46235 City of Birmingham

Fit an exhauster and use it to pull heritage stock. Alternsativly preserve a rake of Mk3s. Think positive and you might actually come up with a good idea one day. I can hear the pigs reving up now, sory it was the rest of the forum snoring.

 

That's just it though, will these modern loco fans preserve their own rolling stock or will they want to rely on those provided on the back of Steam Locos and run them on lines ditto?

 

I think Tom's excellent post sums up most of the thinking regarding City of Birmingham. However - and I don't wish to stir the hornet's nest - if not in steam, then is a line up one day a possibility? CoB has never as far as I'm aware been lined up in preservation with any of her LMS Pacific sisters. There's five in preservation I believe (three Duchesses, two princesses?) and one day it would be nice to see if something as magnificent as the sight of the six A4 Pacifics together could be arranged.

Again, not for a while yet and probably unlikely given the status of all the five surviving LMS Pacifics, but wouldn't that be a sight. After all, Dominion of Canada did not need to steam and yet arguably was one of the best exhibits overall.

 

Simon, one problem to overcome is the asbestos problem, as pointed out by Bob Meanley. That wouldn't come cheap, as well as possibly destroying her 'as preserved' status. Having said that, a 'gathering' would indeed be a wonderful thing to see

 

That makes sense - a shame, but preservation and conservation must come first.

 

One thing these people will soon learn is that buying your loco is the easy par. Getting it and/or keeping it running is a much tougher proposition. Your point about rolling stock is a good one. Then there is the matter of train heating. If it's a freight loco, how easy is it to add eth - assuming they've got eth stock available in the first place?

 

The West Coast MK1 set is dual heated and have seen ETH used on the diesel leg

 

not with a class 56/58/60/66/67/70 they didn't Not sure about 67...

 

I simply pointed out ETH stock was available. fitting ETH would not be that dificult alternativly run in summer or adopt use of generator vans, it has been done.

Class 67 are used by Chiltern with Mk3 stock and DVT so have ETH

 

The best time to do that would have been when she was transferred from the old Museum of Science & Industry to ThinkTank back in 2000 (IIRC). Still, we've already seen a 71000/6233/46229/6201/46203 lineup in preservation - I think we may have to be content with that!

 

That would have been the best time to do so, too late now I think.

CoB was installed into the building called Millennium point and then the rest of the building constructed around her, so to get her out would require removing the front off the building, Millennium point managment who run the building are not going to let you do that.

Birmingham city council, although strapped for cash like most local councils, are not going to sell CoB or any other items in the Birmingham museums collection ( and there are many of them ) to anyone.

In the south square in front of ThinkTank there has been built a Science Garden with lots of water features, the pump room for this is right in front of CoB if it were to come out, ThinkTank are not going to let you demolish there new Science Garden to remove their exhibit.

There are two others of this class, one currently in steam, so its not like its the sole survivor of its type.

Some of you seem to think you could just light up a fire, fill it up with water and steam off, read again Bob Meanley's post on this topic;-

As with a number of the other Coronation pacifics, 6235 was in pretty good condition when withdrawn. My late friend Jack Street who was one of the Crewe boiler inspectors always insisted that at its last general repair, it was given the last "Big lizzie" boiler to be fitted with a new firebox, and certainly from a cursory look at it some years ago it is in very good condition. As for getting it out and just steaming it, that would be a pretty foolhardy idea with a loco as big as this. Without taking out at least some tubes there is no telling what corrosion from its service period prior to withdrawl together with the years of storage have done. Then the safety valves would have to be stripped and there are dozens of items that will probably have seized up, to say nothing of internal corrosion and loose scale in superheater elements and steam pipes, which would get down into the valve rings. And then there is the question as to if the valve and piston rings were adequately lubricated during the years it spent going up and down half a turn or so of the wheels in Newhall Street. All that is if you could or would want to get round current legislation. As for the work at Crewe it appears to have been pretty well cosmetic, and don't forget that it spent a fair time after withdrawl in the back of Nuneaton shed before it was called on to Crewe works for the work to be done on it, so it certainly wasn't at Crewe for anything like the 18 months or so between withdrawl and delivery to Birmingham. All in all it would need some quite extensive stripping of various parts, and examination before steaming could even be contemplated if further damage was to be avoided.

I saw CoB very recently and it looked very well cared for, well lit up including lights under the frame so you can see the workings inside the frames and lighting up the wheels on the "platform" side.

I'm sure more people get to see 46235 than most other preserved locos, you can get right up close and examine it and see inside the cab and tender. If it were back in steam it would now be in some engine house with no public access or on some siding under a cover, only to be seen when out on a steam excursion and how many of the general public see it then? only train loonies and rail enthusiasts, as it is it can be seen by anyone - under conservation in a museum.

Just sayin' but probably stirred up a hornets nest.

 

Thank heavens for post #291 Now can we please put this subject to bed ? 46235 will still be stuffed and mounted long after we're all pushing up the daisies !

 

It's a shame, but I agree. The only chance they had to do this was when they moved museums.

Would love to see 6229 back on the mainline though!

 

There are a few air brake Mk2's already in places like Ruddington & Bury, problem is for these you need double the space and maintenance costs for another rake, plus they are useless for 95% of steam services.

Many lines get round the problem of air braked loco and vac stock by having a dual braked loco between them acting as a translator, a class 56 is no more unsuitable for preservation passenger work than a Q6, yes some diesels don't have ETH, but then many preserved lines only have steam heat stock anyway, and very few diesels have working boilers for that, at the Glos Warks, what's usually a a diesel gala morphed into a mixed gala as steam loco's were needed to heat the stock.

 

Fitting a diesel fuelled air heater to a coach (especially an open one) isn't exactly rocket science and can probably be done for about £3K/coach. It can solve a lot of problems. Similar to the Smiths heaters fitted to DMU's but 21st century technology. You can even install kit that will enable you to turn it on/off from anywhere in the world if there's a mobile signal! (And the tank has some fuel in it.)

 

Trouble with all these mainline returns unfortunately is the novelty value, and the fact there's usually another member of the class already out there. Maybe the first few tours do well, but after that it's the the real loco enthusiast that seeks them out. For most of the others buying steam tour tickets it becomes another one of the "also rans" and the majority of customer buying behaviour, i.e. that which pays the bills, returns to focus more on routes, timings, prices etc while the bills of the loco owner, funders keep on coming of course. I have a soft spot for CoB too as remember seeing it as a child in the old BMoSI in Newhall Street and wishing it had further to go like the engines on the SVR. The cold hard spot I have now however realises that' any such dream is of the pipe variety !

 

Not sure that applies in the current market, when a rostered loco for a tour has become unavailable, there is usually barely anything available to replace it, so even if the novelty of Hamilton did wear off quickly, I still think there would be plenty of promoters wishing to use it.

 

Possibly yes, but that's kind of justifying a negative out of a positive, a negative that shouldn't be there in the first place if that makes sense ? Two negatives in fact, a) a locomotive being restored to main line running for which there isn't a sufficient market, and b) covering up for the unavailability of other locomotives which was never intended. Think I've explained myself but if not please feel free to throw it right back at me, : )

 

I see what your saying, I just mean I doubt a 75MPH rated class 8 would be terribly short of work, looks how much 70013 is used when not at Loughborough and that's only a class 7.

 

Well possibly, but unfortunately that potential for a lot of work also depends on a lot of "known unknowns" and "unknown unknowns" to quote a certain former US Secretary of State. In any event, I wouldn't have thought there was enough work, known, or unknown to support the rebuild of 46235 to main line running at the moment.