The 'Mince Pie Flyer'

55005 at Shenton, waiting to return to Shackerstone.

My last railway 'turn' in 2011 was driving the single-unit 'Bubble Car' at the Battlefield Line on New Year's Eve. The four return trips from Shackerstone to Shenton with a stop each way at Market Bosworth had been advertised as 'The Mince Pie Flyer'. Every passenger was given a mince pie and a drink, alcoholic for the grown-ups, soft drinks for children. In contrast to my turn two days before on 'Agecroft No. 1' at MOSI, the weather remained dry and the sun was out. It did become a little cold later, but it was a splendid day to finish the year.

The single-unit W55005 has recently been 'outshopped' after fairly major work and it looked splendid. I'd never driven W55005 before but, of course, all the controls across a range of DMU types are similar. I'd been warned that, at start-up, I might need to restart Number 1 Engine a couple of times but, in fact, it fired up first go and ran sweetly for about ninety minutes. Then, on the way back to Shackerstone, that engine quit and refused to restart. I eased back into Shackerstone and Pete and I had another go at re-starting, without success. I decided to run on the remaining engine for the rest of the day so Pete and I isolated the final drive and isolated the engine. I completed the 'Diagram' on time without further incident. The most likely cause of the engine problem was air remaining in the fuel line after an earlier hose replacement, but the sound design of the 'Modernisation' Diesel Multiple Units meant that we didn't need to declare a failure.

I really enjoyed the day!

Jan 'in the chair' before departure from Shackerstone.

More pictures of 'The Mince Pier Flyer' are here.
Pictures showing W55005 in detail are here.

Agecroft at MOSI

A photograph (taken earlier in 2011) showing 'Agecroft No. 1' with the semi-open passenger coaches. Click on picture for full image.

After a very successful visit to the Tanfield Railway, 'Agecroft No. 1' handled the Christmas services at the Museum of Science and Industry (MOSI) in Manchester. This has allowed the 'Planet' replica to be 'shopped' for repairs. I didn't do any of the 'Santa' trains, but I was driver on the 29th December 2011. Laurence was Fireman and Dave was Operating Officer. The weather was pretty foul all day - high winds and heavy rain much of the time - (hence no new photographs). The Guard, Duncan, elected to have the 20-ton piped brake van attached at the rear as offering somewhere to shelter from the worst of the weather. I was surprised at just how many passengers we carried in the day - the semi-open replica 1830 coaches are not ideal in inclement weather. At one stage, there was a torrential hailstorm with the hail coming virtually horizontally. I got quite wet and our passengers can have fared little better. Despite these problems, everybody retained their sense of humour and 'Agecroft No. 1' performed admirably, as expected.