Class 309 AM9

The Class 309 was built for Great Eastern AC electric routes out of London Liverpool Street to Clacton and Walton. They were based on the Mark 1 coach design and had a high performance being intended for express passenger duties and were the first British Rail EMUs (officially) capable of reaching 160kp/h (100mp/h) [1].

As built the 309s, originally known as the AM9, were in two and four car sets though the two-car 309/1s were strengthened in the 1980s to four car sets by the addition of loco-hauled Mark 1 stock [2]. Restaurant facilities (the griddle cars) were however removed at the same time from the 309/2s.

Information
Number built:	76 cars (2 and 4 car sets)
Built:	1962-63
Builder:	BR York, Wolverton
Motor:	4 GEC WT101 traction motors per unit (25kV AC OHLE)
Power:	1, 128 hp (841 kW)
Formation:	(309/1) Driving Motor Brake Standard Corridore (DMBSK)+ Battery Driving Trailer Standard (BDTS) (later) Driving Motor Brake Standard (DMBS)+Trailer Standard (TS)+ Trailer Composite (TC)+BDTS (309/2) Battery Driving Trailer (BDTC)+Motor Brake Standard Corridore (MBSK)+Trailer Restaurant Buffet (TRB)+ Driving Trailer Composite (DTC) (309/3) BDTC+MBSK+Trailer Standard Open (TSO)+DTC (later) BDTC+Motor Brake Standard (MBS)+TS+DTS

In the privatisation era some units moved to the North West where they continued in service around Manchester but these were withdrawn in 2000. A couple of units were converted to departmental use testing cab-signalling as the Class 960/1. These were preserved in 2009.

Preserved 309 616 in London & South East ("Jaffa Cake") livery as these received in the mid-1980s [3]

309 616 and 960 102, then at the Electric Railway Museum

Front view of 309 616

Side view of 960 102

Side by side

Another view of this livery, the forerunner to Network South East

[1] Alec Swain, Overhead Line Electric Multiple-Units (Ian Allan, 1990) p. 48
[2] Colin J. Marsden, DMU and EMU Recognition Guide (Ian Allan, 2013) p. 227
[3] Colin J. Marsden, Motive Power Recognition 2: EMUs (Ian Allan, 1986) p. 35

Ruston and Hornsby LAT

Ruston & Hornsby built many of these narrow gauge shunters mostly for industrial users though the most notable example, ZM32 (RH works number 416214 [1]), was bought by British Railways and worked at Horwich Works from 1957 to 1964 on the 457mm gauge line there [2].

Information
Built:	1952-1958
Builder:	Ruston & Hornsby
Motor:	Ruston 2VSHL diesel
Power:	20 hp (15 kW)
Wheel arrangement:	4wDM

The LAT class were fairly simple but sturdy locomotives, diesel mechanical with a chain drive to the wheels. They could be adjusted to a number of different gauges.

A number have been preserved including ZM32 which is now at the Steeple Grange Light Railway in Wirksworth. The locomotive photographed is RH 408430 which worked for Wheatly & Company brick and tile manufacturers in Staffordshire until the late 1970s [3], it is now preserved at the Leighton Buzzard Light Railway and based at Stonehenge Works.

No.27 (RH 408430) preserved at the Leighton Buzzard Light Railway

No. 27 is gauged to 610mm

[1] Paul Smith & Shirley Smith, British Rail Departmental Locomotives 1948-1968 (Ian Allan, 2014) p. 28
[2] Brian Haresnape, Diesel Shunters (Ian Allan, 1984) p. 76
[3] George Edgar, Industrial Locomotives & Railways of the Midlands (Amberley Publishing, 2017) p. 8

Leeds City Transport Horsfield Class

These double-decker trams were built for the large Leeds City Transport tramway fleet. They were known as Horsfield or Showboat trams, the latter due to the amount of lighting the trams had. The trams were built by Brush and had Peckham trucks and British Thomson Houston electrical equipment. As built they were equipped with trolly poles but were later retrofitted with Fischer bow collectors.

Information
Number built:	100
Built:	1931-2
Builder:	Brush Traction
Motor:	2 British Thomson Houston 509 A12 electric motors (DC OHLE)
Power:	140 hp (104kW)

These trams survived to the end of Leeds' tram operations. The now preserved 180 took part in the last tram procession in 1959 before entering preservation. Now it is at Crich Tramway Museum.

Leeds 180 at Crich

Board here

Front view

Galvani

The Scottish chemist and inventor Robert Davidson built Galvani, the world's very first electric locomotive way back in 1842. Although largely forgotten now, and in many ways a technical dead-end, Galvani ran at over six kilometres per hour along the Glasgow to Edinburgh railway line in 1842, just a couple of decades after steam locomotives had become a viable means of traction. However, Galvani was destroyed by steam engineers who were worried that this new electric locomotive would make their only slightly less new locomotives obsolete [1].

Information
Number built:	1
Built:	1842
Builder:	Robert Davidson
Motor:	Battery electric

After Faraday had shown how electricity could be made to generate mechanical movement, Davidson constructed his own batteries and began his own experiments. By 1837 he had built his own electric motors [2] and used them to power a model railway and a lathe, amongst with other equipment in an exhibition held in 1840 in his native Aberdeen. In 1842 Davidson built the full-size electric locomotive Galvani.

Galvani was powered by large lead zinc batteries with an acid electrolyte [3]. The motor consisted of electromagnets around a revolving log to which were attached iron bars, one log for each axle. A switch turned the electromagnets off when the iron bars were in opposition. Davidson experimented with the number of batteries needed, eventually fitted seventy six cells. Galvani wasn't a tiny machine, it was nearly five metres long and weighed nearly five and a half thousand kilograms. Galvani was powerful enough to haul itself and a coach.

However, Galvani was a technical dead-end. The batteries were single use, rechargable batteries had not yet been invented. Galvani burned through it's batteries like a steam locomotive burned coal, though many times more expensively.

After the unfortunate destruction of Galvani, Davidson was unable to find investors to continue his development. Happily however Davidson was long-lived and in the 1890s was able to see his vision vindicated with the arrival of electric railways like the City & South London Railway. He was "re-discovered" and feted by the press as the inventor of electric railways [5].

Galvani [4]

Galvani [1]

[1] "The Earliest Electric Railway", Electrical World Vol. 16 (1890) Jul-Dec p. 276
[2] "Mr Davidson's electro-magnetic experiments", The Mechanics' Magazine, Vol. 33 (1840) p. 92.
[3] R.L. Vickers, DC Electric Trains and Locomotives in the British Isles (David & Charles, 1986)  p. 13
[4] T. du Moncel, Electricity as a Motive Power (London, 1883) Fig. 32
[5] John S. Reid, "Robert Davidson - pioneer electrician", The Scientific Tourist: Aberdeen

Swansea and Mumbles Railway Tramcars

The Swansea and Mumbles Railway was the first railway to offer scheduled passenger services. These commenced in 1807, earlier tramways had carried passengers on occasion but always unofficially. The railway switched from horse to steam power in 1877 and in 1928 the line was electrified to 650v DC overhead and a fleet of double decker trams were produced to run services between Rutland Street in Swansea and Mumbles Pier. The railway had previously operated a battery electric car in 1904 though that hadn't been a success.

Information
Number built:	13
Built:	1928-29
Builder:	Brush Traction

Eleven trams were built by Brush for the line with two more being added later on. The trams were the largest built for use in Britain and could seat up to one hundred and six. They could operate in pairs at busy times. An unusual feature of the trams was that they only had doors on one side this was due to the physical nature of the line with the sea one side and a road the other throughout the length of the line [1].

The railway was run down and closed in the late 1950s despite local opposition after it passed into the ownership of the South Wales Transport Company [2], the last train operating in January 1960.

Tramcar at the start of electric services [1]

Two tramcars in multiple (KD Collection)

[1] "Oldest railway in England is electrically equipped", Electric Railway Journal (Vol. 72 No. 25, December 1928) p. 1082
[2] Colin J. Marsden, Light Rail (Key Publishing, 2018) p. 104