The LNER Encyclopedia

I was with my driver one day a bloke called Les Henderson of Kings Cross who has subsequently passed away I heard several years ago anyway back in around 1974/75 Les and myself as his secondman were on a bit of a funny diagram whereby the first part of it was Les driving a Cravens unit from Kings Cross to maybe Hitchin via the Hertford branch anyway just after we left Enfield Chase station Les who was doing the driving turns to me and says "Do you want to drive?." and I said "No thanks" and Les goes "You don't want to drive?" and I said "No it's alright Les thanks."

To be honest the idea of driving a Cravens unit put me right off but if it had been a Brush 2 (class 31) no problem.

G'Day Gents

In early 1971, there was a diagram that had part class 31 part DMU, I remember we ended up at WGC, and stabling the class 31 in the goods yard, and working a Cravens, all stations back to the Cross, first time I ever drove a DMU, the only station I can remember stopping at was Potters Bar.

manna

manna wrote: ↑Sat Aug 29, 2020 10:00 pm G'Day Gents

In early 1971, there was a diagram that had part class 31 part DMU, I remember we ended up at WGC, and stabling the class 31 in the goods yard, and working a Cravens, all stations back to the Cross, first time I ever drove a DMU, the only station I can remember stopping at was Potters Bar.

A slight digression from the topic thread for a moment but your post reminds me of another odd diagram at Kings Cross in 1975 manna when I was a secondman at Kings Cross and being with a driver and we were working a loco hauled passenger train (a Brush type 4) down from Kings Cross to Peterborough during mid Saturday afternoon and on arrival at Peterborough the return working with your driver was him driving a Cravens unit back up road stopping at Huntingdon, St Neots, Sandy, Biggleswade, Hitchin and so on back up to Kings Cross. I definitely remember after arriving at Peterborough the return working back from Peterborough had my driver driving a Cravens unit and leaving Peterborough station after dark I recall and I was in the driving compartment with him.

Back on the Hertford loop in the 1970s as it is still is today it was quite common to see main line diversions on a Sunday when the main line was blocked for Sunday engineering work between Wood Green & Langley Junction via Hatfield although the sight of a Deltic hauling a rake of B.R.Mk2s over Cuffley viaduct or passing through Hertford North station still looked a bit odd?.

Hi Gents well most London Bananas came in from Bristol via the LMR in steam heated vans,sometimes going around the houses to get to London, Stony Stratford/Verney Jct /Bletchley/Bedford etc,Now there was a Banana depot @ Goodmayes yard(GE) still their after the Hump &its J50 long gone maybe Ffyfes?(song went ffyfes bananas are a fine fine meal sung by a West Indian)oh yeah also Liverpool docks, but lots trucked to London by "Bowkers" or "Suttons"...

G'Day Gents

Thanks for that rockingjohn, I did know about the Banana depot at Goodmayes, and had heard that trains from that depot visited the ECML.

manna

Mickey wrote: ↑Sat Aug 29, 2020 2:05 pm I was with my driver one day a bloke called Les Henderson of Kings Cross who has subsequently passed away I heard several years ago anyway back in around 1974/75 Les and myself as his secondman were on a bit of a funny diagram whereby the first part of it was Les driving a Cravens unit from Kings Cross to maybe Hitchin via the Hertford branch anyway just after we left Enfield Chase station Les who was doing the driving turns to me and says "Do you want to drive?." and I said "No thanks" and Les goes "You don't want to drive?" and I said "No it's alright Les thanks."

To be honest the idea of driving a Cravens unit put me right off but if it had been a Brush 2 (class 31) no problem.

Couldn't you have contrived to fail the Cravens and tried to get a Brush 2 to rescue it?