KX train diagrams in the 1970s.

[Mickey]

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[strang steel]

That is right Micky, because I used to catch the first train from Grantham in the early 1970s and if I remember correctly, it reached Kings Cross around half nine. This didnt bother me because I was working shifts at the time, so I tended to start with an afternoon shift and this gave me plenty of time to get myself sorted out, have a quick lunch and catch a bus to work.

By 1975, though, I had bought myself a car and the occasional rail trip home to see my parents came to an end. That 31 hauled train would have been a bit early for me anyway; I used to pray for a Deltic on the one I caught, but it was probably a Cleethorpes service and therefore was invariably an Immingham Brush 4.

[Mickey]

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[Hermit 109]

Hi Strang Steel, I expect the train you used to catch from Grantham was 1B04 (later 1A01) which was the 07.25 from Lincoln St Marks calling at Newark, Grantham, Peterborough, Huntingdon and King's Cross due 09.52.
It was a King's Cross No 3 link turn (179 duty) and formed the back working off the 02.00 Newspapers to Grantham arr 04.40, then pick up a train of empty stock and work 05.40 4D02 to Lincoln, run round and work 07.25 back.
We used to have a quick break in the driver's mess room on the up platform at Grantham before leaving with the empties to Lincoln, but we were not made to feel very welcome, the Grantham men naturally thought the work should have been theirs as London men had never traditionally worked through to Lincoln. At the time Grantham had lost much of their main line work and the depot was sadly in decline.

[Hermit 109]

Here's a picture of D1506 waiting for departure at Lincoln St Marks c 1968/69. Still in two tone green with a 34G shed plate under the indicator panel. Sometimes the motive power would be a class 31 but a 47 was the norm.

[Mickey]

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[John C]

Hi Micky,

As you'll have gathered from other postings, I spent the first 8 years of my railway career at Watford LM. Strangely, the Cl 47's were a rareity in the London area of that region (certainly on Western Division lines); Yes we saw Stratford ones on Freightliners, but LM based ones were, like I say, unusual. I guess it was places like Crewe and the Birmingham area's that had them.

Oddly they weren't known as 1500's or 47's, but as Four and a half's presumably on account of them being more powerful than a class 40 (type 4), but not as much as a Deltic (type 5), though apart from the prototype, those machines were otherwise almost unkown to LM men.

Interesting what you learn isn't it?

John C.

[Mickey]

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[Andy W]

The 18XX series were not that common on the GN main line because most were slow speed fitted for MGR workings and of the remainder (1837-74), all but 1862-74 were allocated to the LMR.

1862-74 were originally Tinsley based but moved around in the mid to late sixties before settling at Immingham by the beginning of 1970. 1865-8/71-4 were allocated to Clarence Yard for brief periods between 1966 and 1969 and that is when I first saw this batch regularly on the GN.

I don't think any of 1862-74 survive today.

p.s. lovely picture of 1506 at Lincoln.

[Hermit 109]

Hello Micky, D1506 was one of the very first batch of what were to become class 47's, I believe there were 21 locos in that batch and they differed technically with all the rest of the class 47's. They were painted in two tone green rather like the original Deltic livery but not quite the same and I always thought they were a little livelier than the rest of the class that followed. They originally were vacuum brake only as that was the standard at the time and they had Spanner Boilers.
If they were substituted for a Deltic on the 8 coach fast business trains to Leeds or Newcastle, they could just about maintain sectional timings provided there were no P W S, in which case any time lost couldn't be recovered.
On the subject of the Deltics, the original build again was vacuum only, with just a single engine room door and no bulkhead & curtain to reduce the noise in the cab environment. The double engine room doors and bulkhead were added at a later date. One of the Scottish Regiment Deltics carried a Regimental Plaque mounted in a glass case in one cab in the centre of the windscreen, but that disappeared when the space was occupied by the electric train heat controls, I can't remember which loco it was though.

[Mickey]

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[strang steel]

Yes, I remember as a 60s spotter getting thoroughly fed up of D1500 to D1530 or thereabouts, because with the Deltics they took over most of the southern ECML services and we had soon seen them all, with the exception of D1515 in my case (I spent years at Grantham, Barkston, Essendine and Peterborough trying to see that loco without success, only to watch open mouthed as it sauntered past my parents back garden one summers day in 1971 on Skegness excursion train).

However, in the late 60s a lot of the batches D1970 to D1999 and D1100 to D1111 started appearing which made things a little less predictable.

I remember my first visit to the WR and seeing lots of the D1600 ones, and they filled some of the yawning gaps in my ABC. Sadly, I never saw them all as I missed the early casualties D1671, D1734 and D1908.

[Mickey]

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[Hermit 109]

Here's one for you Micky, another diverse King's Cross duty, but this one includes a signal box, on which I'm sure you will have some comments to make

[Mickey]

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