Ugh!

"MartinS" wrote

Not so in the UK, where double-heading of diesels is not unheard of but, with the exception of the class 20s, pretty uncommon.

Wrenn & Lima both produced unpowered versions of their class 20s, and they were dreadful sellers, although sought after these days because of their relative rarity.

Hornby tried twin packs of powered/unpowered 37s & 58s which were not at all popular, and I think we've still got odd ones in stock after years.

John.

Something I always wondered is, what is the oldest piece of RTR stock that you have had since it was first released and is still unsold in your shop?

Fred X

"Fred X" wrote

Not a clue, but generally as prices increase the older pieces of stock have a tendency to be more saleable. because of their lower price.

I did sell something at the weekend (can't remember what it was) that we'd had in stock since 1991.

John.

You should do what Hattons do and put the price up as it becomes more scarce! :)

Fred X

"Fred X" wrote

Some of it we're just glad to be shut of. Obviously the more desirable items get the Hattons' treatment.

John.

Yet Hatton's often cuts prices on new stock.

"MartinS" wrote

Yes, so do we.

John.

Yes, but in Britain it is virtually unknown for more than 2 locos to be on one train. Yes, I do know about the triple class 37s in South Wales.

In North America, if you had 6 locos on a train on a model, having 2 powered & 4 dummies might prevent a power supply from being overloaded.

Kevin Martin

Or might not, since the two powered locos will just work harder and draw more current.

Using six powered locos might prevent a loco motor from being burned out or ageing prematurely.

It depends how the efficiency of the motors varies with loading for a given speed.

I.e., is

(power usefully consumed plus wastage at the higher power)x2

more or less than

(power usefully consumed plus wastage at lower power)x6 ?

My brain hurts.

MBQ

That depends very much on area. I would guess that today it's quite rare, but in the early 80's pairs of 37's were "normal" on Westbury stone trains, mostly the Acton and Merehead trips, and 31's often worked in multiple on Engineers specials. 33's in multiple were common on the SR (the western end anyway). Engines working in tandem, or in multiple with mixed classes, would be rare - the reason being, apart from needing two drivers in the former case, that 2 engines of the same class in multiple were/are rated an 1.5 times the load of one, and engines in tandem are only rated at 1.333 times. Usually, rather than running in multiple for so little gain, special authority would be granted for a single engine to run "overloaded", which normally just meant slow.

And, of course, the Crewe - Glasgow passengers were often double-headed by pairs of 50's right up until electrification. "Crack" expresses, such as the 10.10 "Royal Scot" were always double-headed (well, until BR took over maintainence from EE, when having an engine at all become something of a novelty!).

I've no idea about steam, but probably something similar I should think.

Cheers Richard

Ooops, that should be tandem of course. Cheers Richard

I don't have any problems running an all-powered A-B-B-A lashup of F units on my layout, since my controller can supply 5 amps, and according to my RRampMeter this lot takes less than 2 amps.

I've got a lovely picture somewhere of a Milwaukee Road train with at least 8 F units on the point. I'd love to model that, but I haven't got any CMStP&P F units, nor have I got 8 F units.

beamends wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@bt.com:

Didn't the Scottish region prefer to run pairs of 25s on heavier trains due to better acceleration from having more traction motors (and thus higher current available overall for acceleration) over a larger engine.

(Please feel free to correct if my technical knowledge isn't quite right)

There also seem to be plenty of photographs in books with multiple lash ups including diesel with steam. Whilst these would no doubt have been photogrpahed for their rarity, it still shows that it did occasionally happen.

Then of course there's the photograph in one of the railcar books (I think) of a Black 5 pulling a DMU...

Freight trains through the Canadian Rockies can have 5 locos on point, and 3 radio-controlled units at mid-point. Union Pacific operates up to

10 locos on a train over steep gradients. He's a photo of a 5 loco consist on a double-stack container train.

Here's some spectacular photos of multiple-heading on CPR through the Rockies in the days of steam. Locos up to 2-10-4 Selkirks.

I particularly like this one

It's perfectly possible, the Movement Supervisor had pretty much a free reign as to which engines to use - within reason. The figures I gave were/ are for the general case from the Rule Book and such things could always be over-ridden subject to "authority" being granted.

There were certainly cases of mixed steam/diesel being used, with the proviso that it often occurred to provide brake or steam heating, or after a failure, at least according to photo captions. I'm not at all steamy, so I can only go by what I read on that!

Cheers Richard

beamends wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@bt.com:

Some of the captions also refer to crew training.

Michael.

From steam days, here's the real biggies - Union Pacific 2-8-8-2s with ginormous low-pressure cylinders, 4-6-6-4 Challengers, 4-8-8-4 Big Boys and even a 4-12-2, the largest non-articulated loco built in the US.

Not quite right. The main problem was that lots of locos were available, but not higher powered ones, i.e. 2000hp plus, especially 47s. So the Scottish Region in particular had to make do with 2 smaller locos. They eventually had all the Class 26s & 27s transferred there instead of a mixture including 24s & 25s.

Usually the diesel was coupled as the leading loco, because the diesel didn't fare well on a diet of air contaminated by coal smoke.

Or a failed DMU on Lickey Incline being hauled by a Class 31 & banked by

2 Class 37s.

Kevin Martin

ps Are you warm enough Melbournian? I'm melting in Mooroolbark. For those that don't know, it reached 44 degrees C & more expected.