A Signal Success

The Apedale Valley Light Railway has recently branched out in a new and exciting direction - signalling. Signals on narrow gauge railways are a controversial area - some like them, other see them as one stop away from a pit of Hell. However, nonetheless, the AVLR now has one signal post. Before we start getting strongly-worded e-mails from ORR, perhaps I should clarify that this signal is not actually particularly close to the railway, and is in fact purely cosmetic. The aim is to make the railway more visible to the hoards of punters strolling round the Apedale Community Country Park wondering how they can spend their hard-earned cash on a transport-related entertainment. In a classic piece of railway re-cycling, the signal and its components are on at least their third home. The post is ex-Midland main line, then the Cadeby Light Railway, and now Apedale. The hardware and arm are Great Northern Railway, from Leicester Belgrave Road, and then Cadeby. Yes, we do know that GNR equipment is fairly inappropriate for a site in North Staffordshire, next to a North Staffordshire Railway station building. However, it's a nice, compact signal, and we don't have an NSR signal. So there. The second picture shows the signal at Cadeby, being passed by "Isabel", visiting from Amerton. In a curious non-coincidence, "Isabel" will also be visiting us at Apedale for our "Made in Staffordshire" gala, on the 10&11th of September. Get in touch here with offers of signalling hardware or to point out other historical anomalies on the site.

Industrial Railways

At the Moseley Railway Trust, we are actually quite interested in railways. A well-kept secret I accept, but it cannot be hidden. In particular, we quite like industrial narrow gauge railways. Like most people with a passion for a subject, we are perhaps a little guilty of failing to see the bigger picture. After WW1, these railways became pre-eminent for any site where large amounts of stuff needed to be moved from A to B. This would include civil engineering contracts, for example. What we tend to forget is that when Nuttall or McAlpine or any of the other big civils companies decided to use a railway on a site, they did so because they wanted to move lots of stuff from A to B as quickly and as cheaply as possible. Contrary to popular belief, they didn't use railways because they were fun things, or because the staff liked playing trains, or because it would give people something to preserve in many years time. We have been reminded of this recently at Apedale. One of the current major projects is to provide an inspection pit. To do this, the rails need to be above ground level. There are a number of ways of achieving this. One is to lower the ground. Another is to start from a place where the ground is already low, set the rails at a given height, and then build the ground up to match. In the words of a well-known meerkat, simples. Well, yes, but this needs a lot of stuff moving from A to B. Gosh, that sounds familiar. So, we have been using our industrial narrow gauge equipment to actually do what it was first intended to do. So far, we've only trialled the process, but five skip loads of fill were moved quickly and with relative ease, so it's looking promising. Keep looking in, and we'll update you on how it goes. Get in touch here.

Deutz

The Apedale Valley Light Railway attracts visitors from far and wide to the scenic delights of Newcastle-under-Lyme. It's called "Regenerating the area" and yes, we'd like a cheque from the Government to recognise our efforts at regenerating the area. £500k should be a start - make it payable to "Moseley Railway Trust". Anyway, today we saw a couple visiting us all the way from Cologne. Koln (as it is locally known) has quote a place in narrow gauge legend as the home of the Deutz company. Deutz were, at one time, a profuse builder of locomotives. They were never common in the UK (apparently warranty support was not very good between 1939 and 1945), but exist in large numbers throughout many European countries. The Bord Na Mona peat harvesting operations in the Republic of Ireland used Deutz locos in very large numbers, and many of them still exist over there. The Moseley Railway Trust is fortunate to have one third of the UK population of Deutz locos in the collection. Number 10050 worked in the glamorous surroundings of a sewage works in Dartford before being preserved. It's had some engine problems of late, but should hopefully be back in business before long. This has been achieved with the assistance of our friends at the Golden Valley Light Railway, Butterley. They have a Deutz of their own, number 10248 (the blue loco in the pictures). The third Deutz in the UK is number 19531, which is in the care of the Amerton Railway.

Deutz not only built locos, but also engines which other companies used in locomotives. Three locos at Apedale have Deutz engines - the Simplex 4oSD "Sludge", the tiny "G" class Simplex and also the Ransomes & Rapier loco. The R&R loco seems to have gained this engine at some point in its "interesting" past. So, all in all, there's a lot to thank the Germans of Koln for! As ever get in touch here. We're running steam tomorrow (10/7/11) and then the Simplex No.13 will be in use next Saturday. That assumes its recent electro-mechanical difficulties are finally cured. If only everything in life was as reliable as a Deutz.