Low Flying Meteor spotted at Derby

33046 – Merlin (Originally intended to be R J Mitchell)

33063 – R J Mitchell

Meteor? are you sure it’s not named after the Royal Enfield motorcycle? 🙂

Wrongly “copped”

You are absolutely correct Lord Kenley, my spotters book is out of date! It is indeed No 35011 “General Steam Navigation” which you can see at Binbrook. The “Merchant Navies” ten of which survive from the 30 built are slightly larger and heavier than the “Battle of Britain” and “West Country” Pacifics but I would have to see them side by side to tell! All MNs were rebuilt by British Railways and the air smoothed casing removed but many BofBs and WCs (sorry!) were not.

Why not have a blast with trains if there’s a historical link with aviation? Mind you, this is a very tenuous one, I have to admit! Yes, they’re locos (Pacific Class, so I’ve been informed). The aviation link is they’re both at Binbrook, tucked away on the technical site. It would be interesting to know how they arrived and better still, what’s going to happen with them. They might not even be there now as these were taken on the 5th of March last year.

You ought to see some of the classic cars on some of these sites. A compiund full of Moggie Minors and a variety of Austin A-series’ at one location.

they were there a couple of months ago too.

GWR Castle Class locomotives…

5071 Spitfire ,5072 Hurricane , 5073 Blenheim, 5074 Hampden
5075 Wellington , 5076 Gladiator , 5077 Fairey Battle ,5078 Beaufort,
5079 Lysander, 5080 Defiant (Preserved), 5081 Lockheed Hudson,
5082 Swordfish

Don’t forget the new build A1 pacific “Tornado”.
Named after a certain RAF jet… 😀

I think the photo is actually a very similar merchant navy class locomotive called General Steam Navigation. – but I may be wrong!

Sir Keith Park, 257 Squadon and Manston are all owned by Southern Locomotives Ltd. Expect to see the latter two running in the next couple of years – and a fine sight they’ll make too!

Sir Keith Park

Sir Keith Park has been at Sellindge in Kent for at least 3 years and I saw it there only three weeks ago!

Another expensive hobby!

With regard to the photos of the 2 locomotive carcasses at Binbrook, the one on the left is an Ex Midland Railway “Crab” (There’s an RAF aviation link!) 2-6-0 built at Horwich Number 42859. The other is indeed a Bulleid “Battle of Britain” Class “Pacific” (4-6-2) No 34053 “Sir Keith Park” built at Brighton for the then Southern Railway. Neither locomotive is unique but there are very few “Crabs” around. the Bulleid Pacifics did rather better, as previous posts illustrate. Indeed, “Tangmere” actually runs on the main line occasionally. Rather like aircraft, very few locomotives were purchased from service but many were rescued from scrap condition. The original Battle of Britain locomotive nameplates, together with their distinctive oval squadron or station badges, are highly sought after and make many thousands of pounds at auction. Even the replicas are expensive!

btw, I do not know what the latest situation is with these locos but it has cost us over £70K to restore our 2-8-0 (GWR and no name of course) goods locomotive with another £75K to go. So I expect they will stay there (they were moved from Barry Scrapyard in South Wales some years ago to Hull Dairycoats Rail Depot and then to Binbrook) until the owners get rich!

trains and planes (sort of!)

Why not have a blast with trains if there’s a historical link with aviation? Mind you, this is a very tenuous one, I have to admit! Yes, they’re locos (Pacific Class, so I’ve been informed). The aviation link is they’re both at Binbrook, tucked away on the technical site. It would be interesting to know how they arrived and better still, what’s going to happen with them. They might not even be there now as these were taken on the 5th of March last year.

You ought to see some of the classic cars on some of these sites. A compiund full of Moggie Minors and a variety of Austin A-series’ at one location.

please don’t start with trains – it’s bad enough they’ve invaded Discovery Wings!

There are still quite a few Southern Railway “Battle of Britain” class locos around.
“Winston Churchill”
“257 Squadron”
“92 Squadron”
“Manston”
“Sir Keith Park”

33103 Swordfish
33108 Vampire

Not to mention the ‘Battle of Britain’ class steam engines that were built by the old Southern Railway 🙂

Regards,

Dan