Not Under Ground Underground 1

Due to the exigencies (blah blah), the spill chucking of yesterday's blog was a dismal failure. Some early morning readers may have noticed a clutch of ghastly errors. Apologies. Most were corrected by about 0630.

TC Or Not TC - Hamlet?

Although many of us are familiar with the ubiquitous Southern Railway/Region electric network, we should not forget that there was still plenty of steam around as British Railways staggered though their modernisation plan.

Here is a picture of Eastleigh loco shed in 1955 ...

... admittedly when AS:EF were on strike! But it shows show how many steaming tin cans were chuffing around on Southern metals. 

In the early 1960s most of the Kent main lines were electrifed.

fbb remembers a visit to Eastleigh Works and a walk through shiny new trains to take the Men of Kent more comfortably to the work in The City.

In the South Western Division, the main lines to Southampton and Bournemouth was still very much steam hauled until 1967. The Bournemouth Belle was the crack Pullman express which lasted until 7th July 1967.

That was the date when electric trains first ran in service between Waterloo, Southampton and Bournemouth.

They didn't look at all like the Bournemouth Belle, being in a very dull all-over blue!

The whole project was done "on the cheap". Whist the power cars were new-builds, most of the trailer cars were simply existing Mark 1 coaches done up a bit. Later they were painted biue and pale grey.

Even later, thy acquired Network SouthEast livery.

Fast 12 coach rains usually consisted of two four car powered units (classed 4REP, later class 441. Then they became class 420 and, near the end of their lives they ultimately became kown as class 432.

Two fours still make 8, even in the new maths, so we need another four coach unit to complete the train.

This is where the penny pinching short termism of BR came into play. It was deemed too expensive to electrify all the way to Weymouth.

The cunning plan was to create the 4TC (later class 438) four car units. They would be unpowered but have a driving cab at both ends.

At Bournemouth a 4TC was uncoupled from the London train and a class 33 diesel was attached at the Weymouth end.

This loco would haul the 4TC to Wymouth and propel it back to Southampton where it would be re-attached to an eight car London train.

In 1988 the line to Weymouth was, at last, electrified.

Also in 1967 the branch from Brockenhurst to Lymington was electrified plus the line from Portsmouth to Southampton.

In 1990 the short stretch from Eastl;eigh to Fareham was provided with third rail juice allowing a through hourly service to run from Watelloo to Portsmouth via Eastleigh.

The two routes via Fareham had been in the hands of Southern's so-called Thumpers, class 207 diesel electric trains.

Class 442 units were then deployed ...

... later moving to Gatwick Express duties.

In 2007, they were replaced by class 444.

But a few 4REP and 4TC units hung around and were sold for preservation and as test vehicles of various kinds.

Some ended up on London's Underground!

But they were a bit too big for the tube lines!

Bachmann have produced a model of the 4TC unit (Class 438) and very smart it looks ...

... and, for an unpowered four car unit, expensive it is!

More on  Wednesday .

============================

"NOT the Advent Calendar", but ...

     The      

  CHRIST -mas 

  Criss-muss  

   Confusion  

 Critique   9 

700** Years' (very approx) Preparation
.

We can summarise the work of the "influencers" concerning the future descendant of David as follows ...

He would be a Saviour (in Hebrew, "Messiah"; in Latin and Greek "Christ".)

He would dramatically change history.

He would suffer and die.

He would, in some ways, combine the roles of Prophet, Priest and King.

He would be born in Bethlehem.

 

But we have added so much clutter to the events of "year 0". Bethlehem was the traditional birth place of King David but it was never a "City" - it was an insignificant little village about seven miles south west of Jerusalem.

The influencer called Micah explains:-

The Lord says, “Bethlehem Ephrathah, you are one of the smallest towns in Judah, but out of you I will bring a ruler for Israel, whose family line goes back to ancient times.”

"Ephratha" was a tribal area in which Bethlehem was located. Scholars suppose that there was at least one other Bethlehem, so Micah needed to clarify which one would be the base for CHRISTmas number one.

** Micah wrote his sruff about 700 years BSW.

==================

 Next Money blog : Tues 10th December