Diesel Dawn 2: The Swindon Warships
THE SECOND in the Irwell Press bookazines on modern traction subjects, but the first in collaboration with Mortons, looks at the Swindon-built Class 42 Warships, D800-832 and D866-870. Unlike the first title in this series that rather predictably looked at the Class 55s, this one suffers from not having a card cover so is more ‘zine’ than ‘booka’. As it is a penny under £13, that reduction in quality is disappointing.
The first 25 pages of the text – which is 88-pages, A4 perfect bound – is a historical account of the fleet and then the book continues loco-by-loco, with each having one, two or three pages depending on the material available to the compilers. Having relied on black and white images for the class history, it’s colour images all the way for the loco profiles, all of which have a brief allocation history panel. It’s fair to say there’s not too much to say – or, indeed, much published – about Class 42s that hasn’t already been said, but they remain a fascinating class and this book will win fans. I would urge the publishers of these titles – Volume 3 is on the D600-604 NBL Warships and due soon – to revert to card covers to make them more durable and so more appealing.