Get into train timing the easy way

FURTHER to Don Benn’s interesting piece on train timing (With Full Regulator, issue 276), your readers may be interested to know that the Railway Performance Society has produced a Beginners Guide to Train Timing, which explains in simple terms how to go about timing a train and creating a performance log of a journey.

While many of us now use GPS and other modern technology to help to time the trains, it can be done with just a stopwatch and distance charts.

The guide can be accessed via the society’s website – www.railperf.org.uk – where details of society membership can also be obtained. The society is dedicated to recording and analysing the performance of railways, be it steam, diesel or electric traction.

The society has an archive of over half a million entries, dating back to Rocket and the Rainhill trials, to which members regularly contribute, and a quarterly magazine where performance issues are discussed and analysed. New members are always welcome.

Incidentally, I was on the October 12 trip with Galatea and would endorse the comments made about the run, particularly the ascent of Shap (issue 275). The locomotive and crew did well in the circumstances but the train was overloaded, by probably two coaches, resulting in loss of time on the climb. Frank Price,

secretary, Railway Performance Society