Swanage Railway General Discussion

2024 Timetable out.
Green time table is base steam 6 trips with 4 additional Corfe based Diesel (DMU?) service.
Yellow timetable is base steam 6 trips with 5 additional Swanage based Diesel services.

The main big thing here is... Equal services during the entire summer 6 months is restored.
Compared to historic pre covid yellow timetable (obv was 2 steam) but first service from Norden is 10.30 not 10am plus last service is 5.10 instead of 6 and exta night DMU. Isn't 5pm last train missing out on all those familys that want dinner? One extra steam around 6.30 surly could hoover up all those people.

2024 Price increase- Round trip is now £20 instead of was it £18/19 in 2023?
Annual ticket 50% rise from £100 to £150

 

Announcement is now under 2 hours away… what are we thinking?

 

Either a certain event announcement for June (Bulleids) or a guest loco for that or the Victorian Weekend

 

Either would be fantastic. Southern locomotives still arnt too sure if SKP will be ready for June but they are hoping so.

 

The bulleid Brake 4365 is not actually on site at the moment, but in dry storage pending future work.

The CK 5761 is at Corfe whilst the heritage coach group work on it.

Both Maunsells are in regular service and both were used during the Winter Warm up.

 

The two Maunsell coaches are in very regular use. The two Bulleids need additional work doing before they can return to service. 5761 is currently being worked on with the aim of being back in service this summer I believe. 4365 will then return from Margate to get the attention it needs.

Then at some point 4366 will return from its structural overhaul at Rampart, ready for the interior work to be done at Swanage.

After that I believe the plan is to turn attention to the Maunsell push pull set.

Just need to get that carriage shed built now, so more time can be put into restoring additional coaches, rather than so much maintenance work on the existing ones.

 

So plan A) is to get the 3 coach bullied set running right? Then a two car push pull manusell working with the M7 ?? Leaving the two Manunsell to beef up any stock as needed.

So won't be long at all until we can run a full length heritage set. Leaving the mark 1s for ......... other services etc

Any news with the carriage shed from anyone within the railway?

 

SECR 01 Class Number 65 running as a guests for the Victorian Weekend 'running along with our home fleet'. Wonder if that means only two Victorian lcoos . 5 steam in total which is respectable

 

given the railways current financial situation no 65 will be great to see and ride behind in march please dont double head them though

 

I think you mean 4 in total so far,the T3,34028,31806 and No 65 visiting.Manston isnt coming home until May.No 65 will look superb on the branch.

 

with regard to the push pull set the railway would only need to restore the driving trailer as they allready 2 operational Maunsells

 

Plus the small matter of the equipment on the loco, defining operational practices, through air pipes on the non driving coaches etc …

Tom

 

Indeed I believe that is the plan. To restore the driving trailer and (at least initially) use it with one of the already restored Maunsell TOs.

 

I am trying very hard not to comment on the common eroneous spelling of the great man's name. As it is one of two words (amongst others I am sure), that I almost always spell wrong at the first typing attempt - the other being raiwlays.

I know what the correct spelling is, it's just that keyboards are not set up to be typed on with talons.

 

But apart from that, what have the Romans ever done for us?

 

1980 surely.

 

Was just making the point that contrary to what was stated above, you can't just put any old carriage in the middle of a push pull set - on the SR system, the controls work on compressed air, so the minimum requirement is that any centre carriage is also suitably adapted.

I think it is probably more practical to get to a "poor man's motor train" as follows: restore the driving carriage with a brake controller in the driving compartment, and fit an air horn that can be operated from there. Then come up with an agreed operating method that would probably involve having a driver and fireman on the footplate; and a second driver (or guard) in the driving compartment when propelling, who was responsible for stopping the train (and sounding the horn at appropriate points). The crew on the footplate would be responsible for driving the train, except that stopping would be the responsibility of the front driver when propelling.

That would give you about 95% of the visual effect and to all intents and purposes would give passengers the appearance of being on a motor train, but without needing to solve the significantly complicated problem which is the design and certification of the control equipment and adaptation of the loco and trailer carriage.

Tom

 

Despite the tone, I'm with you on this one. Theres a not insignificant amount of Blue Sky Thinking going on with the Push Pull set. I wouldn't be surprised if its sidelined for the medium term.

 

I think the plan with the push pull set is initially just to get the coaches restored and operational in conventional mode. Then they can be paired with the M7 to visually recreate a typical Swanage branch set of the 1960s (even if only with the loco pulling rather than pushing).

The restored coaches will also used with other coaches on normal Swanage service trains.

Any plans to use them in actual push pull mode would then come later in practicable.

 

There's plenty of photos of those sets being used in normal hauled mode anyway, with all sorts of locos - Terriers on Hayling, Q1s, 33s etc