A spam can in all it's glory. Bullied light pacific 'Wells' 34092

Some unpublished shots of 'Wells' 34092

 

 

Built in March 1949, No. 34092 was a member of the final batch of 20 West Country Class locomotives ordered. It was based at Stewarts Lane (73A) until it was moved to Salisbury (72B). While at Stewarts Lane, it was named 'Wells' by the mayor of Wells on 25 November 1949 (changed to 'City of Wells', unique amongst the rest of its class which were named only after the town, city or region, in March 1950). No. 34092 was often called upon to haul the Golden Arrow service and was further chosen to haul special trains for the visit of Bulganin and Kruschev, and King Faisal II of Iraq.

 

Having covered 502,864 miles (809,281 km), No. 34092 was sent to Woodham's scrapyard. However, in 1971, it was bought by the KWVR and, after overhaul, was used throughout the 1980s both on the branch and on mainline excursions. A Giesl ejector was fitted in 1985. No. 34092 returned to service in August 2014 following an extensive overhaul.
The loco is also planned to return to traffic on the mainline when funding is available to purchase the equipment needed for use on Network Rail

The Crabb offers a little atmosphere

Some of those moments when we

look for a little atmosphere in our

pictures

 

 

Its always good to try a little artistic licence just

to see if it works.

 

Bury Bolton St station

Pickering Station on the North Yorkshire Moors Railway

Superb services offered at

the Pickering station buffet

 

 

I totally agree with a comment on National preservation

at https://www.national-preservation.com/threads/north-yorkshire-moors-railway-general-discussion.29732/page-30#post-1010956

 

I can usually feel my waste line expanding as I

enjoy the delightful and delectable offerings

 

Of course it's the locomotives that are the main attraction

but ohh the pleasures of the stomach are well served too

 

Go along and enjoy

 

Ramsbottom and BR Standard class 4 80080

 

Designed by Robert Riddles, 80080 was built by British Railways at their Brighton Works and entered revenue earning traffic in March 1954 and was initially allocated to Plaistow m.p.d. (33A). Her work was in a pool of locomotives hauling the daily commuter services into Fenchurch Street – the London terminus of the London Tilbury & Southend line.

 

In 1962 when this line became electrified, she was moved to Croes Newydd (Wrexham) Depot in North Wales from where she operated on rural lines in the North and Central Wales area. She remained there until July 1965 when she was withdrawn from traffic and by January 1966 had been moved to Messrs. Woodham Brothers yard in Barry, South Wales where she awaited being cut up for scrap. The service mileage recorded between 1954 and 1965 is 317,000 with the last three years being estimated.

 

80080 remained in Woodhams Yard for 14 years succumbing to the ravages weather, metal thieves, and later preservationists removing parts. When the locomotive was purchased in Autumn 1980 all non ferrous and motion parts were missing and she was no more than a skeletal hulk. 80080 left Barry Yard on 4th November 1980 and arrived at Matlock, the then headquarters of Peak Rail, two days later.
Restoration to working order took 7 years and was completed in October 1987 at the Midland Railway, Butterley, where the owning group had moved the locomotive in 1983. Passed for main line running she clocked up 37,000 miles up to December 1997 travelling to many parts of the country, all by rail.

My thanks to http://www.prclt.co.uk/New_80080_restoration.htm for the notes above. The pictures as usual are my own.

As always many thanks to our preserved railways in the above http://www.eastlancsrailway.org.uk/

Ramsbottom East Lancashire Railway and 13065 Engines history

 42765 (now 13065) was rescued from the famous Woodham Brothers scrapyard in Barry, South Wales and returned to revenue-earning traffic in August 1993, following restoration. After ten years reliable service on the East Lancashire Railway, the locomotive was withdrawn in 2003 when its boiler certificate expired. Following its extensive overhaul, the locomotive returned to service again in 2014 in its ‘as built’ guise carrying its original number 13065 and painted in the LMS crimson lake livery that it will have carried for the first years of its life.

 

 

You can see what they mean about those cylinders

 

 

 

I think the crimson lake sets her of very nicely indeed

 

Ramsbottom is a very lovely rural east Lancashire

town and well worth a visit

 

Plenty of pubs and eateries.

 

 

As built. Scans from 'CJ Allen, Steel Highway', 1928. LMS Hughes Crab

 

 

The NRM's Crabb at Shildon before being shipped

down to York. Many thanks James E. Petts for the

above picture from Shildon

 

http://www.eastlancsrailway.org.uk/

 

13065 LMS Crab at Bury Bolton St station on the East Lancashire Railway

Fowler tried to have the design altered to use standard Derby components. However the design process and pre-production were sufficiently advanced to prevent the fitting of a smaller Derby pattern boiler, and the cylinders and motion also remained as designed by Hughes. Thank goodness it was so well advanced because the boiler is the heart of the Crab and the large inclined cylinders the muscle

 

 

Three have survived, 13000/(4)2700, 13065/(4)2765 and 13159/2859/42859
The first-built locomotive, 2700 is part of the National Railway Collection and currently on static display at the National Railway Museum in York.
42765 has been restored to working order on the East Lancs Railway and, following a further heavy overhaul, returned to service in 2014 in Crimson Lake Livery numbered 13065.

 

No. 42859 had been stored at RAF Binbrook in a dismantled state since 1995 whilst the owner undertook its restoration.
However, in November 2012, after the driving wheels and tender frame were removed without the owner's permission, an injunction was obtained to prevent any further removal of parts. The driving wheels were later discovered by the police during a raid of a nearby industrial unit in an unrelated operation; the owner of the premises was served with a notice preventing the wheels' removal. In June 2013, it was announced that the matter had been classified as a civil dispute by Lincolnshire Police and will have to be pursued through the courts. The boiler and frames were removed from storage in Binbrook under police supervision and moved to a secret location. Legal proceedings for the return of the wheels and tender frame are underway. The boiler was subsequently cut up in a Nottingham scrapyard having been sold by the owner to pay for the costs of moving it from Binbrook. The owner stated that the boiler was beyond economic repair and that he has retained sufficient parts to allow a replacement to be built. The wheels remain at RAF Binbrook under a court order.

 

One was rebuilt experimentally in 1931 with Lentz rotary cam poppet valves. Valve gear replaced by Reidinger rotary poppet valve gear in 1953.

 

 Weight:
Loco 66 tons 0 cwt Driving Wheel: 5' 6"
Boil Press: 180lb/sq in Su
Cylinders: Valve Gear: Walschaerts (piston valves)
Lentz, then Reidinger (poppet valves)
Two 21" x 26" (outside) TE: 26,580 lb    

 

 

Since our reopening of the line in 1987 we have invested heavily in our infrastructure, coach fleet and more recently our Crab steam locomotive. Now, we are taking the next steps to create a sustainable railway with the launch of three new appeals all aimed to further enhance and secure the preservation of the railway for generations to come. To read about our current projects and fundraising initiatives visit

 

http://www.eastlancsrailway.org.uk/appeals.aspx

       

LMS Crab 13065 shining in the sun at Bury

A few more of that superb engine and for the time

being the only one of it's class in steam. Here at

Bury's Bolton St station earlier this year

 

 

The control platform (the footplate)

 

 

The London Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS) Hughes Crab or Horwich Mogul is a class of mixed traffic 2-6-0 steam locomotive built between 1926 and 1932. They are noted for their appearance with large highly-angled cylinders caused by restricted loading gauge.

 

These locomotives were referred to as "Crabs". Several authors have claimed that this refers to the resemblance to a crab's pincers of the outside cylinders and valve motion. Another suggestion is that the nickname refers to the "scuttling" motion felt on the footplate when the engine is being worked hard, due largely to the inclined cylinders, producing a sensation that it is walking along the track. In some areas they also received the nickname "frothblowers" from their tendency to prime easily when the boiler was overfilled, or the feedwater contaminated.

 

Designed by George Hughes, Chief Mechanical Engineer of the LMS, and built at the ex-L&YR works at Horwich and the ex-LNWR works at Crew, they were put into service by his successor, Henry Fowler. The design incorporated a number of advanced features for the time such as long travel valves, compensated brake gear, a new design of tender and a new boiler, the latter based on the one fitted to Hughes' four-cylinder Baltic tank locomotives built at Horwich.

 

 

My thanks to Wikipedia for some of the above notes.

 

http://www.eastlancsrailway.org.uk/