[Piermaster]

Hi All,

Just returned from a badly-needed chill-out weekend in Aberdeen (where I was born). My wife absolutely loves the place and wants us to move up there when I retire.

Well I did get the chance to do some rail photography and grouped this lot into 'Prototype for Everything':

1. Short Terminus roofs are unprototypical:

Here's 2-car unit 158701 at Inverness on an Invergordon service on 08/03/08.

2. Nobody puts a railway coach in a car park:

Mark 2e/f/g coach as restaurant extension of Carriages Hotel at Insch, Aberdeenshire on 08/03/08.

3. Only Edinburgh's Princes Street Gardens is beside a railway:

So is Aberdeen's Union Terrace Gardens! Note disused turntable pit in bottom left and that it is recessed into the gardens 09/03/08.

4. You don't have stand-alone tunnel mouths:

Site of Schoolhill Station, Aberdeen, closed in the 1930s? and immediately north of Union Terrace Gardens 09/03/08.

And finally:
5. West Coast Railways don't operate Class 37s:

37248 at Inverness 08/03/08.

This could be the start of what could possibly the longest thread on any forum!!! I dare you all!!!!

Dave

 

[Martin71]

Love it... now I can justify all my unprototypical work. Great photos.

m

 

[Doug]

My favourite was the prototype for Peco pointwork:

 

[7113]

Lovely Dave

I also noticed that the turntable pit appears to have flooded and has birds swimming in it - now there's an unusual idea for a prototype for everything thread.

I have always been a great believer in having a "prototype for everything" file, unfortunately I currently have no way of posting it here.

By the way, hows the hand?

Regards

 

[Dan Hamblin]

I think this is a rather good example of something a little 'different':

Regards,

Dan

 

[Brian Considine]

Nice link Dan - thanks for posting it.

 

[Jennings]

This was the view out of where i used to work ...

 

[John Webb]

Railway through a garden: Bath, Sydney Gardens
Railway coach in a carpark:
The Sidings, off the A19 just outside York, next to the East Coast main line
Pannel, near Harrogate, used to have coaches forming an extension to a pub/restaurant close to the railway station - or was it the railway station partly converted into a pub?

Sorry, no pictures to go with the above!

Regards,
John Webb

 

[7113]

QUOTE (Jennings @ 11 Mar 2008, 21:16) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>This was the view out of where i used to work ...

I've got to ask the questions, why and where? To me it looks like a scrapyard in the background.

Regards

 

[Richard Johnson]

This has got to be my favourite track photo....

 

[Doug]

Ha, I have some drill bits snapped off and lodged in by baseboards.

 

[Jennings]

QUOTE (BRITHO @ 12 Mar 2008, 13:07) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>I've got to ask the questions, why and where? To me it looks like a scrapyard in the background.

Regards

Its an art studio converted from the redundant 83 stock over in the Shoredtich area of London (About 10 minutes along Great Eastern street near Liverpool Street station). Not sure why tube carriages were picked but its still an oddity either way.

The crane in the background i would gather is something to do with the extension of the East London line which will eventually run just behind this.

 

[7113]

QUOTE (Jennings @ 12 Mar 2008, 17:00) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Its an art studio converted from the redundant 83 stock over in the Shoredtich area of London

Thank you, now at least I can sleep easily tonight.

Regards

 

[Piermaster]

QUOTE (BRITHO @ 11 Mar 2008, 16:53) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Lovely Dave

I also noticed that the turntable pit appears to have flooded and has birds swimming in it - now there's an unusual idea for a prototype for everything thread.

I have always been a great believer in having a "prototype for everything" file, unfortunately I currently have no way of posting it here.

By the way, hows the hand?

Regards

No, the disused turntable pit is not flooded and there are no birds swimming in it! The 'birds' are discarded bags and litter thrown off Union Bridge (the largest single-span granite bridge in the world, built 1803 and 168ft span) and caught in the trees below!

Arm is still painful, but I can now use a knife and fork, but no modelling yet. Got check-up at Ipswich Hospital on 13/03.

Cheers,

Dave

 

[neil_s_wood]

QUOTE (Doug @ 13 Mar 2008, 02:14) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Ha, I have some drill bits snapped off and lodged in by baseboards.
I was just thinking the exact same!

 

[Al]

QUOTE (Doug @ 11 Mar 2008, 11:20) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

UIC loose heel turnout. You don't see them every day.

Jesus, look at the toe opening on it. The switch rail is off the slide baseplates...

 

[dwb]

QUOTE Ha, I have some drill bits snapped off and lodged in by baseboards.

The last time I saw a drill bit that size it when the tyre fitter was showing me why I had suffered a very quick "flat" on my journey home.

David

 

[Lancashire Fusilier]

QUOTE (BRITHO @ 12 Mar 2008, 01:53) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>I also noticed that the turntable pit appears to have flooded and has birds swimming in it - now there's an unusual idea for a prototype for everything thread.

I think that is probably the most appropriate use of the Hornby turntable actually

 

[Piermaster]

During my 32 years London Underground/Metronet Rail career, 12 of them were spent at Upminster Depot and during that time we had 9, 3-car units of 1983 stock stored there as 'unpaid guests' amongst the District Line D78 stock.

There was nothing wrong with the 1983 tube stock, it was a tube gauge development of the D78 stock and were built for the original Jubilee Line, once the extension was under construction, the project team, LUL and Mayor of London chose to break new ground with previously untried features (for London) such as AC traction motors, regenerative braking, platform screen doors and 'moving block' signalling - all these features and more meant that the 1983 stock would be unsuitable for the extension and replaced by 1996 stock.

Deciding what to do with the 63-unit 1983 stock fleet was difficult, thoughts included splitting the Piccadilly Line into two with that lines 1973 stock working Heathrow-Cockfosters and 1983 stock cascaded to operate Acton Town-Rayners Lane-Uxbridge as a separate service; Removing the ex NSE 1992 tube stock from the Waterloo & City Line to supplement the LUL 1992 Central Line stock and re-stock the W&C with 1983 stock; Re-stock East London Line with 1983 stock thus releasing the A60/62 stock for Metropolitan Line service. These and other proposals were considered and rejected whilst the 1983 stock languished in Upminster Depot, South Harrow Sidings, Neasden Depot, Uxbridge Sidings and Northfields Depot.

Once it was decided that this stock should be scrapped after only 14 years existence of which they saw only 10 years service. I was involved in the 'robbing' of the Upminster Depot units to see what D78 compatible equipment could be salvaged for re-use, then it came to disposal - the units whose axle bearings were satisfactory and could be moved were towed away by Jubilee Line Extension Schoma diesel locos top and tailing a 3 or 6 car set at low speed to Neasden Depot, other units were taken by road out of Upminster for scrapping in Rotherham or near Newmarket. One or two of the units at South Harrow Sidings had a arc fault and welded their shoegear to the conductor rails, they were cut up on site.

Dave