Preservation, Western Style

Peter Bamber and Paul Finch from The Western Locomotive Association paid us a second visit in November – this time to present Preservation, Western Style. A member of the Association in the early days had put together a presentation to highlight the work of the preservation team. This has now been resurrected and transferred to digital format. The WLA team are indebted to the late Henry Coates for recording the Westerns in service around the railway system, and then much of the early days of preserving firstly D1062 Western Courier, to be joined soon after by D1013 Western Ranger and last year by D1048 Western Lady. An early cutaway line drawing depicted how the engines fitted into the locomotives, and then through cardan shafts, transferred power to the intermediate hydraulic transmission and traction motors. The show was interspersed with recent images, so we saw Ranger ‘in the air’ earlier this year to allow for the ‘B’ end bogie to be removed for cleaning and restoration. No one knew when the loco had last been lifted, but a date on the intermediate transmission unit gave it away – Swindon 1974! The finale was all three, plus Diesel Traction Group’s D1015 Western Champion basking in the sunshine at Kidderminster during the Severn Valley Autumn Diesel Gala.