The LNER Encyclopedia

Hi all,

I’m trying to find information on the class 31 british rail D5509 diesel.

I have the DJH kit in O gauge and I want to do it as this one as I used to have this in N gauge.

Letters and numbers I can get from Fox decals along with the early crest, I believe it was the early one ?

But under the numbers on the cab is a plate, but I can’t find out what was on the plate.

It's the Brush Traction builders plate.

Thank you 60526, would this be the same on all these or would it have a different No

Believe I found what I needed.

https://www.brdatabase.info/locoqry.php ... &loco=5509

Plate No 675
Year 1958

And small plate underneath

30
A

Yes, the 30A plate is for the shed where the loco was allocated = Stratford.

Technically D5509 was a class 31/0, because it had a different control system to the main class 31s. This was electro-pneumatic and the main external differences were the red circles just above the buffers, instead of the blue stars carried by the majority of the class.

Hi strang steel,

Thank you for the information

strang steel wrote: ↑Wed Oct 25, 2023 8:44 pm Technically D5509 was a class 31/0, because it had a different control system to the main class 31s...

Except when it was a Brush type 2, then a 30/0, in the period from original construction in 1958 until re-engined in late 1968, which saw it reclassified as 31/1.

Actually, I have got my undergarments in a twist with my previous post. The 31/0s had electro-magnetic control. Red circle.

It was the 31/1s which had electro-pneumatic control. Blue star.

I'm still pretty certain D5509 was a 31/0, as were all the original 20 Pilot Scheme locomotives. Ok, 30/0 until re-engined; but if we are going down the pedantic route they were originally D12/2.

The red circle locos were early withdrawals as non-standard, and they could not work in multiple with blue star locos.

Personally I always preferred the old Brush type 2s with the four character headcode boxes at either ends of the loco that were built into the locos roof cos somehow the non-headcode box type 2s didn't look quite as appealing to me and I was glad that none of them were usually seen on the GN in the late 1960s and 1970s although having said that sometimes back in 1970-71 going to Liverpool Street on the GE from Kings Cross for a 'change of scenery' it was a bit refreshing to see one or two 'toffee apples' for a change ha ha

Mickey wrote: ↑Fri Oct 27, 2023 10:30 am Personally I always preferred the old Brush type 2s with the four character headcode boxes at either ends of the loco that were built into the locos roof cos somehow the non-headcode box type 2s didn't look quite as appealing to me and I was glad that none of them were usually seen on the GN in the late 1960s and 1970s although having said that sometimes back in 1970-71 going to Liverpool Street on the GE from Kings Cross for a 'change of scenery' it was a bit refreshing to see one or two 'toffee apples' for a change ha ha

The 'toffee apple' was derived from the shape of the drivers control lever; there was no direct relationship with the absence of the headcode boxes - aka 'skinheads' - but a high probability that both would be applicable on the same pilot scheme locomotives.

I don't think any of the original Pilot Scheme locomotives were built with headcode boxes. They came a few years later, and some early classes were retrofitted with them in the 1960s. A few individual locomotives had a box at one end and discs at the other, after accident damage.

The construction of Brush 2s was reasonably advanced by the time headcode boxes were made standard, and so another twenty or so of the 31/1s were delivered with discs, which many of them kept until withdrawal - although don't ask me to list them because that kind of pastime is a nightmare.

The highest numbered individual I have a photograph of is D5559, seen here passing Stratford circa 1961.

65447 wrote: ↑Fri Oct 27, 2023 3:05 pm

Mickey wrote: ↑Fri Oct 27, 2023 10:30 am Personally I always preferred the old Brush type 2s with the four character headcode boxes at either ends of the loco that were built into the locos roof cos somehow the non-headcode box type 2s didn't look quite as appealing to me and I was glad that none of them were usually seen on the GN in the late 1960s and 1970s although having said that sometimes back in 1970-71 going to Liverpool Street on the GE from Kings Cross for a 'change of scenery' it was a bit refreshing to see one or two 'toffee apples' for a change ha ha

The 'toffee apple' was derived from the shape of the drivers control lever; there was no direct relationship with the absence of the headcode boxes - aka 'skinheads' - but a high probability that both would be applicable on the same pilot scheme locomotives.

Yeah, some of us spotters on the GN just referred to the non-headcode box type 2s as 'toffee apples' regardless and I only remember seeing them at Liverpool Street around 1970-71. At the end of the same decade I was a secondman at Stratford loco during 1979 and a few blue livered non-headcode box type 2s were still at Stratford at that time which I rode on on a couple of occasions at that time on a few of the Stratford freight diagrams from Temple Mills and the 'toffee apple' controller a 'brown coloured' ball shaped thing on a metal stick (hence the name toffee apple) that was 'slotted' into the drivers desk of which there was only one 'toffee apple controller' in each loco and for it to be used in the other cab of the loco it had to be 'disengaged' from the drivers desk in the driving cab and taken to the other rear cab and slotted into the drivers desk in that cab to be used. Compared to the more familiar 'normal' looking controllers worked by a metal bar type controller built into the drivers desk like in the vast number of other class 31s the 'toffee apple' controller looked a strange looking thing.

Also a secondman had to mess about with the front 'discs' to show the class of train or light engine on those 'toffee apples' as opposed to just 'putting the headcode up' in the headcode box.

This publication from Strathwood in their Diesel Dawn series is most informative and recommended: https://strathwood.co.uk/products/diese ... -june-2022

Always liked the old Brush type 2s they were easy to drive and easy to operate the Spanner boiler to produce the steam to heat the B.R. Mk.1 carriages hooked on behind the loco. The Clayton & Stones boilers found on the other diesel classes were harder to operate (I found anyway) unless you was a secondman in the higher secondman links such as no.3 the Doncaster link, no.2 the York & Leeds link & no.1 the Newcastle lodge link and were use to always being on either Brush type 4s, EE type 4s & class 46 'peaks' during the winter time at Kings Cross.

strang steel wrote: ↑Thu Oct 26, 2023 6:59 pm ...I'm still pretty certain D5509 was a 31/0, as were all the original 20 Pilot Scheme locomotives. Ok, 30/0 until re-engined; but if we are going down the pedantic route they were originally D12/2...

Just a kid at the time, no idea of all this earlier Dxx/x classification: 'Design origin type x', and often a nickname, was all we knew. Learn something new every day.