The Rail Enthusiast thread

[Cathryn]

It will be a fine-looking beast. They are about the same size and power as a Castle, but with only two cylinders. I imagine they are rather hard on the track.

I shall ask The Fat Controller!

 

[Jameshow]

If anyone is feeling nostalgic for the Pacers, I recommend a trip on a local stopping train on a non-electrified line in Hungary, where you may be treated to a class 117 4-wheeled railcar, with or without a pair of 4 wheeled trailer carriages behind it. They rock and they roll like the BR Pacers, and date from the same period, which shows that similar pressures and solutions were being sought on both sides of the iron curtain. They were known as BzMOT until reclassified as 117, and versions can be found in other ex-Eastern Bloc countries such as Slovakia and Poland.
View attachment 687691

View attachment 687692

view from the end of the trailer
View attachment 687693

a Slovakian example
View attachment 687694

Do they screech round bends like the Pacers due to not having boggies??

 

[robjh]

Just realised that if you sit in the very front seats in a German ICE, you can see the driver's cab

and front view through an opaque screen (+ your own reflection)

 

[rogerzilla]

We booked a holiday in Zell am See again this year then found the Pinzgauer Lokalbahn to the Krimml waterfalls, which we keep meaning to do, was cut in half by flood damage (in 2021, as far as I can tell) with a rail replacement bus from Mittersill to Krimml. Network Rail fix stuff a LOT quicker than that.

 

[Richard A Thackeray]

Last night I watched the Channel 5 programme 'Britains Most Luxurious Train Journeys'
It was the Midland Pullman episode, with the HSTs finished in that gorgeous colour scheme

https://www.channel4.com/programmes/britains-most-luxurious-train-journeys/on-demand/73122-003

https://www.midlandpullman.com


Even the crockery celebrates the original Manchester - St Pancras route

 

[Andy in Germany]

Just realised that if you sit in the very front seats in a German ICE, you can see the driver's cab

View attachment 688240 and front view through an opaque screen (+ your own reflection)

Apparently the opacity can be changed with a button on the drivers console.

 

[Richard A Thackeray]

Thursday 4th
I was riding home slightly earlier this afternoon, & had ridden through the Woods
On reaching the railway bridge, circa 14:35, that carries NewLands Lane, by sheer coincidence I could here a train approaching
It got there just as I got onto the bridge deck

It was 2 HST power-cars coupled to each other

This is something that I've seen photographs of, but not physically seen before!
Apologies, no photograph, there wasn't any time to stop, let alone fish the iPhone out of a pocket!

It was travelling north-east, from Wakefield KirkGate towards Normanton
https://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/3675566

 

[BrumJim]

Apparently the opacity can be changed with a button on the drivers console.

Or if the emergency brake is applied. I can't think of anything more scary than feeling the brakes apply quite hard, and then looking up and seeing the screen turning opaque.

 

[Mike_P]

After 35 years in these parts a work related visit today unexpectedly took me up the far reaches of Nidderdale and the Yorkshire Water road along the route of the contactors extension of the Nidd Valley Light Railway; albeit the contactors line was the original but only of 3ft gauge. Widened to standard gauge and then the oddest passing loop was provided with a sharply curved line that the road follows curving around an outcrop that the line tunnelled through. Up hill trains to the reservoir construction sites taking the tunnel and the downhill trains assisted by gravity around the tight curve which certainly awakens the journey in a car. Today the tunnel is the main evidence of the railway, the uphill end is hidden in a tree filled cutting but the downhill end is prominent

 

[Andy in Germany]

Or if the emergency brake is applied. I can't think of anything more scary than feeling the brakes apply quite hard, and then looking up and seeing the screen turning opaque.

Probably better than what may be visible on the windscreen.

 

[Richard A Thackeray]

@Mike_P
That's the Scarr House Reservoir 'line', isn't it?

 

[BrumJim]

Probably better than what may be visible on the windscreen.

Depends on how vivid your imagination is.

 

[Mike_P]

@Mike_P
That's the Scarr House Reservoir 'line', isn't it?

Yes. The line was originally built for the building of Angram reservoir which was completed in 1915 and then cut back to site for Scarr House Reservoir, completed in 1936. The Nidd Valley closed the following year, a public passenger service having operated between Pateley Bridge and Lofthouse from where the contractors railway commenced.

 

[Mad Doug Biker]

I shall ask The Fat Controller!

I am not sure @Rocky would know, to be fair.

Just realised that if you sit in the very front seats in a German ICE, you can see the driver's cab

View attachment 688240 and front view through an opaque screen (+ your own reflection)

I think it is only the ICE3 and any later types.

Thursday 4th
I was riding home slightly earlier this afternoon, & had ridden through the Woods
On reaching the railway bridge, circa 14:35, that carries NewLands Lane, by sheer coincidence I could here a train approaching
It got there just as I got onto the bridge deck

It was 2 HST power-cars coupled to each other

This is something that I've seen photographs of, but not physically seen before!
Apologies, no photograph, there wasn't any time to stop, let alone fish the iPhone out of a pocket!

It was travelling north-east, from Wakefield KirkGate towards Normanton
https://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/3675566

Were they the 'Rail Adventure' ones?

 

[Richard A Thackeray]

Were they the 'Rail Adventure' ones?

I have no idea, sorry