The Flying Scotsman

Here is another fabulous model from Hornby - The Flying Scotsman - shown here in its LNER apple green livery, the model that I have added to my collection and looks stunning in its display case.

The Flying Scotsman began life as No 1472, an A1 Pacific-class locomotive. The Pacific class had a 2-6-2 arrangement of wheels, which enabled it to carry a bigger boiler, making it suitable for long-distance passenger services. Under ownership of the London and North Eastern Railway Company (LNER) it was renumbered the 4472 and christened the Flying Scotsman.

When it broke down and was taken out of regular service it was the ideal candidate for putting on show at the British Empire Exhibition in 1924 and 1925. It was an immediate hit with the public, and its fame was sealed when in 1928 it launched the regular 10am non-stop Flying Scotsman Express Service from King’s Cross, London, to Waverley, Edinburgh.

To cope with the 631km (392-mile) route the locomotive pulled a special eight-wheel tender that carried great quantities of water and coal. Since the crew had to be replaced during the eight-hour journey without stopping, a special corridor was built in the tender to allow the relief crew to pass between the train and the cab.

The Flying Scotsman became even more famous on 30 November 1934, when it travelled at 160.9km/h (100mph) breaking the world speed record.

In January 1947, the Flying Scotsman was converted to the A3 class that incorporated a larger boiler with a higher boiler pressure and, a year later, it was re-designated as the No 60103 under the ownership of British Rail. In 1963, it was sold off and went through several owners before being rescued by the National Railway Museum, York, in May 2004.

The locomotive shown here is in its later A3 configuration, 4-6-2.

The Beautiful 'Great Snipe'

I have just added this superb LNER 4-6-2 'Great Snipe' A4 Class locomotive to my OO/HO gauge collection. I have a mind to install a small layout in my new garden shed when it has been built.

1930s Britain was a place in which luxury, glamour and boundary pushing were all revered and admired, none more so than within the railway industry. There was strong competition between the London Midland & Scottish Railway and the London & North Eastern Railway, both operating main lines on different sides of the country and wanting to dominate the lucrative London to Scotland traffic.

In 1933 Nigel Gresley, Chief Mechanical Engineer of the LNER, visited Germany and saw the high-speed streamlined ‘Flying Hamburger’ which the LNER were considering buying but Gresley decided that these diesel locomotives would not be powerful enough for the anticipated passenger capacity. Following trials of his A3 Pacifics, when locomotive No. 2750 ‘Papyrus’ recorded a new maximum speed of 108 mph (173.8 km/h) and completed the London to Scotland journey in under four hours, the LNER authorised Gresley to begin development of a streamlined version of the A3 designed purely for high-speed passenger services.

The resulting 4-6-2 A4 Class three cylinder locomotive had a boiler pressure of 250 psi, vacuum brakes, a fuel capacity of 8 tons and a water capacity of 5,000 imperial gallons. The locomotive and tender had a combined weight of just over 167 tons and regularly achieved a speed of 90 mph in normal service. The innovative streamlined casing was both elegant and practical as it contributed to a more fuel and water efficient locomotive and incidentally created an updraught to lift smoke away from the driver’s vision, which had been a problem with the earlier A3 locomotives.

Following the commercial success of the Silver Jubilee train, other streamlined services were introduced: the Coronation (London-Edinburgh, July 1937) and the West Riding Limited (Bradford & Leeds-London & return, November 1937) for which more A4s were specially built.

My father served an apprenticeship in the Crewe engine works during the 1930s and helped to build some of these superb locomotives. I long for a return of the days of steam hauled trains, the nostalgia of a young trainspotter who spent hours watching these great locos haul passengers and freight through his home station of Rugby on their way from London to Glasgow and other stops in between.

All we have now are our 'Heritage' lines like the Bluebell and Lavender lines in Sussex where it is still possible to enjoy watching these superb feats of engineering in action. 

And I have a display case at home to house these detailed models to wonder over.....