Junior's efforts Part II

I just came across a small pile of digital files (if digital can be stacked) from Junior's rail travels about a decade ago.  Damn child always had a better eye for things - and a better camera - so these are a standard above the usual shown on this blog.   

First up a couple of West Ryde visitors.  Silverton's 442s6 leads 4872 and 442s3 on 1441 up containers at West Ryde on 23 January 2006.

A bit later on on the same day the pleasing combination of JL404, 4472, 4458 and 4488, passed through the same location with 4168 up LVRF containers. Good to note that all bar 4472 are still trawling around pretty regularly.

Over to Marrickville now to find 4833 coming up the grade with an XPT carriage in tow on 1 May 2006.

Down south to Maldon for the afternoon steelie with NR7 and NR113 up front on 13 July 2006.

Further south to Werai this time NR113 is leading another NR and another on 27 April 2006.

Over to the coast for 2204, 2208 and semi-obscured 3102 on a down ARG flour at Scarborough on 13 December 2007.

Moving over the border and forward two years to April 2008 the lad was track side at Tottenham to get NR79.

And NR75 around the same area.

And then he started photography of ballast - which led him ultimately to a science degree with a geology major, but that is another story.

More ballast - at night - at Goobang Junction.

I will sign off with his shot of the crossing arm at Koolewong crossing going up or down.

Cheers!
Don

Molong Calling

This afternoon I was contacted by the Senior Train Hunter, who wanted a view as to whether his HO scale representation of NSWGR's W44 ore train should be tailed by a guardsvan.  Of course it should have a van, I say, thereby averting his public humiliation at the hands of IMRA's stalwarts.

Once home from work I check the validity of my assertion.  Of course, in 25,000 photos you would expect that at least one would exist to justify what I had ventured.  About 6 hours later I am about to admit defeat, but have found a few examples of freights through Molong over the years.

Starting with a black and white shot of Molong in the distance, we have a couple of pigs getting started  to head east in the early 1960s.

I think the next shot was taken a few minutes later, and by that time 3652 and its mate had neared the camera.

The next two shots are the same sequence, but this time its around 1963 and the train is the famed W44 ore train, headed by 6024 and another 60 class.

Around the same year W44 is ready to head to the seaboard once more, this time with 5284 leading a 60 class. A local farmer is busy divesting his flock's product on the far left of the shot.

 

Later in the 60s diesels took over for most of the big freights, especially during the drought of 1965 to 1967.  Most of the time it was branch-liners on duty - 48s and 49s. In the following photograph a 49 leads two 48s with what also appears to be W44.  By this time the silo had received a bit of freshening paint.

There are other shots, but I'll keep those for another time.  Instead I'll finish with a nice snap off the end of the station platform of a sun-drenched 8021 with two sister Alcos in 1982, and then a 30 year fast forward to January 2012 with a fairly shuddery video of NRs 40, 121 and 6 coming through a very rationalised yard with NY3 steel train.

So there you have it - truly 50 years of Molong.

Yawn, NRs...

Now this sounds like a very boring set of shots, but they are a relatively colourful and somewhat groundbreaking loco (in Australian standards anyway).

When NRs commenced in the mid 1990s, they heralded a new era of higher horsepower locomotion.  

In near to original condition, though wearing a Pacific National signboard, NR88 leads a sister through Coniston with the evening steely about a decade after its introduction to service.

NRs were groundbreaking in other ways. Several were allocated to dedicated services, and were painted accordingly. Here a weathered NR57 sits in its Seatrain livery behind an equally tatty NR53, in its Trailerail scheme.

The third of the original trio of dedicated liveries was the grey Steelink, shown here at Maitland on NR58 on an Adelaide to Brisvegas intermodal.

After the initial trio got a coat, not much happened for more than a decade. The second phase of special liveries celebrated passenger services, rather than freight haulage.  First up, two examples of the first Indian Pacific oral blue livery, once more at Central.

I think NR26 was the lead loco on that occasion.

A nice contrast to blue is red, and NR75 got the red treatment in honour of the Ghan passenger train. Here it is at Footscray in the mid noughties.

One of Australia's least run passenger services is the Southern Spirit. That didn't stop Pacific National painting NRs 84 and 85 into a fairly attractive livery. Here NR85 tails two vanilla NRs through the Hunter.

The most recent livery in honour of a passenger train was applied to NR18. Here is is at, you guessed it.... Central, having just come off the Indian Pacific: its reason for uniqueness just beside it.

Its time to finish with possibly the best of the set... I really like the Southern Cross flavour to the current Pacific National design, and not in some brogan sort of way either.  Here is NR62 leading a couple of sisters through Moss Vale recently.

Until next time!

Today's dance

Just a quickie from Central today... The changeover of NRs for the Indian Pacific occupies many of my Wednesday lunchtimes, and today was no different. 

NR27 did the honours of bringing the up Indian Pacific into Sydney this morning, assisted by DL39. Journey over, the NR awaits a crew to head over to Chullora.

NR28 has the corresponding role. Here they are, metaphorically nose to nose.

NR28 then collected the DL, and went off to sit at the head of the single motorail wagon.

Should be an on-time departure this afternoon.

 Cheers!

Junior's efforts

The Junior Train Hunter (JTH) passed a chronological land mark this week, so to commemorate this event i thought I would invite him into the Rambler blog as a guest photographer.  

He has picked most of these as being among his favourite photographs, which is evidence of his rather quirky range of interests.  So, please, sit back and enjoy 10 of his finest.

We'll start with this 2005 Australian classic.  The only thing missing is a half-stripped HQ Holden, to go with the BBQ, Hills hoist, inventive backyard fence and Tangara.

Number 2 is from Marrickville in January 2005, showing veteran Alco 4483 and even older GM27 wandering by with a trip train, both carrying virtually-new Southern Shorthaul Railroad's yellow livery.

Just down the line at Canterbury, the driver of JL404 (nee 44209) opens the throttle to give JTH's photograph that extra element.

 

In June 2005 the trip back to Sydney from Thirlmere behind 4201 and 4803 after a Rail Transport Museum event produced this rather ethereal scene.

Junior has always been rather lucky... and none more so than the day he wandered down to Koolewong station to have these strange Western Australian K class visitors rumble through. The camber of the rail through the curve adds to the angular look of the locos.

In Christmas week 2005 2214 stropped just under Unanderra pedestrian overbridge, whilst coupled to 2208 on and AFG grain train.

Into 2006 and the luck continues. Being in just the right place at the right time, JTH catches a quad coalie being led by 8230 crossing double ELs at a rain Canterbury. 

 

Back down into the Illawarra to a scene no longer available to most - the once-wide open spaces of Port Kembla Inner Harbour for quad 82s.  The blues in this photograph just scream typical South Coast weather.

 In mid-2006 the JTH made it to California. He got to Tehachapi, Vegas and Disneyland, and Cajon Pass for these two BNSF C44Ws on a container freight.

In July 2008 when he was supposedly studying for his HSC we spent a weekend at Parkes. One of the highlights was the hospitality provided by the locals, including a SCT driver who took the JTH out to 7PG1 prior to its early evening departure.

 

There is enough left in the bank for another couple of blogs by Junior, so if he behaves himself he will be invited back.  Will leave now with this posting of a bonus photograph... a rather inventive time lapse effort at Koolewong in 2009.

Redfern

Instead of a locomotive or a train, this time a location.  Having done a little spiel on Sydney's major railway station, its time to move down the line to little old Redfern.

Redfern station is a much unappreciated piece of railway and urban architecture.  Sure, the 'improvements' of the past two decades have done little to improve its aesthetics, but there is an underlying character almost impossible to rub out.

Instead of posting numerous shots of suburban and interurban electric trains, the following collection come from basically just one afternoon in November 1982.

The first is a snap of 3214, when it was the leading P class offering of the NSW Rail Transport Museum.  Here it is working a shuttle in honour of the re-opening of Central Railway Station, just a kilometre away.

If the loco or the stylish Pullman carriages is not your style, just revel in the advertising hoardings on the building in the background.  Some of these painted signs can still be seen 30 years later! 

The Southern Aurora passenger car in the western dock was a favourite place to park carriages which had received attention at the nearby Elstons sheds.  Sadly, I deemed it too unimportant to photograph these exhibits, though a DR carriage off the Silver City Comet caught the Senior Train Hunter's attention when it lay there around 1980.

While we are on the Senior Train Hunter, he is the suspect for the following classic, showing 3830 working its train towards Central.  This train probably emanated from Macdonaldtown

carriage sheds

To quote a phrase I hate... 'moving forward' its time to return to the 1980s and indeed the same day that 3214 had been photographed.  The first is 48160 trundling a milk pot and a louvre van towards Darling Harbour.

Shortly after, 4509 surprised yours truly by appearing from the north.  Surprised, because by this time Darling Harbour was basically dormant on weekends, and this was a Saturday from memory.  Check out the 80s fashions on the style-master on the stairs - this would still be acceptable in these parts today!

By the 1990s Darling Harbour railway yards had disappeared, so Redfern lost its supply of goods trains... almost.  The odd spoil train (well, its technically a goods train) still sneaks through, such as the one headed by 8007 in 1992.

Still, the 1990s were full of interesting trains passing through Redfern's platforms, even if they didn't stop.  Here a DEB rail car set sets off for the South Coast.

Freight locos still get the odd trip through Redfern, usually at the head of one of the few remaining locomotive-hauled passenger trains such as the Indian Pacific.  In 2004 NR70 and DL43 almost managed to nip by one Saturday afternoon.

As noted above, spoil trains are semi-regular visitors to and through Redfern.  In 2003 44206, then monickered as JL402, sat at the southern end of Redfern station for most of one weekend.

However, 99.9 per cent of the time, its sparks, sparks and more sparks...  here's just one from last year.  Pretty things, aren't they?