary.

 

No difference according to NR! Be the same as the 20's being used to haul the sandite trains in a few weeks time. Yet 60163 is classed somewhat differently! I'd love to know what would happen though, if there was a repeat of the salt train spilling it's load on the WCML in early 1997 and shorting out the track circuits and Railtrack quickly managed to gauge and scramble 48151 with a steam lance to sort it out. (At the time they needed 12 weeks notice for a light engine movement) Very hypothetical but if something similar happened and 48151 was available but it had ran it's annual allowance would NR be prepared to do the same again?

 

I'm not completely sure of the rules myself , but I think there is some sort of way of getting round things hence companies like DRS, WC , ROG, and HNRC being able to use 20's 37's and 47's without any limit on there mileage, same as serco being allowed to use 73's on the beds, they're pretty much new loco's but because they're still classed as 73's it makes the paperwork a little bit easier. Am I making sense?

 

Seems bonkers when it operated on the BR network under a TOPS number, which is currently vacant, to later give it a different... TOPS number. One of those classic 'you couldn't make it up' British idiosyncrasies where bureaucracy is king.

"Nah mate. That's how we do it now. Why? Because we do. More than my job's worth to question it."

 

Yes, that's a good summary. Often known as "grandfather rights". (It was how mainline steam was organised up to the early 1990's.)

Cheers, Neil

 

Some evolution certainly but "grandfather rights" are still pertinent - the EU standards were
carefully framed to accommodate riveted boilers.