With Full Regulator
With LNER A4 class Pacific No. 60009 Union of South Africa having worked its final main line charter for the foreseeable future, Don Benn looks at some of the 4-6-2’s performances – including the recent ‘Cotswold Venturer’ on February 22, a snippet on Sou
Don Benn charts some of the performances of No. 60009 Union of South Africa down the years
I BOOKED on the Railway Touring Company’s (Rtc)‘cotswold Venturer’on February 22 in the hope that I would get a final run on the main line behind John Cameron’s magnificent A4 class Pacific No. 60009 Union of South Africa before its retirement in April.
However, events conspired against me as Network Rail was still trying to complete the remedial works at Eastleigh following the freight train derailment on January 28 – plus a landslide had closed the diversionary route via Romsey near Dean, which would have been used by Cross Country trains.
The National Rail Planner wasn’t keeping up with this and I was given four different journey options over consecutive days until it settled on buses as being the only way north from Southampton Airport Parkway. Not wanting to risk this, I emailed the RTC office and staff kindly transferred my booking to August 22, by which time life would hopefully have returned to normal.
However, all was not lost as the indefatigable ‘Shireman’ and my old friend David Sprackland were both on the train and have kindly sent me details of the performance of‘no. 9’.
Steady running
I have covered the outward journey in some detail and so Shireman takes up the story:“after meeting some familiar fellow enthusiasts on Slough station, we watched the very weathered No. 60009 drift in. Load 11 with nothing on the back but a tail-lamp. Unfortunately Standards were at the front. My carriage was the fourth from the front on the outward, but ninth back on the big climb in the evening. C’est la vie. Like February 16, 2019’s run, Pete Roberts was our driver.
There is nothing in the way of gradients between Slough and Reading on‘god’s Wonderful Railway’, but there is space for some decent fast running. There was a gorgeous sound from up front as No. 60009 got away. After a decent pick up, we passed Burnham at 45mph, the chime whistle drifting on the wind. Well before Maidenhead, 1-in-1320 up, six miles out, we hit 60mph but that was it. There was no high speed running over the next 11 miles, despite a seemingly clear path to Reading.
“In 2019 we ran nonstop through Slough, so there can be no meaningful comparisons. A decent crowd of photographers greeted No. 60009 as we ran into platform 13 a couple of minutes down, the chime whistle sounding. We left two minutes down, with long blasts on the superb chime whistle.
Being way out on platform 13 meant no fun climb to High Level, just a run past new depot‘around the back’. Still, we had a decent restart and we’d reached 50mph five minutes out as we passed milepost 38½. Pete got into No. 60009 and the wonderful three-cylinder snarl echoed around the Thames Valley. Station passes were: Tilehurst 51mph; Pangbourne 61mph; and Goring and Streatley 67mph, the A4 purring along at the head of our train.
With greens all the way, it was fingers crossed for a 75mph run. With eight miles of decent relief track before Didcot Approach, did we get there? Unfortunately not. We passed milepost 46 at 68mph, but then Pete just allowed No. 60009 to run up the 1-in-1320, then 1-in1508 through Cholsey, 67mph, before putting the brake in at milepost 49, four miles from our stop at Didcot Parkway. We rolled into the station to a chorus of chimes close to three minutes down in 23 minutes 11 seconds from Reading, including what turned out to be a signal check around Moreton.
“The run to Swindon was never going to be anything special as we were pathed through the long Wantage
Road-challow loop to allow a GWR Bristol IET (Intercity Express Train) to pass. We left eight minutes early for some reason and didn’t even get to 60mph in the seven miles to the loop. We ran through rather slowly and only hit a max of 59mph to our first water stop in Swindon East Yard. We were four minutes down, but had a 21-minute stop scheduled, more than long enough to leave on time. The best laid plans of .... Word came back that the tanker hadn’t arrived and thoughts of‘i wonder if the driver went to Challow?’circulated; but no. Apparently Swindon’s‘magic Roundabout’did its thing and mesmerised the driver of the water wagon so much so that we finally left 29 minutes late.”
Storming climb to Sapperton Tunnel
Table one shows the detail of the running on the Swindon to Gloucester Yard section. Shireman describes the running with Ray Poole now in charge.“the late departure was actually a good thing as it meant 1L68, the GWR Paddington to Cheltenham Spa service was in the wind, so we’d get a clear road to Kemble, over Sapperton Summit and down to Standish Junction. Once past Swindon Junction, it got noisy and we hit 60mph less than four miles out at milepost 81 on the 1-in-401 down as we crossed Purton Crossing, chime whistle blasting a long warning of an A4 in a hurry. There were lots of photographers enjoying a last but one look at No. 60009.
“It was a lovely section to race on this relaid track. No. 60009 sounded superb on the close to two miles of 1-in-330 up, left at 62mph. A short 1-in-406 down and level bit saw a snarling No. 60009 reach 67mph, a speed held as we shot across Minety Level crossing just before milepost 87. It was truly excellent stuff!
“Speed held on a mile of level track and then we attacked the three miles of 1-in-330 up from milepost 88 to Kemble at 65mph. An A4 in almost full cry must have made a wonderful sight trackside; the snarling sounds were certainly appreciated in coach G. Speed only fell slowly – milepost 89 passed at 62mph and milepost 90 at 61mph. No. 60009 roared through Kemble Tunnel and through the station on the level at 62mph, with long blasts on the chime whistle meeting the approval of the sightseers and photographers. The three-quarters-ofa-mile of 1-in-143 up was dismissed at 63mph. This was going to be fun. We passed milepost 92 on the level at 63mph and over the next half-mile or so of 1-in-400/200 up/level at milepost 93, we hit the mile of 1-in-100 up, the beginning of the short westbound climb to Sapperton Summit at 60mph.
The sound from up front was tremendous, but speed fell to 54mph with a short slip as we passed milepost 94, the start of the mile and a bit on 1-in-94 up to the summit. In the cutting, the snarl of the A4 reverberated off the sides as speed fell quarter by quarter to: milepost 94¼, 49.5mph; 94½, 47.2mph; into the Short Tunnel at 45.8mph, out into the sunshine at 45mph; and into the long tunnel at just under 45mph. The summit is in Long Tunnel, where it didn’t feel as if speed fell much below 45mph, before Ray eased No. 60009 and then braked as we left it on the 1-in-90 down. A noisy climb and a decent summit speed for 11 on!”
The run down to Gloucester Yard and on to Worcester Shrub Hill was unexceptional with a maximum speed of 72mph and an arrival a minute early.
Return from Worcester
For the return run on February 22, I have detailed the section from Gloucester Yard to Kemble and this is shown in table two. Once again Shireman describes this:“we were too far back to hear a lot and there was no real charge on the approach to Stroud over the mile of 1-in-276/620 up, topped at 45mph. Travelling through Stroud at 45mph close to line speed of 50mph and out onto the lower reaches of Sapperton Bank, a bit of a snarl drifted back as No. 60009 attacked the 2½ miles at 1-in-250, crossing Capels Viaduct, just after milepost 102 at 46.
“Ray had No. 60009 really notched up now and plenty of noise drifted back as our speed rose to 51mph at milepost 101. Unlike in 2018 when we were checked to 27mph by a yellow aspect signal caused by over enthusiastic linesiders, we crossed Brinscombe Path
“An A4 in almost full cry must have made a wonderful sight trackside; the snarling sounds were certainly appreciated in coach G.”
on the short level bit at 51½mph. Speed held on the half mile of 1-in-310, and straight after that the grade steepens to half mile plus of 1-in-103. St Mary’s Crossing, the mid-point, was passed at 51.
“Then we had our first slip and concern about the state of the railhead as our speed fell rather rapidly to 43.3mph over the half mile of 1-in-75. A bit of a recovery came across Chalford Viaduct on the steeper half mile of 1-in-70, 37.2mph, then another slip on the mile of 1-in-74 took speed down to 34.2mph. Bit of a worry with the steepest gradients still to come. We crossed Frampton Viaduct on the 1-in-75 at 34mph and hit the close to a mile of 1-in-60 to Sapperton Long Tunnel at 31.3mph, Our speed fell away to 25.4mph at milepost 96, with another slip we struggled into the tunnel at 24.8mph. Very different to the magnificent flat out charge into Sapperton Long Tunnel at 38.2mph in the dry in June of 2018.”
Bob Baines took over from Ray Poole at Didcot and ran No. 60009 up to 73mph before Reading, finally bringing the train into Paddington on time after a great day out for No. 60009. Throughout I have used the times and speeds as submitted by Shireman and David, though these differ slightly as can be the case when using GPS.
Early days with Steam Dreams
In the early days of Steam Dreams they ran trains formed of the‘green set’starting at Alton and encouraged short journey bookings, so on Saturday, October 25, 2003, I made a booking to join the 7.15am Alton to Worcester at Woking for a run to Clapham Junction via Staines. Table three shows the detail of this run made on a bright but very cold Saturday morning. I don’t have a gradient profile for this route other than the start to Byfleet Junction which is 1-in-326/367 down. We left Woking over half an hour late and the start was very cautious as indeed was the running as far as Virginia Water, where the train had lost another 5¼ minutes.
Things then perked up and speed touched 60mph at Feltham Junction, before calling at Richmond and arriving at Clapham Junction 35 minutes late. It’s strange how some railtours stick in the mind, but I can still recall that cold sunny morning. Heritage electric traction back to Woking in the form of 4BEP unit No. 2324, maximum speed 80mph, completed this little jaunt. A few days earlier I had gone to London to photograph No. 60009 on another Steam Dreams excursion, this time the 11am
Waterloo to Yeovil Junction, which had started from Alton at 8.03am.
Moving on exactly 11 years, Saturday, October 25, 2014 saw me on the bleak platforms of Potters Bar awaiting RTC’S 7.08am King’s Cross to Newcastle‘jubilee Requiem’railtour, which had No. 60009 at the head of 12 coaches.
One benefit of timing on the Great Northern main line is that there are full mileposts on the east side, as well as every quarter on the west side – those that are still there of course. In fact, I was seated on the west side facing the front of the train.
Up front were driver Ron Smith and fireman Fraser Birrell, who were to take us as far as York and they got the substantial 475 ton train moving nicely to reach 67½mph after Hatfield and regain over three minutes of a seven-and-a-half minutes late start to the Stevenage stop 19 minutes 42 seconds for the 15.02 miles. After the stop, we ran up to 70mph after Hitchin and then settled down to run easily on the slow line with speed in the 60s along the racing stretch to Huntingdon, passed a minute early and on to the water stop at Holme a minute early in 46 minutes 16 seconds for the 41.17 miles from Stevenage, a gain of nearly three minutes on the schedule.
We then ran slowly to Peterborough, our last pick up point, arriving there a minute early. It was there that word came back from the support crew that John Cameron, the owner of No. 60009, was also on the engine.
Dash down to the Trent valley
Table four shows the running from Peterborough to York which was a mixed bag. The engine appeared to be priming and the climb to Stoke on the slow line was steady to say the least, nearly eight minutes having been lost from the restart. Then followed a lovely dash down to the Trent Valley averaging 75.52mph between mileposts 104 and 122, before our progress was rudely interrupted by a diversion through the Carlton Loop, for reasons unknown.
Recovery to Markham summit saw a reasonable 52½mph at the top of the 1-in-200/330, but the check at Carlton had lost us further time and we made the water stop in the Babworth Loop in 78 minutes 54 seconds for the 62.86 miles from Peterborough, or about 71 minutes net against a schedule of 68 minutes. Further details of‘the Jubilee Requiem’ were in HR196.
Next in this mini tribute to No. 60009 is a run along the Berks and Hants line. Pete Roberts had been charge of the big Gresley on the 11 coach 8.15am Paddington to Minehead‘west Somerset Express’which we joined at Reading on August 18, 2018. Table five has the details of the running from Frome to Taunton which was pure Pete Roberts’s enginemanship. I think Pete is the last ex-nine Elms man still on main line driving duties and I had many runs in the 1960s with him firing, mainly to Jim Robinson from who he learnt his trade. He will only thrash an engine in rare circumstances but will always try to keep time and so it was on this day.
After taking water, we left Frome nearly two minutes early and then made a good climb to Brewham before touching 75mph down to Castle Cary, where we were checked and then ran cautiously for the next few miles. Athelney was passed just inside schedule, but a late running GWR service saw speed reduced to 14mph, before Cogload Junction and a signal checked approach to the Taunton stop, two-and-a-half minutes late in a net time of 45 minutes for the 41.59 miles from Frome against the schedule of 47 minutes. More details of this trip can be found in HR246.
Scottish BR runs
Finally to Scotland in 1965, where I had a number of runs behind No. 60009 on the Aberdeen to Glasgow three-hour trains. Although I started timing seriously in 1962, I didn’t get to the Great Northern main line before the end of steam but instead got my A4 haulage by a number of trips north of the border, my favourite train being the 7.10am Aberdeen to Glasgow which connected off the 7.30pm‘aberdonian’from King’s Cross.
I never had a bad run with the Ferryhill men on the 7.10am and the run in table six was no exception. It was a morning of severe gales and we had been stopped a number of times for telegraph poles and trees down before reaching the Forfar stop, which was left over 11 minutes late. The running on to Perth in 31 minutes 13 seconds for the 32.50 miles was a little below the more normal 30-minute mark, but still pretty decent touching 79mph over the river Tay near Cargill. The 32-minute booking was the last mile a minute schedule for steam in the UK.
Now with the virtual shut down of Great Britain, it looks like No. 60009 Union of South Africa has run its last main line trip before being retired. Many thanks to John Cameron for making his engine available and to the crews who produced so many good runs with this superb reliable locomotive.